Last December, the State Land Department’s Board of Appeals approved a right-of-way requested by Toronto-based Hudbay Minerals Inc. for two water pipelines, a power line, and a fiber optic line across a portion of the Santa Rita Experimental Range, which is the oldest continuously utilized long-term agricultural research station in the U.S.
“This is super huge for us,” Hudbay’s land manager Robin Barnes stated in a Dec. 8, 2022 email to Michael D. Romer, the land department’s rights-of-way project leader, moments after the appeals board approved the right-of-way during a public meeting.
The ‘super huge’ deal was about to get even better for Hudbay, which is planning to construct the Copper World/Rosemont Mine Complex that would include four open pit copper mines on the west and east flanks of the Santa Rita Mountains 35 miles southeast of Tucson.
The company was facing a dilemma, and the State Land Department was about to provide the solution, according to department records obtained last April by Save the Scenic Santa Ritas, a Tucson-based nonprofit conservation group opposed to mining in the Santa Rita Mountains.
I owned 21980 S. Helvetia Road, and would have been foolish not to sell to them. I see my former place will now be a tailings dump. Turns and churns my heart and stomach. Thank you, STSSR, for your continued updates and work.
Damon
Litigate everything. Clearly, AZ government is unaware of water issues in its State. Litigation should delay progress until thus disastrous mine development is stopped for good. Write your Federal representatives to update the 1876 mining laws.
How can the STLD approve a 138-kV transmission line right-of-way without a in a Comprehensive Environmental Compatibility (CEC) granted by the Arizona Power Plant and Transmission Line Siting Committee and approved by the Arizona Corporation Commission as clearly required by A.R.S. 40-360, et al? The present Rosemont CEC’s right-of-way does not include fiber-optic cable, two above ground pipes, etc.