County officials will allow more time for a Scottsdale-based company to clean up junk at an old marble quarry near Corona de Tucson before it takes the company to court.
Doug Woolsey, general manager of W.R. Henderson Arizona Properties, says his company has spent some $10,000 in recent weeks to clean up the old Andrada quarry and remove more junk than county environmental officials ordered removed three months ago.
The county's threat to take Woolsey to court over the issue is based less on concerns for public safety and more on county officials' opposition to his proposal to mine limestone at the quarry, Woolsey said. Henderson Properties also intends to build homes on 155 acres that include the quarry, he said.
"They don't want us out there, and they're doing everything they can to destroy us."
Opposition to the company's proposal to mine limestone at the quarry runs deep in Corona. But residents' more immediate concern is the quarry's threat to public safety and health.
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It's a favorite site for target practice and paintball battles. The graffiti-covered walls and broken beer bottles throughout attest that it's also a popular partying spot.
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Worse, vandals have used wooden pallets and other debris in recent months to set fires. The worst of those, in March, was sparked in a pile of wooden pallets and other combustibles inside an old steel storage building that burned so hot the steel building collapsed.
Bruce Whitehouse, Corona's fire chief, said he hopes the county's cleanup orders will eliminate the need for him to send firefighters to the mine.
He also hopes Henderson will eliminate other health and safety problems at the quarry, like pools of water that could pose a drowning hazard and serve as breeding grounds for West Nile Virus-bearing mosquitoes.
County officials concluded after a recent visit to the quarry that Henderson "still needs to do more cleanup — there is more work to be done," said Beth Gorman, spokeswoman for the county Department of Environmental Quality.
County environmental officials met with Woolsey at the quarry on June 20 to explain what else needs to be done to comply with a Notice of Violation from the county issued March 14.
When Henderson failed to adequately clean up the property, Gorman said, the Environmental Quality Department threatened legal action.
It will take more than a cleanup in order for Henderson to resume mining at the quarry.
Two local environmental groups that oppose the project, the Empire-Fagan Coalition and the Save the Scenic Santa Ritas, won a round in their fight against the mine on June 6 when the U.S. Interior Department Board of Land Appeals granted a stay to a decision by the Tucson Bureau of Land Management office to permit the mining.
Jean Bogg and her husband, Chris, who have lived about a half-mile from the quarry for 27 years, said they were happy about the decision. They said they oppose the mining project because the noise, blasting, heavy equipment and big trucks that come with a mine would turn their dream home into a nightmare.
"I moved out here because it's away from the city, and it was going to be my little retirement Shangri-La," Jean Bogg said.
Her main concern is that the blasting would alter the geology and cause local wells to dry up. "If it (the mine) gets going, our property values would be lowered," she said. "If I lose my water, my land will be value-less."
Woolsey says residents' concerns are unfounded: Studies show the mine would have no impact on area water supplies, he said.
Woolsey said he's tried to convince residents that he's trying to improve the property, and that he wants to be a good neighbor. He said the company bought four adjoining properties — some formerly owned by residents who opposed the mine — for a total of about a million dollars.
