Nero Fiddle's, While Rome Burns: Grupo Mexico mining subsidiaries (including ASARCO) making lots of money as the children in Paso del Norte endure paltry 52 million for 110-yr-old-smelter's Clean-up

"google alert:
Grupo Mexico reports mixed bag of metals production in 2Q, 1H
Mineweb
Grupo Mexico says its mining subsidiaries-Asarco and Southern Copper Corp.--have already been paying a windfall mining tax over the past decade as metals prices soared. Grupo Mexico reported its mining division increased production by 39% during the ...
See all stories on this topic »
"
Children in the Paso del Norte endure arsenic, lead, cadmium and still undeclared-illegally-disposed-hazardous-wastes from the now-closed ASARCO site as ASARCO (Grupo Mexico) makes record profits.    ASARCO was never made to face the liabilities from nearly ten years of illegal waste disposal at the ASARCO El Paso site (1992-1998) and we have never been told why.

Despite many years of asking for full disclosure of the chemicals left here from Asarco's illegal "sham recycling" operation -- we have never received the chemical disclosure.   We do know that Asarco handled PCB's, and Radioactive wastes.  The dioxin levels have to be high.  So why this continued silence?

Why was ASARCO allowed to get away with disclosing these liabilities in our court bankruptcy system? 

"Grupo Mexico net doubles..."

"google alert:
Grupo Mexico net doubles as metals prices rise
Reuters Africa
Sales were likely boosted by the reincorporation of Arizona-based miner Asarco and higher freight traffic from Grupo Mexico's railroad division. The company did not give details in an early filing with Mexico's stock exchange. Asarco was under Grupo ...
See all stories on this topic »
"

WOULD THE NET DOUBLE IF THE FEDERAL DEPT OF JUSTICE HAD MADE THE BANKRUPTCY COURT FORCE ASARCO TO ADDRESS THE LIABILITY FROM THE ILLEGAL MULTI-STATE WASTE DISPOSAL OPERATION ASARCO RAN FROM 1992-1998??  (see the DOJ-EPA Asarco 'confidential for settlement purposes only' 73 page document (Corpus Christi TX, El Paso TX and E. Helena MT))

Asarco clean-up El Paso Trustee and Demolition NOT DISCLOSING THE ILLEGAL CHEMICALS INCINERATED THERE FROM 1992-1998

"Google Alert - asarco bankruptcy
Asarco is disappearing 30 percent of copper smelter demolished
El Paso Inc
To help pay for the cleanup, a trust of $52 million was put aside in the $1.8-billion Asarco bankruptcy settlement. It's enough to essentially demolish the ..."

Gelmore ALDEA smartcode ASARCO EL PASO development

The full plan for this Geltmore ALDEA development can be viewed at
http://www.geltmore.com/aldeaelpaso.html/

ALDEA is being planned for extremely contaminated land by ASARCO El Paso
TX (East Helena MT ASARCO site is also now being rezoned for development).

The ALDEA developers may not be aware that their development is being
planned for land that is a stone's throw from the world's largest
unpermitted and illegally-operated toxic waste disposal operation
(1992-1998). This has been fully documented by the EPA to the Federal
DOJ in 1998 (publicly released in 2006 see 10/2006 NYTIMES story and 73
page confidential-for-settlement-purposes-only document detailing the
waste shipments) and again in a 2011 publicly-release copy of the 1994
ASARCO Supervisor's whistleblower report detailing the blatant receipt
and hiding and mixing of the poisons for shipment to the El Paso smelter
for burning.

This smelter may be CLOSED but the poisons remaining in the land around
it were never disclosed because the EPA made that 1998 secret agreement
with the Federal DOJ (For more information about these secret
agreements, see the recent Financial Times article covering hedge funds,
Horizon Shipping lines, the Federal DOJ and Asarco (use internal google
engine).)

It is not prudent to build on the old ASARCO site and expose anyone to
the associated risks from those chemicals. Young college students have
not yet had children and their bodies, and future children will be
exposed to those risks. If any women living there are carrying unborn
infants, or raising young children - - those unborn and/or infants will
be disproportionately affected by the chemical toxins.

ASARCO had the worlds two LARGEST CONTOP Incinerators -- and ran these
hot and long from 1992-1998 spewing out incompletely-burned toxic and
hazardous wastes including radioactive material all that time.

