Richmond Beach Sign Burning
From The Extended Group
The Richmond Beach Sign Burning episode occured following election day in November 2002. Brett, Jeremy, Stuart Gavin, Jordan and others are remembered to have been involved.
The Plan
Looking for something to do, and possibly following a typically unproductive Pork band practice, a number of group members began talking about the election, and how there were so many signs still up around town. While parked in Terry's car near the Baskin and Robbin's near Fred Meyer several members began to horse around with a nearby Jay Inslee sign. This quickly developed into a plan to gather as many signs as the group could find and the group dispersed into a Terry car and a Stuart car with an agreement to meet later. Some group members, including Stuart, expressed trepidation about this plan, but Brett reassured them that in fact, most of these signs were illegally placed on public property (which was true), and that, since the election was now over, they were fair game. This was unintentionally hilarious as when Brett made this statement he was holding a "Century 21" real estate sign that was clearly private property.
The Episode
After driving around and acquiring a healthy number of election signs (actual number is not recalled by the author, but was at least 15) stacked in the back of Terry's car, the group headed to the beach around nightfall. Here the plan took form: a fire was lit in the pit at Richmond Beach Park and with the aid of lighter fluid the group began lighting aflame each of the campaign signs. Several signs were waved around while they were burning.
Unfortunately, because most of the signs were small rectangular cardboard on a wooden board, when lit, many of the signs resembled crosses burned by the KKK and from a distance the ritual could easily have been mistaken for something much more sinister than a bunch of nerdy pyro high school students. Because of such concerns, and an increasing paranoia the cops were watching from a vantage point near The Bluff, the signs were abandoned and the group began to leave the park. Upon crossing the railroad bridge the group was startled to notice at least two police cars beginning the descent down the hill to the park. Gavin turned to Jordan, who was at the time a police explorer, to ask what to do and saw that Jordan was already running for the stairs out of the park. The rest of the group ran for it up the hill and all members avoided capture. Gavin then proceeded to hide in his nearby house. The success would not be repeated during the First Response incident.
