The Town of Patagonia will host the first of five half-hour public hearings regarding the Community Protection and Benefit Agreement Wednesday, March 25, at 5:30 p.m.
Town Manager Ron Robinson told the PRT Tuesday morning that the public hearings will be conducted prior to the next five regular meetings of the Town Council. The council meets on the second and fourth Wednesday of every month.
Tomorrow’s public hearing, which was announced in a March 20 notice provided to the PRT yesterday, will be centered on hearing citizens’ “concerns about water protections.”
Robinson said a more detailed schedule of future public hearings on other CPBA-related topics will likely be announced shortly.
After the public hearings have concluded, Robinson said Mayor Andy Wood will convene a larger public workshop regarding the CPBA, an event she had mentioned during the council’s March 11 regular meeting. At that meeting, Wood said, “We’re going to try to have it for like four hours. We don’t have a date determined yet but it will sometime in the latter part of May. It will give the public an opportunity to come forward, express their concerns, come up with ideas and be able to have a voice in this. So I’ll keep everybody posted when we get closer to that time frame.”
The March 25 public hearing will be held in council chambers at Patagonia Town Hall. Space inside the chambers is limited to 47 people. Zoom access to the hearing will be available via MEETING I.D. 957-511-4862 and PASSCODE 338501.
For more on recently expressed local concerns about protections for water from discharges from the South32 Hermosa mine, see “County Schedules Meetings to ‘Clear the Air’ on Hermosa Discharge Levels” (Jan. 14, 2026). The Patagonia Town Council held two study sessions on the issue in January.
Here is the official notice of the March 25 public hearing provided to the PRT by the Town on Monday, March 23:
