According to the Associated Press, the authority gave $5000 towards the project, which will be erected at the Muhlenberg County Courthouse.

The presentation was made outside the courthouse last Friday.

The memorial, which will have brass statues and a plaque, will be emblazoned with the names of the more than 300 miners killed in regional work-related mining accidents.

“When we remodeled the courthouse, we really thought that we needed something to pay tribute to basically what got us here: the coal industry,” judge executive Rick Newman told SurfKY News.

“So we asked the architect who was doing the work on it if there could be an area where we could put a coal miners’ memorial.”

TVA government relations senior vice president Emily Reynolds added that coal remains a valuable part of its generation portfolio 80 years after its foundation.

“TVA supports this project to honor the service and sacrifice of those families involved in the mining industry,” she said.

The TVA is a fixture in the area, operating the coal-fired Paradise facility.

The plant on the Green River opened in 1970 and uses about 20,000 tons of coal daily. It has the capacity to produce more than 2200 megawatts of power.

According to local officials, the largest death toll in the region was in 1910, when 34 workers were killed in nearby Browder.