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AUGUST 29, 2000

On Monday, the Department of Interior announced the closure of a mine in the San Francisco Peaks in Arizona, considered sacred to 13 tribes in Arizona and New Mexico.

As part of a settlement with the Tufflite Corporation or Arizona, the government will pay the company $1 million to close its operation. The open-pit White Vulcan pumice mine will close within the next six months.

The company will also give up all claims it has to mining in the area and restore the site. The company will still be allowed to sell already extracted pumice from the mine for the next 10 years.

"I am pleased that this mine is being shut down and this long controversy is ending," said Secretary of Interior Bruce Babbitt on Monday. "The mine is on land which is sacred to 13 Native American tribes and the operation of this mine has scarred the San Francisco Peaks."

The mine, which is located in the Coconino National Forest, has been in operation since the 1950s. In July, the US Forest Service recommended that a ban on new mining on the peaks, but tribes like the Hopi, the Navajo Nation, the Yavapai-Apache, nd the Hualapai, have opposed mining for years.

The Navajo consider it one of the four sacred mountains central to their history.

Babbitt has also opposed continued mining in the mountains. He had previously called for a repeal of the 1872 Mining Law, which allows companies to claim public land for as little as $5 an acre as long as they can show there are sellable minerals on it.

The mine has been used as a source of pumice, used by the fashion industry to produce items such as stone-washed jeans.

You can view a map of the region at the Arizona Republic

Relevant Links:
Department of Interior - www.doi.gov
The US Forest Service - www.fs.fed.us

Related Stories:
Govt may buy mine (Enviro 07/19)
Protection of sacred mountain urged (Enviro 07/14)
Protection sought for sacred mountain (Enviro 05/09)