San Rafael Rock Quarry Committee

Aimi Dutra of the San Rafael Rock Quarry last week unfairly accused the Pt. San Pedro Road Coalition of ignoring scientific evidence, fear mongering and exerting political pressure.

Three highly respected physicians, concerned about toxic quarry emissions, wrote to local physicians asking them to support their call for an epidemiological study, continuous air quality monitoring and limiting quarry dust distribution.

Quarry owners spent huge sums of money for a study they controlled, and for PR that glosses over the very real threat quarry operations bring to our community. "Peer reviews" of the study by biased, pro-industry doctors hired by the quarry provide no reason to trust the study's conclusions.

If the quarry poses no health risk as it claims, it should not object to continuous air monitoring and to an epidemiological study. These are sensible measures given that proposed quarry operations include 250 daily truck trips and ongoing blasts which result in dissemination of diesel and crystalline silica, both Proposition 65 carcinogens, while refusing to enclose dust-producing operations.

The quarry wins over local residents by funding school projects. We applaud these acts of corporate charity which offset some of the unpaid county taxes and fees for the quarry's 11 unpermitted buildings that the quarry was forced to remove. They are not, however, a substitute for a safe operation. It is the quarry that exerts political pressure, not the coalition.

The quarry is a large business and its owners make major political contributions far and wide. The coalition, in contrast, is a grassroots organization of volunteers who care about the health of the community and the environment in which they reside.

We hope that our supervisors will put our environment and the health and safety of the community ahead of financial considerations when voting on the quarry's EIR on Oct. 27.