Instead of being concerned about whether the streams are made worse or better (there could be some operations made to improve them to offset any known harm from mining) they are treated as if they were holy and sacrosanct.
The whole point of these policies is to make it economically infeasible to live in remote areas. They want to force people into cities.
We even had scientists testify that the dredging operations bring food to the surface that fish use, and any sediments stirred up are soon re-deposited on the stream floor. No facts disturb a democrat’s strongly-held convictions.