We don't know why Walmart (or whomever owned that land) did not give the
developers full disclosure -- or, why our City of El Pasodid not do the
same (i.e. deliver the full chemical picture to the developers). Our
City and government would rather ignore the toxins than disclose these
to us -- but, slowly slowly the truth is coming out, and we know now
that PCB's are involved, dioxins, radioactive materials, mercury etc.

For copies of the documents about the contamination see this blog, or
look at the EPA ASARCO document page.

Asarco merger rumors

"Re: Asarco     21-Jun-11 08:26 pm    

<<If the merger goes through, you can forget any signicant dividend. >>>

...Grupo owns almost 100% of AMC.   AMC [American Mining Corp.]owns 100% of Asarco and 80% of SCCO [Southern Copper Co.]. AMC borrowed 1.5 billion to get Asarco out of bankruptcy.................  No question: To the extent amc uses a scco dividend to pay debt we get 20% now and zip if this merger goes through."

http://messages.finance.yahoo.com/Stocks_%28A_to_Z%29/Stocks_S/threadview?m=tm&bn=13898&tid=59232&mid=59242&tof=12&off=1

East Helena MT follows El Paso Texas lead and makes contaminated ASARCO land zoned for development: The secret waste stays SECRET

How very sad for El Paso Texas and East Helena MT that the citizens are not being told about the massive amounts of illegal hazardous wastes.   EPA secretly told the Federal DOJ in 1998 that ASARCO was running an unpermitted and illegal secret hazardous-waste disposal operation for profit.   ASARCO Encycle in Corpus Christi (see the whistleblower report) would take the stuff in internationally, mix it up and hide it, and send it along via the railroad to El Paso Asarco and East Helena Asarco for secret disposal.  PCB's, Dioxins, radioactive materials -- all were handled and smelted.   The DOJ kept it such a secret that the DOJ Trustee failed to act on a legal-request to inform the bankruptcy court; and, the bankruptcy courts were allowed to IGNORE THE LIABILITIES from the years of secret waste disposal.   To this day although the sites are closed, there has not been DISclosure of the chemicals involved.  Whatever it was, it was very very bad.

"While the lack of a zoning ordinance certainly made it easier on them the first time around, the Johnsons know that the new codes will help businesses looking to expand into East Helena as more and more property becomes readily available with the bankruptcy of Asarco.

For decades, the smelter had a stranglehold on the city’s outlying property, making it difficult for people who wanted to build into the valley. With the foreclosure on its property and the recent cleanups after it was determined a Superfund site, the area is primed for change."

Read more: http://helenair.com/news/article_8f4bbf64-9fb6-11e0-98f2-001cc4c03286.html#ixzz1QV4KnSxe

Apparently ignoring ASARCO's multi-state non-permitted secret hazardous-waste disposal operation (1992-1998) ... Steelworkers Union/attorneys reach work agreement

Tentative agreement reached with Asarco, Unions - Topix
Tucson, AZ Tucson based ASARCO LLC President and COO Manuel Ramos announced today that the Company and the Unions representing employees at five Asarco ...
www.topix.com/.../tentative-agreement-reached-with-asarco-u...

Steelworkers Union and Asarco reach tentative agreement

"...Manuel Ramos, President and Chief Executive officer of ASARCO
announced the company and the Steelworkers have reached a tentative
agreement. According to the union, both sides have agreed to extend the
existing wage package for another two years through June 30, 2013.

ASARC0 has 2,267 full time workers at its five operating copper
facilities in Arizona. Locally, at its Hayden Smelter and Hayden
Concentrator in Gila County along with the nearby Ray Complex in Pinal
County, the copper company employs 1,350 persons of which some 250 live
in Globe-Miami"

Wed. June 22, 2011
http://www.silverbelt.com/v2_news_articles.php?heading=0&page=72&story_id=2748

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This donation is not tax-deductible. But the majority of its use will
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Asarco Mine worker Marine (no criminal history) killed by SWAT TEAM after his 12-hr shift: OATH KEEPERS Memorial Service for fallen Marine

"Note to Viewer: Be advised that this is a very emotionally difficult video to watch as it is a memorial service for a fallen Marine with his widow and other family and to remember our war dead. This should not be viewed lightly, but it goes to the heart of what it means to be an American and how high the stakes are for all of us in the struggle for our liberty."

Where is Justice? Where is Color of Law? Where is Environmental Justice? What is happening to our United States of America?

