[Source: Daily Star] -- The town of Oro Valley will not contribute money toward an additional $680,000 needed to pay for archeological work on a Hohokam village located within the town, the Oro Valley Town Council recently said. Pima County — not Oro Valley — must find other sources for additional money, the council decided in a public meeting last month. The site, called Honey Bee Village, is the only large, remaining and intact Hohokam village in Oro Valley. It is within Rancho Vistoso, east of North Rancho Vistoso Boulevard and south of the Moore Road alignment. The 13-acre core of Honey Bee Village is meant to become a public preserve. Pima County currently owns these acres, but the county and the town are negotiating an intergovernmental agreement that would transfer ownership to Oro Valley. The county will continue working with Oro Valley on the issue of where to find additional money for archeological work on the village, said Roger Anyon, a cultural resources program manager with the Pima County Cultural Resources and Historic Preservation Office. The full cost of archeological work on the village —which includes fieldwork, data analysis and reporting — will be about $1.68 million, not the $1 million in bond money that the county had originally allotted for this project. During discussions with Oro Valley town staffers, Pima County had agreed to transfer $340,000 in Pima County bonds from an archeological project in Marana to this project in Oro Valley. But the county wanted Oro Valley to split the cost, which meant that the town would have had to use $340,000 from its general fund to cover the balance. That's not a step the Oro Valley Town Council is willing to take.
