Status of climbing on the Murray property from the RRGCC.

Post by **rhunt** » Thu Oct 16, 2003 9:41 pm

Cool have a great weekend. Pigsteak is dragging me to Jackson Falls this weekend and promises to give me a grand tour of all the new stuff!

weather looks good so far

Post by **jeffers_mz** » Thu Oct 16, 2003 10:51 pm

Well Sandy, I thing you've pinpointed the main reason I'm not a lawyer. I also like to KNOW, black and white, true and false, one or zero. Law doesn't work that way. You can find 10 lawyers that all say the same thing, but if one guy you don't ask believes differently, there's always the possibility that a judge will see it his way, that then an apellate judge will agree, and all ten of those assertions fly out the window.

For me it boils down to an issue of trust. I've talked face to face with Shannon, met John Bronaugh and read many of his posts, and if I'm right about who True North is, I've spent a good bit of time talking to him too. I've hung out for hours, days even, with Gretchen and her husband, trusted my life to both of them while they were belaying me, and they are all climbers first, including all that that implies. When they say they have the rope, they either have it or will risk it all trying.

Shannon says none of the attorneys sees a legal basis for the signs and gates and that tells me two things. One, she's asked more than one, and two, that is the best information I'm going to get unless I want to pay more retainers and/or take the issue to resolution in court.

I trust these people explicitly and implicitly and if you are a discerning individual, that should mean exactly nothing to you because you don't know me. But that's not the end of the road. Walk up and talk to these people yourself. They are around. I'm confident that if you do you will notice exactly the same things I did, and once the basic trust has been established, many of the relatively smaller issues will disappear.

That said, I'm going to try to answer your specific question anyway. The RRGCC does NOT know beyond a shadow of a doubt that it is legal to climb there. If they did, they would say so. I believe that they believe beyond a REASONABLE doubt that it is legal to climb there. The RRGCC's position seems crystal clear to me, if I may be allowed to paraphrase.

"We believe it is legal to the best of our knowlege, but we cannot promise we are right. We'd probably like to tell everyone to just climb somewhere else till the dust settles, but we have no legal or moral right to say that and saying that will open up a much bigger can of worms. Although it appears legal to climb there, you may still be cited, and if you are, you might want to try this, this, and this."

I know you want it more black and white than that, as do I, but unfortunately, I think this is the best you're going to get until more cards are played in this process.

Post by **jeffers_mz** » Thu Oct 16, 2003 11:02 pm

Gretchen wrote:Looks like someone put some thought into it Jeffers.

Well, not really, Gretchen. I like to solve puzzles, it gives me something to do while I'm waiting on webpages to load.

If I know attorneys, then John has already thought this through, which means that all of you are light years ahead of me on this.

But, in your official capacities, you may not have the freedoms of speech I have, and almost certainly don't have the free time I have sooooo....paraphrasing certain things here may still have some value. I recognize also the risks uninformed postings may pose and am trying hard to avoid them. If I screw up and cross a line let me know and I'll try to fix it or just shut up.

Also I hope my comment about giving women in the family way extra room wasn't offensive. Having no small experience in this I meant to imply that the combination of hormone dumps added to an already dynamic and perhaps dangerously intelligent personality reaffirm that discretion is indeed the better part of valor, something that Mr. Sheriff was lucky to avoid finding out. 'Twere meant as a compliment and no offense was intended.

Post by **Scaife** » Fri Oct 17, 2003 12:02 am

If we stop climbing on the Murray property because it's not worth the risk, wouldn't this also decrease interest in buying the property? I assume that this fact would concern the Murray's. The more people that climb on it, the more people that will be willing to give money to buy it. Charmane's actions are directly effecting the sale of the property by the Murray's to the RRGCC.

Post by **TrueNorth** » Fri Oct 17, 2003 12:08 am

We may have two seperate issues here. 1) Access to the land 2) Access to the roads.

Post by **Gretchen** » Fri Oct 17, 2003 12:10 am

NO offense taken Jeffers, I saw your point. Also we certainly appreciate your vote of confidence!!! I went easy on the poor Sheriff and Robert. They are caught in the middle. In the conversation I certainly wanted Robert to walk away with the feeling that the climbing community is not the enemy and that we are looking for a long term relationship of mutual respect.

John & Shannon have covered a ton of "what if" ground over this subject. There are things that we can't disclose at this time and I feel that Shannon did a very solid job of conveying the best message that she can at this time. Not to say that the RRGCC is hiding a thing, just we need to be cautious as we go forward. To much time & effort has been put into this deal to let speculation derail the effort.

Post by **TrueNorth** » Fri Oct 17, 2003 1:48 am

The brainstorming, and intellectual effort put forth on the subject is encouraging. I often read complaints about the “lack there of: in other threads. Even though similar issues have been raised in the past, one would have to admit, to the general public, it appears that we have been somewhat blind sided and now working from a defensive position.

Speculating for the purpose of exploring options and/or trying to understand the weaknesses and strengths of those we are trying to work and/or negotiate with may have merit. As long as we do not created unfounded fear or expose our cards in the process, I for one, feel comfortable with keeping the stream of thought open.

Post by **jeffers_mz** » Fri Oct 17, 2003 4:35 am

TrueNorth wrote:We may have two seperate issues here. 1) Access to the land 2) Access to the roads.

Order a case of forty percent, some caps and a detonator to that Cat D9 and we're in business.

Too bad the main ingress is mostly downhill. If it was up and down, we could call it....Nada Tunnel South.

Guest · Post by **Guest** » Fri Oct 17, 2003 4:53 am

you're soooooo blue collar.... can I hold your hard hat?

Post by **jeffers_mz** » Fri Oct 17, 2003 8:03 am

Not on the first date.

I spent a couple decades in the construction biz, but since I upgraded to IT about 5 years ago, I've learned to point my pinky when drinking from a bottle of bourbon.

A paper bag is a lot classier too.