Trees Spiked & Banner Dropped Against New Lacey Police Station
February 24, 2024
Feeling desperate after Friday's emergency rally to stop the deforestation on the property for the new Lacey police station, where police and security presence, including drones and undercover cops, something else had to be done. In the earliest hours of Saturday morning, a small crew spiked various trees in the woods that are currently being logged, a well-known ecodefense practice to prevent or at least delay the logging of these precious trees. We need forests, not cops. Hours later, a seperate crew dropped a banner that read Stop Lacey Cop Complex #stopallcopcities at the Olympia/Lacey pedestrian bridge over Pacific Avenue that will hopefully bring more awareness to the project, which the city of Lacey has been pushing through since 2021 (or even as early as 2019) with little-to-no transparency.The new police station will include an 8 lane firing range, a training facility for the use of law enforcement agencies in the region, and a "community center." We only became aware of how eminent the project was after the groundbreaking ceremony was announced a week prior to the event on February 5th. This is unacceptable.
Some context. Lacey signed a purchase and sale agreement on September 7th of last year acquiring a subdivided parcel from St. Martin's University. This parcel contains second growth forest, wetlands, and is in the well-known Asarco smelt plume that has contaminated soils from Tacoma to Lacey. Surrounding areas are known to contain lead and arsenic poisoning at levels that would require major clean up before development. The environmental checklist submitted by Brian Beley, the KMB architect and project manager, contains blatantly falsified information, such as no proximity to wetland and no birds or animals present in the forest whatsoever. This environmental checklist is the only step towards permit approval for deforestation. Additionally, the forestry practices application that was submitted is incomplete and haphazardly filled out. As if this wasn't shady enough, Lacey passed an ordinance in December (Ordinance 1650), within the same month as the project announcement, changing municipal code for building permits and subdivision of parcels that do away with public comment periods and criteria for subdividing parcels.
As anarchists, we do not believe in funding our already militarized police state another $40-60 million. We do not support police trainings that focus their efforts on target practice, gun violence, or crowd control through "non-lethal" munitions. We believe in amplifying the voices and centering the needs of the people, we reject a world of repression wherein those with power attempt to beat us into submission. We will fight back. And together, we will build a future where we are cared for, where we are heard. We are safer without the police. We take care of us.
Greetings to the rebels who took action under the cover of night!
I want to respond briefly to the communique "Trees Spiked, Banners Dropped Against New Lacey Police Station," particularly this part – "a small crew spiked various trees in the woods that are currently being logged, a well-known ecodefense practice to prevent or at least delay the logging of these precious trees."
Why is tree spiking a well known practice in ecodefense? How does it delay or prevent logging? I think it's important to look into questions like these to help decide on which tactics will be most effective to use at a particular moment.
The whole idea behind tree spiking is that there is a risk of the chainsaw operator hitting the spike and damaging the chainsaw and potentially kicking up shrapnel that will injure or kill the operator, similarly when it's hauled off to be processed that the presence of the spike will damage the machinery and potentially injure or kill the workers. And yes, despite the insistence on EF! style NVDA, there is an implicit threat to injure or kill people in tree spiking. That's what makes it effective.
Unfortunately, the forest here is being cleared by heavy machinery and as far as I am aware the wood isn't being sold off for lumber – though I am open to being proven wrong on this and in which case consider this critique retracted. But because of these things it seems unlikely that this is an effective action.
I don't say this to shit on your action, I think in many cases just showing the will to act is can be an effective action in itself especially in times of general defeat and low capacity. I say this for you all, for me, and for potential onlookers to think a little more about where to strike and with what weapons.
May a thousand rebels bloom under the cover of night,
May a thousand forests grow upon the ashes of our enemies
(A)
Found on pugetsoundanarchists.org