Facing renewed momentum behind a long-contested mine proposal, the Pima County Board of Supervisors voted this week to take its opposition directly to HUDBAY, formally telling the company that despite recent legal and financial wins, county leaders remain firmly opposed to the Copper World project’s environmental and public health impacts.

Supervisors approved the decision by a 3-1 vote during their Jan. 20 meeting, with District 1 Supervisor Rex Scott abstaining. While he has repeatedly stated his opposition to the project in previous years, Scott said he was not comfortable voting for the resolution, calling it an unnecessary and repetitive step.

The Canadian-owned company HUDBAY is seeking to establish the Copper World Project in the Santa Rita Mountains, about 28 miles southeast of Tucson, which would include up to five open-pit mines. The company estimates the project’s first phase would bring $1.7 billion in investment to the county. But the proposal has faced bipartisan opposition for more than 20 years over concerns about environmental damage and public health. While the board has previously sent multiple resolutions to state and federal officials and regulators, this resolution would be delivered directly to HUDBAY.

The resolution adopted in October 2025 states that the proposed project would cause irreparable harm to local stream networks and downstream perennial waters, including Cienega Creek, while pumping thousands of acre-feet of water from nearby wells and increasing groundwater extraction. It also warns that increased heavy truck traffic would raise dust levels in nearby communities to unsafe levels and threaten wildlife within the Maeveen Marie Behan Conservation Lands System.

In the week before the meeting, HUDBAY finalized a $600 million joint venture with Mitsubishi. Earlier, the company also prevailed in a right-of-way lawsuit brought by the Arizona State Land Department. Together, those developments have cleared major obstacles for the Copper World project, bolstering the company’s confidence that it will ultimately move forward.

Copper World representative Jerry Bustamonte acknowledged the supervisors’ long history of opposing mining operations in the Santa Rita Mountains but said the company is willing to address their concerns through update meetings and by offering site tours.

“We've been successful as a company, leading as a transparent and responsible neighbor. We believe that open doors and open dialogue will serve this community much better than communications like the ones that you are voting on today,” Bustamonte said. “Meanwhile, we continue to advance the copper world project. Copper World is no longer a question of if it gets built. It is moving forward and for more reasons why our relationship needs to change for the better.”

District 2 Supervisor Matt Heinz said he learned the board’s concerns were never shared with HUDBAY’s board of directors, prompting supervisors to adopt the resolution so it could be formally delivered with a cover letter to the company. He said previous resolutions on the issue appeared to have gone nowhere and that he had heard HUDBAY was portraying the project as being welcomed “with open arms.”

“I believe they are mischaracterizing the region's interest, or lack of interest, in this particular project,” Heinz said.

District 4 Supervisor Steve Christy, the board’s sole dissenting vote, said he remains confident the project will be allowed to proceed and argued that supervisors should work to resolve the issues that prompted the resolution rather than opposing the project outright. He also said it was hard to believe anyone could still think the board was not opposed to the Copper World Project given its long history of resistance.

“I want job growth. I want economic development. I want workers to have strong family entities that can give money to their well-being, to their education, to their homes, to food on their table and economic growth,” Christy said. “I also want to point out to the construction community, the contracting community, unions, mechanics, shop people and everybody who has jobs as a result of the HUDBAY project that (my colleagues) are not to be taken as friends.”

The Copper World Project site lies within District 4, and Christy said that, as the district’s supervisor, he would send his own letter to any stakeholder who receives the board’s resolution stating that he remains strongly in favor of the project.

District 5 Supervisor Andrés Cano said he would prefer resolutions be delivered to all relevant stakeholders in the future, adding that he did not agree with HUDBAY’s claim of wanting full transparency with the board and saying the company canceled a scheduled meeting with his office.

“That is not a cooperative discussion that I believe is indicative of the kind of sentiment we heard from their representative,” Cano said.

County residents have long raised environmental and public health concerns about the Copper World Project before the board. JP Salvatierra cited public health risks he said he learned about during a town hall with Attorney General Kris Mayes.

“I would call Copper World a future nuisance under our ordinance and guidelines,” Salvatierra said. “Have you ever looked at a satellite view of Green Valley's tailing pond? That's what this future is going to look like. How much 2.5 micron dust particles can we absorb before we are engulfed with COPD?”

Ian Stash is a journalism major at the University of Arizona and Tucson Spotlight intern. Contact him at istash@arizona.edu.

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