The Initiative - Collective

http://www.blogtalkradio.com/…/fighting-crime-from-online--…

When our team lead, Krystal (Temper), posted the flyer on various veteran Facebook pages, the response was resoundingly great... except for over at Stolen Valor, where "Snake" (the Admin?) had some choice words.

Let's just be clear about something:
The Washington Initiative isn't making a single cent off of this project, nor are any of our volunteers. Like most of our projects (homeless outreach, used needle pickup, teaching free self-defense classes, etc.), we're doing the majority of it out-of-pocket and WITH ZERO INCOME.

The only people who should profit from this project are the veterans who will be receiving these care packs.

That's it.
Ever.
Period.

That Stolen Valor chose to remove our post (the same post that we made here on our own page) and accuse us of trying to make money by exploiting veterans without taking the time to read what we're about or ask questions is beyond disappointing... it's disgusting. It seems they care more about policing potential military posers than they do supporting those who actually served.

Here is our narrative of yesterday's events.

We arrived at Westlake Park at 1730 and immediately were pulled aside by the Seattle Police Department, who questioned us on what we were carrying. We explained to them that we were carrying non-lethal items (some of us had CS gas / pepper spray for personal protection), medical supplies, and a fire extinguisher to put out any random fires (like the year prior). Evocatus, who was leading this patrol, was carrying the fire extinguisher and one of the pepper sprays and was asked to surrender those two items. He complied, and was given a case number to reference to get his equipment returned.

We proceeded to introduce ourselves to the PugetSound MedicCollective. They are an amazing organization, and we didn't want to duplicate work or get in each others way. We also met two legal witness advocates who were monitoring the demonstration in order to provide an accurate recounting of any injustices perpetuated upon protestors. Finally, we saw the Emerald City Heroes Organization and said hello.

At this point, we were joined by a spontaneous (but incredibly helpful) volunteer, "D".

Once the demonstration started, we stuck to our primary goals:
- Help whoever needs it
- Keep the public safe
- Do not engage
- De-escalate as needed

Immediately, CS gas was deployed; those present at Westlake Park could taste it in the air. Unfortunately, Westlake Shopping Center is also in that immediate vicinity, and there were hundreds of members of the public observing the demonstration, taking video, and going about their shopping/sightseeing. After CS was deployed, Temper started alerting bystanders to leave the area, explaining what was going on; one such individual was a young woman with a baby in a stroller. The WAI/U.S.I.D. team continued to notify the public to move on/get out of the gas zone as we followed the demonstration.

During the three hours we spent walking alongside the mob, we experienced and/or witnessed the deployment of CS gas, flash grenades, thrown rocks (and cans of ravioli??), throwing wooden poles, shooting off roman candles, and spraying of some mystery liquid.

We stayed out of the way of police and protestors alike, offering Sudacon wipes to those who wanted them after a round of CS gas, as well as providing First Aid care to KOMO News Reporter Joel Moreno after he was hit with a blast ball that cut (and, as we suspected, broke) his left wrist/arm. Boomer Elias Thompson of Team U.S.I.D. and "D" were especially useful in these times.

Once we heard that the police were corralling the protestors in the Costco parking lot in SoDo, we decided to hop in the car and patrol that way, looking for stragglers who may be injured. Finding no way in/around the area, and hearing nothing else on the scanner, we ended our patrol at 2037.

2016 Roster:
Evocatus, Team Lead
Temper
Boomer, Chief Medic
USID Charlie
"D"