In Rosemont Copper’s alternate reality, a nature-adoring mine has already become fact, and big-money jobs lurk just over the hill—in this case, in the Santa Rita Mountains south of town.
Within such mystical realms, appearance is everything. For instance, Canadian investment firm Augusta Resource Corp. must convince financial backers that its Rosemont Copper subsidiary is more than just a shiny website and a few suits.
It must also persuade locals that a multitude of their fellow citizens likewise inhabit this magical world. Not surprisingly, Augusta employs a small army of inventive public-relations folks and, on occasion, more than a little skullduggery.
Which brings us to the “partners.” On its website (rosemontcopper.com), Rosemont details its plans to pull copious amounts of copper from an open pit in the Santa Ritas when (not if) it gets a green light from the adjacent Coronado National Forest—upon which tailings would be dumped—and a slew of federal regulatory agencies.
Meanwhile, the company’s public-relations posse doggedly spreads the notion that this mine is a fait accompli, and that Rosemont Copper has become a bona fide community member. One pillar of this strategy involves spreading small donations throughout town—or proffering the occasional volunteer—and then listing the recipients on Rosemont Copper’s website under “partnerships.”
The message couldn’t be more explicit: These organizations, from Tohono Chul Park and Arizona Opera to the Casa de los Niños child-abuse crisis center, symbolize Rosemont’s support across Tucson.
The New Oxford American Dictionary defines partner as “a person who takes part in an undertaking with another or others, esp. in a business or company with shared risks and profits,” or, “either of two people dancing together or playing a game or sport on the same side.”
In truth, Rosemont may just be gaming the term: Almost without exception, organizations listed under “partnerships” say they take no stance on the mine project. Some contend they know little about it, while others apparently have no connection to Rosemont whatsoever.
Many organizations seemed unaware that their names were even listed as partnerships; several were less than pleased about being slipped into the online queue.
At least one, the Arizona Foster Care Review Board, a government agency, wanted its name off the list posthaste. “We’ve asked them to remove us as a partner,” says the board’s Caroline Lautt-Owens. “I’m not exactly sure why we’re listed, but I can tell you that the Foster Care Review Board is a volunteer-based program, and we have over 500 volunteers across the state. I know that our Tucson office had a volunteer at one point who worked for Rosemont.”
Lautt-Owens says that recipients such as her agency were initially noted more innocuously on Rosemont’s website. But after being contacted by the Weekly, she took another glance. “I saw how we were listed as more of a partner, and that concerned me, because that almost looked like there was a true partnership. … Is the perception that it’s more than volunteers? Is the perception that they’re somehow giving us money?”
Even after a bit of research, an Arizona Opera staffer remains baffled about how her organization landed on Rosemont’s list. “We have no record at all of ever working with the Rosemont Copper mine,” says development and external affairs director Mindy Riesenberg. “We know nothing about it. I know nothing about the mine, and we are completely uninvolved with them.”
But at least one organization, the Perimeter Bicycling Association of America—sponsor of El Tour de Tucson—embraces Rosemont’s support. Pointing to more than $20,000 in annual contributions, Perimeter president Richard DeBernardis calls the company “one of my top sponsors. … I don’t have a problem with Rosemont Copper. I wouldn’t be dealing with a sponsor I had a problem with.”
And at the Tohono Chul Park nature preserve on Tucson’s northwest side, executive director Christine Conte tersely clarifies the connection. “We are not a partner with Rosemont Copper,” she says, noting that in 2008, the company donated $500 for a geology wall at the park. “They have not given anything since, and what they have done does not qualify as a partnership.”
Still others, such as the Community Food Bank of Southern Arizona and Casa de los Niños, simply accept Rosemont’s money while claiming neutrality. “As an organization, we have no opinion and take no stand on that,” says Casa executive director Susie Huhn. “I’m not making an approval statement about whether they should be able to mine in Arizona or not.”
