Guest commentary: Issues to address in Santa Ritas

Can you move the den of a black bear family 5 miles north and guarantee the bears’ food and water? Or, do you upset the ecosystem with more or different predators in that location? Do you force the bears into a human occupied area?

Can you move a pygmy owl nest 3 miles south and provide a GPS locator beacon to guide them back to the new nesting site after each foraging flight?

The vehicles developing the site and the vehicles working production from the site require a carbon based fuel; which is then processed for truck movement and released as a carbon based exhaust. No matter how many pollution credits are purchased regionally, the actual exhaust is polluting locally.

The water issue is one of not having a closed circuit locally. Water would be removed at one site and “replaced” at another 40 miles away downstream. And then, it might be “paper water credits’” from the CAP system.

To be correct, the water needs to be piped/pumped back to the aquifer about 5 miles upstream from the using pumps so that the water may actually recharge in the area or be used by agriculture or commercial users.

I do not argue that 35 years from now this site, or any other mining site, may be reclaimed beautifully, in the future. The issue is that the bears, the owls, the pollution, and the water supply problems are in the immediate present.

So, the question is, does this tradeoff benefit or denigrate the area in the near future — the life times of the inhabitants of this area?

Chet Davis is vice president of the Green Valley Community Coordinating Council.