A ‘hit-piece’ was not what I saw.
Re: Augusta Calls Film a “hit piece”, The Weekly Bulletin, 10/3/2012
On September 29th, I had the opportunity to watch the brief documentary Cyanide Beach which traces the recent history of some ill-fated mining ventures, in Italy and elsewhere, and the recurring faces who populate the Corporate Boards of the shifting projects. Augusta Mining, responsible for one of the new thrusts in Arizona towards strip mining, labeled the film a hit-piece, claiming a chain of loose and even false comparisons. But a hit-piece is not what I saw. As a Ph.D. researcher, I perceived careful work and statement of fact by the film maker, letting the audience largely draw their own conclusions. Rather than “guilt by association,” the film detailed industry guilt in environmental matters, and then asks reasonable questions about the associations. Career executives and investors involved in long-suspended projects do resurface years later involved in others, and thus the question is quite reasonable: will the new projects work out for their communities any better than the old ones? The industry spokespersons try to draw a stark separation between old projects and new ones, but the film stays with its facts. If past is prologue, should we be nervous about the future of mining? The facts, and the questions, are provocative.
David Budd, Ph.D., Patagonia, Arizona
I saw the movie in Tucson and it was truly impressive. You know CEO’s who have $$$ in their eyes will do whatever it takes to get rich. All of their promises to “be good neighbors” and produce “21st century mines” are only PR so that they can make their billions and if they really cared about the environment there wouldn’t be so many Super-Fund sites in the world. Excellent movie!
Our water..our well water, our river water belongs to the intahitanbs here to use. Rosemont Mine would use up the great majority of it and give us CAP water instead. I have tasted CAP water numerous times and it is not the quality of our ground water here. We are already experiencing water sources diminishing and what is more important to any community than water nothing. Already, even before the mine is a done thing , we have friends who have heard of the mine problem here and are concerned about the water as well as the negative impact the mine would have on future real estate values.