BEULAH - Wayne Boeshans can't stop coal mining from coming within 500 feet of his dairy barn, but he might be able to negotiate a better deal.

Thursday night, and for the second time in three months, the Mercer County Planning and Zoning Commission tabled a permit for Coteau Properties to mine a 5,700-acre coal field north of Beulah.

Some of the board members wanted to give Boeshans another 60 days to work out problems with Coteau.

Coteau wants to start mining the new permit area in 2005.

The way the mine plan works, a series of consecutive lengthy pits would be dug near the Boeshans farm starting in 2009 through 2014.

Boeshans says the noise and dust will affect his dairy herd and his wife, Iris', long battle with asthma.

He said he wants the coal company to pay him at least half what his dairy farm is worth to move out.

Boeshans has milked cows since 1969, continuing a dairy tradition his granddad started back in the early 1900s.

Coteau's land manager Jim Melchior said the company has been trying to lessen the impacts of mining so close to the dairy farm and will stay farther away than it has to by law - 1,000 feet from the Boeshans' home and 500 feet from the barn.

He also said the company would agree to compensate Boeshans if he could show his cows made less milk because of the mining.

Melchior said Boeshans' dairy farm is outside the permit area, and the only influence Boeshans has on the mine's actions is the support he gets at public meetings.

Boeshans agreed. "As long as the county gives its support to delay, I get a little negotiating power."

Planning member Troy Sailer said Boeshans should have more time, given the issues at stake.

Coteau's attorney Brian Bjella reminded the zoning commission that it's job has to do with mine conditions, not private negotiations between the company and the landowner.

Boeshans' attorney, Greg Lange, said the company plans to mine the long pits so it can mix shallow, cheaper coal near Boeshans' with deeper more expensive coal farther south. "There is room to negotiate," he said.

On another front, the Mercer County Commission has yet to approve two road closings inside the permit area, while it works to get an easement from Boeshans for alternate public access.

Myron Hafner, who lives near Boeshans, also encouraged the zoners to delay approving the zoning permit.

Hafner said the new road closings will add to the already considerable number of miles of road closed because of mining, at inconvenience and expense to people who live around there.

He said Coteau would be a better neighbor if its application were stalled a while.

The county commission will take up the road-closing request in May, and the zoners will review the conditional use permit later that month.