Hi Grant, when I called the Copper Fox Office about this, I was told that the Miami folks were keen to welcome us into the community as it would carry significant job creation potential. Below is an article about Bell Copper (who we bought out) from Jan 14, 2011 from the Arizona Daily Star. Rosemary Castenada is the mayor quoted below. She is still in office though her term expires in 2014. Cheers, Stockfriend *** Copper Firm's Plan to Drill in Miami, AZ moves Ahead *** A Canadian company hopes to start drilling under the streets of a Central Arizona town in a few months to look for copper, now that the Miami Town Council has endorsed the exploration project. First, Bell Copper Co. must close a deal with the estate of Miami's founder to spend $2.5 million on surface and underground mineral rights to more than 1,000 acres. Then it will spend up to 30 months conducting a feasibility study of its project before seeking state and federal permits to build it. The Town Council voted 6-0 Monday, with one member abstaining, to write a letter supporting Bell Copper's plans to take an estimate of up to 50 million pounds of copper per year from under the streets, and employ about 100 people. It could take Bell Copper a month or two to close a deal to buy mineral rights from the Van Dyke Trust, which represents the heirs to Cleve Van Dyke. He founded the town in 1909. Seven years later, Van Dyke, who was in the mining and real estate businesses, hit a 40-foot-thick deposit of 4 percent copper underneath the town. Today, Bell Copper estimates that 112 million tons of deposits containing an average of about 0.52 percent copper lie underneath the town's streets. The company will pay the trust $500,000 on closing the deal, and the rest over four to five years, said Tim Marsh, Bell Copper's president. To start drilling to further define the amount of copper lying beneath the town, the company needs permits from the town and from the state Department of Water Resources, Marsh said. Permits to start mining would be needed from the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency and the Arizona Department of Environmental Quality. "It will be a lot of time and a lot of expense that we will bear with no chance for being remunerated should things not work out," Marsh said. "That's the risk we are willing to go forward with." The town's letter of support will be only for exploration efforts for now, not actual mining, Miami Mayor Rosemary Castaneda said Thursday. Town officials aren't at all opposed to mining, but they want to see how the exploration goes before supporting an actual mine plan, she said. "How are they going to do this? What is their plan? How is it going to affect us in our daily lives? Are they sympathetic to us as a community?" Castaneda said. "We're taking this one step at a time. This step is exploration." But, she added, "This town is ready for a revitalization, if you will. You take an action and out of that you see opportunity arise, and we've had no opportunities here for many years." Castaneda said that just the prospect of environmentalist oversight of the project makes her more comfortable about the mine. "Every environmentalist in this state is watching this," she said. Contact reporter Tony Davis at tdavis@azstarnet.com or 806-7746.