NCJ - Tree-sitters taken down

Tree-sitters taken down
by ANDREW EDWARDS
March 20, 2003

PACIFIC LUMBER CO. MADE GOOD ON ITS PROMISE TO TAKE DOWN TREE-SITTERS FROM their perches in Freshwater this week, launching an operation that's supposed to last several days.

On Monday long time tree-sitter Remedy and her neighbor Wren were hauled down in a day-long operation, involving six climbers, more than 15 Humboldt County Sheriffs (many working on their day off), seven correctional staff from the Humboldt County Jail to book prisoners, at least four California Highway Patrol officers and tens of activists.

Greenwood Heights Road, an offshoot of Kneeland Road that winds up a wooded mountainside just northeast of Eureka, was blocked off by Pacific Lumber personnel for several hours on Monday. The company's justification for the closure, which involved no public notification? An encroachment permit it had applied for last year.

The aim was apparently to prevent activists from gathering at the base of trees that tree-sitters occupied. But even residents were turned back. Only press, PL workers and law enforcement were allowed.

Humboldt County Supervisor John Woolley received about 30 angry calls from his constituents and looked into the matter. After consulting with Public Works (which manages county roads) Woolley concluded that the encroachment, which was solely for logging, didn't apply to tree-sitter extraction, and county attorneys notified PL that the barricades would have to come down.

"It's only there for commercial logging processes," Woolley said, adding that he was worried about lawsuits. "You could see the future, if you're dealing with an illegal encroachment permit."

County Counsel Tamara Falor said PL must give Public Works two-week notice of any road closure. Such notice was not given in this case, Falor said.

Sheriff's deputies, unaware of the wrangling behind the scene, went to work early enforcing the permit. They walked a group of activists that had gathered at the base of the tree down the road, until one of the more vocal ones, Alexander Carpenter, aka Four Winds, 26, laid down in the road and was arrested.

"I got so tired of being pushed down the hill by billy clubs I laid down and let them arrest me," Carpenter said. "I was a guilty man there."

Carpenter was back on the scene as soon as he got out of jail.

The climbers, led by the always cheerful Eric Schatz of Schatz Tree Service, threw ropes into the trees and went up after the tree-sitters, three climbers per tree. Hours passed and nothing happened. A cold wind blew.

After four o'clock the road was opened and activists began to stream back. They were herded past the tree-sits, contained by a wall of deputies.

Around 5 p.m., after hours of apparently pleasant, if fruitless, coaxing by Schatz, Remedy was brought down; they had cut the chains that anchored her in her lock box.

"If the chains had been shorter they wouldn't have been able to do that. It was kind of a faux pas on my part," Remedy said in an interview Tuesday.

The mood was emotional. People were crying. When Remedy appeared and was driven away in a cop car the crowd surged forward, blocking the road. Deputies forced them back. Finally they sat down on the road and chanted.

When Wren came down things got ugly. Activists were shoved back by batons and the crowd was pepper-sprayed. Several people were arrested.

That night, both trees were reoccupied, Remedy's by three women and Wren's as well. In the case of Wren's tree, activists reportedly climbed up PL's own rope, which had been left overnight.

The next day the climbers came to the heavily populated lower village but were only successful in removing one tree-sitter, Annapurna. She was unhurt. Her tree was immediately reoccupied by tree-sitters travelling high up on traverse lines.

In an apparent gesture of frustration at the end of the day, PL employees surrounded the tree, still occupied, and girdled it with a chainsaw, removing the bark from around the base of the tree to kill it.

Activists on the road rushed the workers screaming that the tree was occupied, almost as if in pain. Some scrambled to protect surrounding trees but the workers didn't do anything more.

After two days, three tree-sitters had been arrested, three trees reoccupied, one road reopened, one tree girdled, 11 ground-based activists arrested. Stay tuned. The battle is supposed to continue all week.