When I contacted Rosemont Copper and requested to speak with a company official about these “partnerships,” I instead received a call back from Strongpoint, one of Rosemont’s hired PR firms. When I asked Strongpoint vice president Jan Howard how organizations such as the Arizona Opera became listed as partners despite no apparent Rosemont ties, she promised an answer.
That answer never came. Nor has Howard explained why others such as Tohono Chul Park and the Foster Care Review Board found themselves on the list, a designation they obviously opposed. Howard did say that donation recipients received “correspondence” explaining how their names would be used.
Our request for a copy of that correspondence also went unanswered. Instead, we received a statement from Rosemont vice president Kathy Arnold, who described my inquiry into Rosemont’s so-called partners as “pathetic.”
Critics might tap that very term to describe Rosemont’s string of misleading PR efforts, tracing back to when the company packed public hearings with mine supporters—who merely turned out to be hungry fellows lured by the promise of cheap T-shirts, a free meal and jobs that have not materialized.
Or the “surveys” distributed by another Rosemont PR firm that touted the mine’s potential. The surveys asked readers to check the box supporting Rosemont, or another requesting more information. There was no box for opposing the project.
Next came the alleged letters of support for Rosemont that blanketed Tucson in 2010. Although made to appear as if they came from various neighborhoods, the testimonials were actually concocted by company PR hacks, complete with fake signatures.
The “partners” snafu only deepens Rosemont’s substantial credibility gap, and may prove self-defeating, according to Tiffany Gallicano, an assistant professor of public relations at the University of Oregon. “One of the worst things you can do,” she says, “is alienate organized groups of people by pretending that you have their support without their permission.”
She calls it green-washing “by pretending to have support that you don’t have. It’s also ‘astro-turfing,’ which means fake grassroots.”
Either way, Gallicano says, “It’s a huge abuse of trust.”
This article appears in Dec 6-12, 2012.
It’s amazing at the lengths the opponents of the Rosemont Copper project will go to tarnish the good name of this company.
Tarnish? The Rosemont Copper Company already has a rusty, crusty reputation of unethical practices without this article. I appreciate reading about Rosemont Coppers lack of ethics … about how benign organizations operating in Southern Arizona were drafted into “partnership” to deceive the public about support for the Rosemont Open Pit Copper Mine. IF allowed to proceed, this Open Pit Copper Mine will destroy a large area of the Santa Rita Mountains south of Tucson and the surroundings. IF allowed, the Rosemont Open Pit Copper Mine would take value from neighboring real estate, it would drain the water table forcing nearby well owners to drill deeper, it would increase large truck traffic on the Sonoita Highway making that road more dangerous, it would destroy wildlife habitat, it would destroy archeological sites, it would take copper and ship the ore out of the United States, it would profit a foreign company and it would do additional damage. The Rosemont Open Pit Copper Mine is a very bad idea that should not be allowed to proceed. Who are you Longtime Rosemont Supporter? Why do you hide behind a fictitious name? I am proud of my position about Rosemont and use my name when commenting on line. Why are you hiding, LRS? IF this Mine is allowed, does anyone have any doubt about the lack of reliability of Rosemont’s promises to clean up after they destroy such a large area of Southern Arizona? Would Rosemont adequately compensate nearby property owners for diminished values? Would Rosemont pay for drilling water wells deeper on nearby real estate? Would Rosemont compensate all people injured in traffic accident caused by their big trucks? The best course of action is to deny Rosemont Copper the permit allowing square miles of overburden to be dumped on National Forest land, which belongs to every U.S. citizen.
Rosemont Copper used to have a web site with a list of their local business supporters. On Feb. 23, 2012 I downloaded a list of those companies (which I still have in my possession). Today, that site has been removed. Why? Are these businesses no longer proud of supporting this ecological disaster? Was the boycott of these businesses being felt? What other shady practices will we uncover about these carpetbaggers?
Just say “NO” to these foreign land rapers.
I am involved in an organization that has considered seeking some Rosemont blood money, er, corporate community relations funding. So far I have been successful in blocking this “partnership” citing the PR peril the non-profit would find itself in.
