Lehigh Quarry

For the past century, Lehigh Permanente Quarry (“Lehigh Quarry”) has been the site of a limestone mining operation and cement plant that has ravaged more than 800 acres in the hills outside Cupertino, reducing much of it to moonscape conditions. Now Lehigh has proposed plans to expand its operations.

Lehigh Quarry has violated environmental regulations protecting air and water quality on a large number of occasions, with more than 2,100 known legal violations in the past 10 years. Over the decades, Green Foothills has worked to limit environmental damage at the quarry. Lehigh’s large size and repeated violations make it an especially significant problem for the region.

Now, there may finally be an opportunity to end this long history of environmental violations that threaten both nature and human health. Santa Clara County is researching options for shutting down both the quarry and cement plant based on the thousands of legal violations, and acquiring the entire site for planned restoration.

Acquisition of the entire property and termination of Lehigh’s polluting operations could lead to the creation of a new open space preserve reversing decades of environmental damage. It represents a tremendously rare opportunity for the largest restoration of nature in Santa Clara County outside of the South Bay tidal wetlands.

Please join us in the fight to acquire, protect, and restore the Lehigh Quarry property as green space for people and wildlife. Sign the petition to stay informed about opportunities to take action to shut down Lehigh Quarry, reclaim the devastated land, and permanently protect the existing habitat.

Green Foothills appreciates every individual, agency, and foundation who makes our work possible and we are proud to recognize every contributor in Our Donor Community. Thanks to their generous support, we are able to champion land use decisions that affirm and support open space, biodiversity, climate resilience, and natural resources in San Mateo and Santa Clara Counties. To ensure local nature always has an advocate, please become a Sustaining Contributor today.