The Democratic mayor has denied the mining company access to county lands for prospecting, threatened Kennecott with trespassing if it tries to touch down a helicopter on the property and petitioned the U.S. Bureau of Land Management for mineral rights.

The measures, Corroon insists, are to defend the largest swath of publicly owned wilderness on the county's west side - otherwise known as Rose Canyon Ranch and Yellow Fork Park.

"Salt Lake County purchased the property as open space for our citizens to use for hiking, biking and riding horses," Corroon said. "Really, how could I say to Kennecott, 'Yes, go ahead and explore this property for mining purposes.' "

Relations have soured between the parties in recent months, highlighted, in part, by Kennecott's announcement in mid-September that it would pursue mining claims not only in Rose Canyon but also in nearby Yellow Fork Canyon.

While Kennecott says its hunt for Yellow Fork minerals isn't retaliatory, a company spokesman said last month that the county's resistance in Rose Canyon - and its interest in buying up mineral rights to prevent prospecting - "forces our hand."

So while Kennecott appeals to the BLM for access to its Rose Canyon mining claims (the bureau can grant that admittance without the property owner's permission), the copper giant is preparing to send surveyors into 80 acres of Yellow Fork to search for profitable ore within the federal government's mineral holdings.

"We have a business we are trying to conduct," Kennecott spokesman Louie Cononelos said, noting the proximity of Yellow Fork to the mineral-rich Bingham Canyon Mine. "We are proceeding along those lines to do it."

Tension between mining and open-space preservation resurfaced last fall when Rose Canyon went up for sale. Before the county could buy the property, Kennecott (not knowing about the county's interest in securing it for open space, Cononelos said) filed for mining claims there.

With two other offers for the land on the table, Corroon & Co. went ahead with the $8.7 million purchase. Combined with Yellow Fork Park and a neighboring BLM parcel, the public expanse stretched across almost 4,000 acres (about the size of Holladay).

"We knew there was a lot of interest in this land and that we probably wouldn't have another shot at something this significant," county open-space coordinator Lorna Vogt said. "It was a calculated decision and a hard decision. But we thought it was worth the risk. We still feel that way."

At first, the county and Kennecott worked cooperatively. The company started surveying the land in May with the understanding that it would dig no trenches, excavate no roads and disturb the property no more than to remove brush for its survey equipment.

But as weeks passed, the county grew weary of the work. It had dragged on longer than expected (delays caused by Kennecott's inability to readily access Rose Canyon, mine officials counter). And the county argued it still wasn't getting a sufficiently detailed schedule about when Kennecott's crews would be working on site. So the county drew a hard line.

"I hope you understand that Mayor Corroon feels duty-bound to protect the citizens' investment in this property," the mayor's chief administrative officer, Doug Willmore, wrote in a July 30 letter obtained through an open-records request.

The county refused Kennecott further access without BLM approval. It threatened the mining company with trespassing if, as suggested in a July meeting, it tried to land helicopters on the property. And it urged the BLM to let the county buy nearly 1,200 acres of federally owned mineral rights - not to search for ore but to keep others from doing so.

"Mineral values in the property appear to be negligible," Willmore explained in his BLM request for mineral rights, "and are far outweighed by the property's public benefit as open land."

Kennecott has filed a formal challenge to that request.

"We are aware of what the county has done," Cononelos said, "and we have taken necessary action to protect our position and our property rights."

Corroon's Republican rival, Michael Renckert, sees the mayor's opposition to mineral exploration as too rigid. Describing the property as an "investment," Renckert said the county could reap financial benefits from mining (if a profitable ore bed exists) while still preserving the land for open space.

"We shouldn't be stifling economic development," he said, "if we have the opportunity for a win-win situation."

While the copper company says its mineral exploration will do nothing to disturb the county's open space (except to remove brush), Corroon isn't about to give Kennecott permission to cross county lands.

If Kennecott wants permission, he said, then it can get it from the BLM.

jstettler@sltrib.com