I disapprove of this stunt by Rosemont (and yes I disapprove of the mine). And while I can understand a desperate nonprofit accepting donations from Rosemont, I suggest that Perimeter Bicycling should give it back. It’s dirty money, and the El Tour should care more about the environment.
Even if these bogus “partnerships” Augusta Resource tried to claim on their website had been legitimate, the total number of supporters this would imply would not come close to the 20,000 legitimate people who have signed the petition in opposition to this project in the five years since Augusta Resource first proposed it. I, my wife, and others were gathering signatures all day Friday at the Fourth Avenue Street Fair in front of the Revolutionary Grounds Coffee & Bookstore between 4th and 5th Streets. The highly favorable response to this petition drive over these past five years demonstrates clearly the feeling of this community. People tell us they signed a few years ago and we do not take their signature a second time. These signatures are being submitted to the US Forest Service on an on-going basis so the Forest Service is fully aware of the very strong community opposition to this proposed open pit mine in these scenic Santa Rita mountains. A small percentage of these signatures are people from out-of-state and from outside the United States who are here for tourism and for recreation. While these people do not pay taxes as community members do to defray the cost of management by the US Forest Service of these publicly-owned lands, they too have a legitimate interest in preserving these lands, as we do in preserving their lands should they be so threatened. The Forest Service in all fairness must give the weight of this opposition its due and, in so doing, deny this applicant the use of 3,300 acres of the Coronado National Forest to dump mine waste rock and tailings 800 feet high for four miles along the length of Scenic State Highway 83.
There is nothing this foreign corporation will not do to get approval for their mine. Their continual practice of slinking up to the community in an effort to make themselves look like good neighbors is nothing short of PATHETIC.
And they Say things as/like to:
It’s amazing at the lengths the opponents of the Rosemont Copper project will go to tarnish the good name of this company.
to leave the only other option, and start a fight, to enter into contact connection at all to slowly rebound and move their company along, which sounds like some personally owned biz, working head over heels and so no one potentially answering every detail. Its all attitude, big man $$ and power, unfortunately.
ethics people hearts not shall to be rooted low so shallow to Flower and burst over joy and happiness about an open pit in our mother earth. I have compassion for people and try let my empathy get me somewhere and DO draw the line Here since A mine doesn’t have legs and live yet. A mine here IN AZ Tucson etc is just not just Practical if so you see it even then as practical..the old world is dying and Peace and Harmony world being born, A mine Here has no place in addition to our deserts. Wanna mine with your desert. or A Desert with your Mine. lol
See
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=C56Bt0afEcg
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=u9cgUSnTGes
PS
OMG YES YES yes EL TOUR WHAT is up, I will forgive them, but I did NOT pertain to these shady rosemont commercials, one about riding bikes safely and its just what an artist would do to GET their hands in on some bread of tomorrow.
Posted by SonoranWinds on 12/06/2012 at 12:04 PM
I disapprove of this stunt by Rosemont (and yes I disapprove of the mine). And while I can understand a desperate nonprofit accepting donations from Rosemont, I suggest that Perimeter Bicycling should give it back. It’s dirty money, and the El Tour should care more about the environment.
The focus should be more on accountability than defiance. Rosemont will get their permits to operate. Hold the company to its word.
word.
Paul Tadeo, how would anyone hold Rosemont to its word? There is a corporate shield in place that allows individual people responsible for failure to live up to any corporate contractual obligations to escape responsibility by bankrupting and dissolving the corporation. Furthermore, much of the blathering that the corporate mouthpieces say about how the Rosemont Open Pit Copper Mine might be operated, IF it is allowed to proceed, is not contractual. And, who will have sufficient financial resources to fund what will likely be a long legal battle in court to hold the corporation, assuming it still will exist, to the limited contractual obligations that are not met, IF the Rosemont Open Pit Copper Mine happens to be allowed to proceed.