Troops,
We do everything by the book. Assistant Chief of Staff, Mr. Josh Warren, and I visited the AO last week after the park gave us the green light.
This past Monday we received notification from the Ranger stating that they would prefer there be no "air powered" (gas gun) guns, and if we would drop the numbers from 300 to 150 pax and change from Sept. 27th weekend to a dead weekend, it would work better because as of this past Monday, Sept. 27th weekend is no longer a "dead weekend" as initially projected. I would to mention that the Ranger's office has ALWAYS been on our side and did everything he could to lock it down. But this last round of frustration is beyond his control.
John Lu, ACoS and I pondered on this and we are rather uncomfortable with the no "air powered" restriction and the unpredictable dates. We were committed to Sept. 27th as were Ft. Worden. While we fully understand safety issues when the park is full, it frustrates us that we essentially have no control over what their sales dept. would book?
As of today, Wed. Aug. 7, 2013, we are suspending TW till further notice. All who paid will be refunded this week. We need some time to re-visit with them to either iron out a concrete commitment without putting ourselves over some cold/freezing/rainy weekend; and if we are forced to seek other opportunities, then, so be it. Ft. Worden is an unique AO, but putting people there over some rainy/freezing dead weekend is not in our best interest.
We appreciate your understanding as we are equally, if not more, frustrated than most as we already committed over $2000 in location scouting lone. That said, we still need to remain true to our folks and keep their best interest in mind.
Erik Hickly
Chief of Staff
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