Pipeline Meeting Packs House

By TIM ELLIS

More than 300 residents tell state regulators why CAP line a good idea – or a bad one

More than 300 people packed a Sahuarita meeting hall last week to tell three top state regulators why they favor, or oppose, a plan to build a Central Arizona Project pipeline into the area.

After four hours of public comment, two of the three Arizona Corporation Commission members said after the Dec. 5 special meeting that they will closely examine the proposal to bring in CAP water to help replenish the area’s dwindling groundwater.

“I came into that meeting with a number of questions, and I came out of it with even more,” said Kris Mayes, one of the commissioners who sat in on the special open meeting.

Mayes and fellow commissioner Bill Mundell said they have questions about the financing and “transparency” of the deal between Community Water Company of Green Valley and a Canadian-based mining company.

Commissioner Gary Pierce could not be reached for comment after the hearing.

Wells’ impact a concern

Augusta Resource Corp. has pledged to build the approximately 9- mile, $15 million pipeline from the CAP terminus near Pima Mine Road and Interstate 19 into the Sahuarita-Green Valley area.

But Mayes said her biggest concern is the impact of the deep, industrial-strength wells that Augusta is drilling just east of Sahuarita on the area’s aquifer – and, in turn, on four other local water companies and on private wells.

The wells would produce the 100,000 acre-feet of water that officials with Canada-based Augusta have said they will need over 20 years to develop an open-pit copper mine in the upper reaches of Rosemont Canyon in the Santa Rita Mountains southeast of Tucson.

“That’s why I think we need to slow this thing down,” Mayes said. “There are so many big issues in this case that it doesn’t make any sense to rush it.

“We have a duty to protect the customers of private water companies,” she said in an interview after the meeting. “And any drawdown of the water table that negatively impacts the wells of these private water companies could lead in the future to rate increases.”

Likely consequences

If Augusta’s powerful wells draw down the water table, the water companies will have to sink deeper wells, use more electricity and build more elaborate water-purification systems, Mayes said.

People who live near the area where Augusta is drilling its wells also would have to pay for those expenses, she said. But the commission has little authority to help them, she added.

That concern was voiced by some of the residents who spoke during Wednesday’s marathon session at a Sahuarita American Legion hall.

Verl Fenn, who lives about 200 yards from a well that Augusta drilled last month, said he and the people who depend on about 100 wells within a mile of the Augusta well are worried about that negative effect.

Augusta didn’t inform anyone in the area about the wells, said Fenn, one of about 50 people in the area who’ve formed a group that’s trying to protect their wells from the impact of the Augusta wells.

“They’re not saying anything about how they’re going to get this good, potable water that they’re going to be pumping 30 miles away” to the Rosemont mine, he said. “They’re not talking about the harm that they’re going to be causing to this valley.”

But the crowd was about evenly divided between those who opposed the pipeline, because of its connection to the Rosemont mine, and those who favored the pipeline, because it presents a chance to bring the community’s allocation of CAP water to the area.

The community has for years been trying to accomplish that goal, with no success, said Nancy Freeman, a longtime water-issues activist.

The 5,000 acre-feet that the pipeline would bring to the area yearly “is a drop in the bucket” compared with the estimated annual groundwater deficit of 30,000 acre-feet, she said in an interview after the hearing.

Augusta’s proposed pipeline would not bring any new water into the area; rather, it would allow the company to use relatively dirty and expensive CAP water to recharge the aquifer for the groundwater that it pump for the mine, Freeman said.

Augusta should use CAP water for its mine, not groundwater, she told the commissioners.

No solution, just studies

Rachel Malcolm of Green Valley told commissioners that the Dec. 4 unanimous vote by the county Board of Supervisors opposing the CAP pipeline “offered no solution to Green Valley’s water problem – only more studies.

“I say grab Augusta Resource’s offer and run with it,” Malcolm said.

Charles Johnson, another Green Valley resident, rejected assertions by county officials that the Augusta pipeline should not be built because it’s not big enough to solve the area’s groundwater problems.

“The county approves developments but won’t help us find money for the CAP project,” Johnson told the commissioners.

“Our aquifer is depleting fast,” he said. “Please help us get the CAP water that we need.”

Supervisor Ray Carroll, who represents most of the Sahuarita- Green Valley area – and the area to the east where the Rosemont mine would be developed – said the Corporation Commission should reject Augusta’s pipeline proposal because “it’s linked to the mine.”

Augusta’s wells “would only exacerbate a bad situation,” because the company plans to pump water from the aquifer and send it to the other side of the Santa Ritas, said Carroll, one of the mine’s most vocal critics.

Augusta has not done any hydrological studies to determine the impact of the big wells on the valley’s aquifer, he said. The lack of those studies also makes it unclear what effect the CAP water that Augusta proposes to use for recharge would have on the area’s groundwater, he said.

Dick Walden, president and CEO of Farmers Investment Co. and FICO Water Co., railed against the pipeline and Augusta’s wells. Both proposals were planned without any notice or coordination with area residents or water company officials, he said.

“Multiple concerns”

State Rep. Marian McClure, who also represents Green Valley, Vail and Tucson’s East Side, told the commissioners that she has “multiple concerns” about the Rosemont mine, especially its potential to pollute water in the Vail area.

Sandy Whitehouse, a Corona de Tucson resident, said that’s her main reason for opposing the mine.

“Water from mining is tainted,” said Whitehouse, president of the Santa Rita Foothills Community Association.

Arturo Gabaldon, Community Water’s president, repeated a point he has made in several previous meetings: The water company has no control over the Rosemont mining proposal, or over Augusta’s Sahuarita-area wells.

Gabaldon said the Corporation Commission should support the company’s initiative in securing Augusta’s funding for a pipeline and to replenish the aquifer with CAP water, in exchange for groundwater it pumps.

He said it’s unfair for county officials to deny the company and its 11,500 customers a chance to bring in some of the area’s CAP water allotment.

Gabaldon disagreed with Mayes’ belief that the commission should take its time reviewing the pipeline proposal.

“Slow down? We don’t even have anything in front of them yet,” he said. “Community Water Company has already taken over six months to investigate this. How long should we wait?”

For more information

* To find out more about the proposed water pipeline, go to: www.communitywater.com.

* For more about the proposed Rosemont Mine, and the company that wants to develop it, go to: www.augustaresource.com and www.rosemontcopper.com.

* For more about opposition to the mine, go to: www.scenicsantaritas.org.

* The Arizona Corporation Commission’s Web site is www.cc.state.az.us.

* Contact reporter Tim Ellis at 807-8414 or tellis@azstarnet.com.

Originally published by TIM ELLIS, ARIZONA DAILY STAR.

(c) 2007 Arizona Daily Star. Provided by ProQuest Information and Learning. All rights Reserved.