A bit more sunlight reaches the Arizona Centennial Museum

The Aug 17th post described how Arizona Centennial Museum planners worked in absolute secrecy beginning in mid 2009.  The Governors office even placed state employees under gag orders to hide what was happening. In February 2010, when the Governor presented her “birthday gift to Arizona”, she spoke to a selected by invitation only group. On Aug 11^th, the Arizona Republic published the first story clearly telling people what was actually happening to the mineral museum.

Today, the Arizona Republic published a second article related to the Arizona Centennial Museum.  It describes how the Arizona Department of Mines and Mineral Resources (former administrator of the mineral museum) “ran out of money”, and was shut down.  The Governor actually starved the department to death by transferring most of their budget to the Arizona Historical Society, as documented by previous posts on this blog.

Arguments that the function of ADMMR should be funded by the mining industry are not unreasonable.  However, no money is being saved by closing the ADMMR.  The Governor is incrementally transferring their budget, and much more, to the Arizona Historical Society.

So, the real question is not: “Should the taxpayer have been funding the ADMMR”.

The real question is: “Is the Arizona Historical Society (5C Arizona Centennial Museum) more deserving of a state subsidy than the ADMMR?

Reference:
States mining agency to shut down
Ryan Randazzo
Arizona Republic, Jan 20, Page D2.