---------------- Begin Forwarded Message ---------------- DesMoines Register 16 arrested at Menards protesting use of old trees Students chain themselves together at the neck By TOM ALEX Register Staff Writer 10/27/1999 Students chained themselves together at the neck with bicycle locks Tuesday and staged a sit-in at a Des Moines Menards store to protest the sale of materials made from old-growth forest. Police met with Menards employees and decided to wait for the students to unlock themselves. After about five hours, the students became uncomfortable and stopped the protest, students said. Students who obstructed drives or doorways were charged with criminal trespass, police said. Others were charged with failure to disperse. In all, 16 students were arrested and taken to the Des Moines jail and the Polk County Jail. Police Sgt. Richard Jones said: "I suppose most of them live in frame houses. We took them to concrete dormitories." The Menards store is located at 6000 S.E. 14th St. Jill Peterson, a Grinnell College freshman, said the protest targeted Menards because it had not agreed to quit selling products from old-growth forests, which in general are more than 250 years old. She claimed that the company was using old-growth wood from around the world for rake handles, doors and other items, "which can easily be made from renewable sources." The student protesters, from Drake University and Grinnell College, are members of STEP, Iowa Students Towards Environmental Protection. Dawn Sands, a spokes- woman with Menards, said the company has been talking with the Rainforest Action Network of San Francisco. She said Menards was under the impression the company would not be targeted in the protest. "We are working to see what can be done," Sands said. "We buy from many vendors, and it's hard to know what, if any, materials would cause them concern. What they should be protesting are the logging companies" involved in those practices. Mark Westlund, communications director with Rainforest Action Network, said Menards was not removed from a list of its so-called "Foolish Five," because the company failed to send a letter saying it would phase out use of old-growth forest products. Others on the Rainforest list are Home Base, 84 Lumber, Payless Cashways and Wickes. Peterson said Home Depot, the site of a demonstration last year in West Des Moines, had been taken off the list. In August, Arthur Blank, president and chief executive of Home Depot, promised that the company would stop selling wood products from environmentally sensitive areas. ___________________________________________ Rainforest Action Network 221 Pine Street #500 San Francisco, CA 94014 Telephone: 415/398-4404; fax: 415/398-2732 Website: http://www.ran.org ----------------- End Forwarded Message ----------------- - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - For SC email list T-and-C, send: GET TERMS-AND-CONDITIONS.CURRENT to [log in to unmask]