Regarding the Letter to the Editor of January 6th titled: Addressing sheriff's Burning Man report
Jim Graham PR and Crisis Manager says (Sheriff) “Allen’s actions give the impression crime in Black Rock City is higher than it actually is.”
Actually it’s much worse. The facts are:
PCSO: arrests 44, citations 53
BLM/USFS: citation 463
WCSO: arrests 7, citations 94
NHP: arrests 8, citations 1,073
“From 1990 to 2014 we were able to work collaboratively with Sheriff Allen’s predecessors.” In 2012 BRC (Burning Man) sued Pershing County in Federal Court including the Pershing County Sheriff.
In 2014 and 2015 Pershing County was paid only $240,000 while BRC increased the Burning Man budget to $30 Million (2014), $36 Million (2015), and in 2017 BRC had over $41 Million in ticket revenue alone.
Jim Graham you have previously acknowledged of $1.5 Million in donations from Burning Man/BRC only $13,500 were given to Pershing County charities.
“The current agreement between Burning Man and Pershing County is the culmination of months of discussions among the stakeholders, and includes many years of data and anticipated future growth.”
In the year the Settlement Agreement was signed 2013 the Maximum Population at Burning Man was 69,613 every year since it’s been in excess of 75,000 in 2017 it was 79,066.
A concern is the accuracy of BRC’s Population count on Friday 8/31 per BRC’s PRAM it was 69,507 though BLM had the population total at 70, 358.
I will stick to the facts, leaving Jim Graham and Burning Man to make “statements that include errors, accusations, hyperbole, false claims and information taken out of context.”
David Skelton
Lovelock
