Copper rush: Opponents worry feds have fast-tracked Resolution mine OK
Friday, November 27, 2020
Cronkite News
WASHINGTON – Activists worry that the Trump administration has fast-tracked the final environmental impact statement for the massive Resolution Copper mine, a project planned for lands near Superior that are claimed as sacred by the San Carlos Apache.
Opponents became alarmed when the U.S. Forest Service’s schedules of proposed action, which said the environmental statement would be completed by
December 2021,
suddenly shifted this year to a finishing date of
this December,
before President Donald Trump leaves office.
“A lot of alarm bells went off when we saw this,” said Randy Serraglio, Southwest conservation advocate at the Center For Biological Diversity. “We realized … they’re just rushing this through to get it done, while Donald Trump is still president.”
But officials with the Forest Service and Resolution Copper mine insist nothing is being fast-tracked.
Ivan Knudsen, a Forest Service spokesman, said more than “30,000 submittals received during the public and tribal comment periods” were cataloged since the last draft of the environmental impact statement was published in August 2019. He stressed that the timeline adjustment from 2021 to 2020 does “not reflect an acceleration of the … process” and that federal and local appraisals are being conducted.
“Once completed, they will be reviewed by the regional appraiser, and after they are accepted, made available to the public for review,” said Knudsen.


Note: This story originally appeared on Cronkite News. It is published via a Creative Commons license. Cronkite News is produced by the Walter Cronkite School of Journalism and Mass Communication at Arizona State University.
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