Asarco Mine Employee and three-tour Marine combat veteran NO CRIMINAL HISTORY shot dead at home by SWAT TEAM after 12 hour shift

ASARCO Arizona employee and MARINE (no criminal history) shot over sixty times in his home right after leaving his shift/going to bed. Wife and one young son were home. The safety was still engaged on his gun.


"Joe Waldman of Tucson's KGUN-TV says the SWAT team prevented paramedics from going to work on Jose Guerena for one hour and fourteen minutes."

SWAT TEAM HELMET CAM and shooting on this video:



Marine Guerena's wife's 911 call on the next video:



Las Vegas Review Journal article about Marine Jose Guerena's killing

Asarco claiming that its historic smelter not responsible for Lead contamination (Hey El Paso Texas - doesn't this sound familiar??)

Associated Press - June 3, 2011 3:55 PM ET

"""OMAHA, Neb. (AP) - The Asarco mining company says the Environmental Protection Agency concealed records about lead contamination in Omaha that may clear the company from responsibility.Asarco filed a federal lawsuit against the EPA Friday because of new information that emerged about the source of the lead contamination found on nearly 6,000 Omaha properties.New records the agency released in response to a Union Pacific lawsuit suggest lead paint on houses, not Asarco's former lead smelter in Omaha, may have caused the contamination."....

Asarco's Omaha NE smelter shut down in 1997 just before the EPA and DOJ made the historic SECRET confidential-for-settlement-purposes-only ASARCO agreement that Rep. Reyes (Chair House Intelligence Committee) said "Asarco paid millions on the condition that the details of what it had done would never become public".    Asarco had been bringing in secret international and governmental wastes at Asarco Encycle in Corpus Christi TX (where they held the recent Asarco Bankruptcy proceedings).   The wastes were then illegally mixed and railed up to East Helena MT and El Paso TX for disposal.

Since the Omaha Asarco smelter was still running all those years - until 1997 -- is it possible that Asarco was sending secret stuff to that location also for disposal?  

Authorities still snowballing Radioactive Isotope testing at El Paso TX, at the ASARCO industrial site

The Asarco El Paso site is being demolished as this is being written, and nothing is being done to list the actinides and radioactive isotopes that Asarco left there from its nearly ten (or more) years of secret hazardous waste incineration.   The El Paso Clean up Trustee wrote (email):

 "Asarco ...handled a wide variety materials including radioactive materials.  Given the scrutiny [not!] of the site from both state and federal authorities, we do not expect man-made radioisotopes, TENORM [technologically enhanced naturally-occurring radioactive material], byproducts or residues at levels above their respective natural levels." 

There is no "scrutiny" of the site for radioactive isotopes!!  The Trustee and the Environmental Agencies refuse to test for these -- they are assuming that the levels were and are safe without producing the SCIENCE.  Ask them - they cannot produce *any* data to show the names of the radioactive isotopes present and their amounts.

Yet another "settlement" potentially related to Asarco activity (this time in Omaha NE)...

UP Settles Omaha Lead Dispute With EPA for $25M
OMAHA, Neb. June 2, 2011 (AP)

Union Pacific and the [Federal EPA] ... are ending their decade-long dispute over lead contamination in Omaha with a settlement that reduces the railroad's share of the cost to $25 million...The EPA blamed industrial sources of lead [i.e. ASARCO smelter, which closed 1997 - one year before the 1998 DOJ EPA Asarco confidential for settlement purposes only document secretly-detailing how ASARCO ran an illegal hazardous waste incineration operation in Corpus Christi, TX; East Helena MT and El Paso TX for nearly ten years] and Union Pacific argued lead house paint is the real problem. Last fall, Asarco tried to intervene in a federal lawsuit Union Pacific had filed against the EPA after the railroad learned that agency officials may have deleted some records related to the lead-contaminated properties in Omaha.... Asarco [wants to] recover compensation from companies that contributed to the contamination.

http://abcnews.go.com/Business/wireStory?id=13737687

Was this another secret Federal Department of Justice "settlement decree" like DOJ-Horizon Shipping Lines etc.?  Meanwhile neither ASARCO, the Federal DOJ, or the EPA are disclosing the details of what Asarco had done when it illegally disposed of hazardous wastes for nearly ten years.  Technology has been around for over 30 years that can determine exactly what metals are there, and where they came from.

