Shane Gibson
In a previous life as an event producer myself, I've run in to these
"friends of" groups a couple of times. I produced a 12 hour Adventure Race
in the Columbia River Gorge in 2005. We put out notice to several groups
of our _approved_ permits to run the race, 3 months prior to the event. 5
days before the event, the "Friends of the Gorge" (who received notice from
us) called to shut down my race, stating that our race course covered
"sensitive terrain", and would require a Ecological Damage Assessment, and
that we did not have the appropriate permits.
Fortunately, we had proof we notified them 3 months prior, and the park
rangers agreed that our permits were fully sufficient to address any
issues, and were properly in place.
I am certain beyond a shadow of a doubt that it was a standard practice to
try and scare and shut down a race. It happened several times to other
event producers in the Gorge with the same exact patterns.
I generally don't want to *believe* evil of people ... but those types of
tactics are cold, calculated, and intentional. Designed to shut down a
race, cause chaos, and incite fear. I classify tactics like that similarly
to "terrorism". Just of a lighter weight nature.
~~shane
On Wed, Jan 14, 2015 at 5:42 PM, Brian Hart via OBRA
wrote:
> The writer of the VeloNews article (
> http://velonews.competitor.com/2015/01/news/cyclocross/commentary-nationals-disaster_358091)
> goes far to explaining how the CX Nats '15 fiasco unfolded.
>
> I am a cyclist. I love trees. I am not a tree expert, so I defer to the
> opinion of the arborists quoted in that article, and the concerns of the
> Austin Heritage Tree Foundation here seem very reasonable:
> http://www.austinheritagetreefoundation.com/Tree_Alerts.html. However, I
> think the writer in VeloNews is misguided in his effort to absolve that
> group of any responsibility whatsoever, and in so doing, misses one small
> point: where was the Austin Heritage Tree Foundation when the permit was
> issued or when the course was set up?