Hmm wonder what kind of hardwoods

[Craig D Peltier]

Wish the auction was here in states, preferrably seattle.:D My newspaper said that it will be govt auctioned and hoping of raising 1.8 million.

SAO PAULO, Brazil - Heavily armed federal police swarmed an Amazon town and seized more than 500 truckloads of illegally cut hardwood that were confiscated but abandoned earlier this week when rioting residents and loggers drove out environmental authorities.
About 450 officers retook the town of Tailandia on Saturday, patrolling on horseback and in pickup trucks and standing guard outside sawmills.
At least 2,000 enraged residents burned tires, blocked roads and forced Environmental Protection Agency workers to flee the area on Tuesday. The force sent in Saturday allowed the seizure of the wood to resume while preventing any new violence, federal police officer Fernando Alberto Silva told Globo TV.

[Jim Becker]

I think I saw something about that on the a page of one of the Sao Paulo newspapers on Friday as I was sitting in the lobby of my hotel waiting for my taxi to the airport. (I was in Sao Paulo for the last two weeks on business) Unfortunately, I don't read much Portuguese...

[Jim King]

This is a continuing saga with the DNRs of these countries and the hungry people. An example, last week some people made a police complaint against me saying we were stealing wood from other peoples land and stealing land etc. We heard the big news from Brazil also and we calculated it out with the figures published here that and it amounted to 17 minutes of production for Oregon.

They told INRENA ( the Peruvian Dept of Natural Resources ) I had a stack of illegal wood at the entrance to the road where we work and INRENA called me up and said they had to confiscate it. I said no problem the law is the law. They said we dont have enough money for a truck to haul it in. I said I will pay for the truck.

Off they went, INRENA, police, my secretary , laborers etc and were starting to confiscate my wood. Only one problem . It was not my wood and people started coming out of everywhere with machetes, axes, shotguns, gas to burn the truck etc etc. Then the truck left so he did not get burned alive with his truck.


The problem was nothing more than that a couple of thieves wanted to get us in trouble by telling INRENA these stories not thinking about what the reaction could be and that we would not put up a fight. Then they could squat on the land and get a loan against it for clear cutting and deforestation. They were there but escaped when the owners of the wood tried to get them and behead them. The owners of the wood then decided that if they were going to loose the wood they would burn it. As the police had also gone disappeared they started the hot dog roast.

Saturday morning several of the people showed up at my office in the shop and I immediatly called the TV crew . When they arrived the people gave their story that fit so well with my campaign against the government and the non profits that Hollywood could not have done better. Then I loaded everyone in the jeep (11 people) and got to the village for an interview of the village people and to film the wood still burning. This wood was to buy school supplies and help a very sick girl in the village. This is going on National TV Monday night. (Tonight) and we are we will try to get it on CNN Español.

Result is we are winning. Our lawyer in Lima called Saturday and said a Presidential and Congressional commission will be here this week to change the law so people can work and ask us for more suggestions.

It was a great couple of days. The battle continues.

Jim

[Lee Koepke]

Wow, thats one heck of a story Jim.