Remember also that Grupo Mexico now owns ASARCO and wants to run a railroad line from Northern Mexico up through Santa Teresa N.M. border crossing, where U.P. Railroad and BNSF are building facilities (recent Sunland Park NM water treatment plant changes are said to accomodate the new UP facility).

UTEP invites their students to INTERN AT THE EL PASO ASARCO site without disclosing the illegal hazardous chemicals onsite first

UTEP invites their students to INTERN AT THE EL PASO ASARCO site without disclosing the illegal hazardous chemicals onsite first from the secret hazardous-waste disposal operation run at this site from 1992-1998 (EPA to DOJ confidential for settlement purposes only 73 page document, 1998 -- revealed by front page NYTIMES story, 10-2006):

"google alert:

ASARCO Internships
-ASARCO REMEDIATION PROJECT- Description and Requirements: The Center for Environmental Resource Management (CERM) at UTEP invites applicants for Student ...
answerpot.com/showthread.php?2603984-ASARCO...

"

ABC NEWS: "Tucson SWAT Team defends shooting Iraq Vet 60 Times" (just got off a 12 hour shift at the AZ ASARCO mine)

"Fwd: Google Alert - asarco
Tucson SWAT Team Defends Shooting Iraq Vet 60 Times
ABC News
"And the Pima County sheriff scolded the media for "questioning the legality" of the shooting. Jose Guerena, 26, died the morning of May 5. He was asleep in his Tucson home after working a night shift at the Asarco copper mine when his wife, Vanessa, ...
See all stories on this topic »"

El Paso ASARCO: smartcode not so smart after all

An arsenic-expert in N.Carolina told me that he would not live next to a smelter - even a closed one - and leave any windows open.  You can't smell or taste arsenic, and even swamp coolers won't remove the smallest particles that go straight to the most inner places of our lungs.  El Paso TX has nearly 110 years of Arsenic deposited for 1000 square miles, and the worst of it is within ten miles of the smelter.  HUGE amounts of arsenic.

City Council just voted to make all the old ASARCO land and the WALMART-former-Asarco-land a "walking community".  This is the EPI-CENTER of 110 years of Arsenic-Land, across from a sewage plant, a Rock Quarry.  The poor Developer went from a traditional design to the smart-code "walkable community design" to please City Council. 

"If wishes made horses then poor men would ride" - and if wishes cleaned up Asarco then this smartcode could thrive...

However, because of the intense contamination all around for 10 miles-out-from-the-smelter, it should not have been zoned smart-code after all ---- because NO ONE SHOULD BE OUTSIDE.  It should be all motorized-traffic (no bicycles, walking, swimming outdoors), no windows open, no one outside EVER there -- refrigerated air and electrostatic filtered heated central air in winter.  

The Developer ought to get out now, before moving tons of dirt, and building according to "smartcode".  After all, it  is like planning a walkable community next to any hugely poisonous toxic no-man's land (Chernobyl comes to mind)  --- just not smart at all.

Asarco: nearly 1/2 Billion dollars available for Coeur d'Alene and only 55 million available for El Paso TX exposed to Asarco's secret haz-waste disposal operation

EPA funding will help assess proposed cleanup sites Coeur d'Alene Press "At this time, more than $494 million are available from the 2009 Asarco bankruptcy proceedings to help pay for environmental cleanup in the basin. ..."

ASARCO worker shot dead in his home by no-knock warrant-SWAT team -- and, his rifle still had the safety on

A two-tour Marine, no criminal history, working 12 hour shifts at ASARCO in Tuscon -- suddenly is dead from a no-knock warrant raid by a SWAT team who shot over 60 bullets in 7 seconds into him.   His own rifle's safety was still on.   The SWAT Team thought no one but him would be home, but he hid his wife and son in the closet when she heard strange noises outside and woke him up...


Google Alert:
"The Indiana Supreme Court decision makes less sense than before.
Pajamas Media
Jose Guerena, 26, a [twenty-six year old] former Marine [with two overseas tours of duty], was sleeping after the graveyard shift at Asarco Mission mine ..."

SWAT raid that killed Arizona ASARCO worker and Marine - recorded in 911 call

"Google Alert - asarco
SWAT raid fatal drama is revealed in 911 call
Arizona Daily Star
Jose Guerena, 26, a former Marine, was sleeping after the graveyard shift at Asarco Mission mine about 9:30 am when his wife woke him saying she heard ..."