Legislation filed to have AZGS establish a mining and mineral museum

Arizona State Senator Ed Ableser introduced a bill to have the Arizona Geological Survey establish "a mining and mineral museum as the state depository for collecting, cataloging and displaying mining artifacts and specimens of various ores, gemstones and lapidary material and other valuable mineral specimens."

Senate Bill 1016, went through its first reading today and was assigned to the Appropriations Committee.  

Sen. Ableser introduced similar legislation in previous sessions but none of them moved out of committee.   Although the bill does not state it explicitly, most readers interpret it to mean AZGS would restore the former Mining & Mineral Museum [right] in Phoenix, run by the Arizona Dept. of Mines & Mineral Resources.  The museum building was transferred to the Arizona Historical Society in 2010 in anticipation of converting it to a Centennial Museum, but the funding never materialized to support that.  ADMMR was merged with AZGS in 2011.

Advocates for the mineral museum have been trying to get it restored since then.