In every issue of this fine rag, my hack team of wannabe journalists and I tackle some of the most laughable criminal acts that have recently happened in our area. Then - if we're doing our job - we write about those crimes in a way that makes you chuckle, or at the very least gives you something to do other than scoff at those gawdawful Mercedes Christmas commercials.

This week's Ragnet takes us to Olympia, where it's always "political."

Enjoy. - Matt Driscoll

Having once been wheat-pasted ourselves here at Weekly Volcano World Headquarters - the words: "Wheatpaste your asshole" etched in bright pink spray paint across a wall of our building, among other hilarious acts - we know the pride that comes with having your workplace targeted by vandals. It means they care. They REALLY care.

The Olympic Region Clean Air Agency knows the feeling all too well, having once again been targeted at their office on Limited Lane in Olympia by what seems to be a persistent gang of troublemakers.

According to reports in the Olympian, employees at the Olympic Region Clean Air Agency arrived at work Tuesday morning to find the doors glued shut and a brick heaved through a back glass door - all suspected acts of protest that occurred overnight, Dec. 6-7. This latest episode is the second time in approximately three months the doors at the Clear Air Agency have been glued shut, with a similar incident having occurred in October. There are rumors employees have also long suspected someone is wiping cooties onto the office doorknobs, but the Volcano can neither confirm nor deny those reports at this time.

All of this, of course, comes as the Clean Air Agency considers a permit for what's described as a "biomass project" near Shelton - effectively a wood-burning power plant that detractors say would rape the environment and give us all cancer and other horrible maladies by annually releasing about 550,000 tons of carbon dioxide and hundreds of tons of pollutants linked to smog and acid rain into the air.

On the plus side, the proposed $250 million plant (attempting to be brought to you by a company called Adage) would provide electricity for about 40,000 homes and employ roughly 750 people directly and indirectly during construction, and 200 people directly and indirectly after construction. So there's that. ...

As you can see, the Olympic Region Clean Air Agency has quite a predicament on its hands, which is probably why they got so miffed at this latest act of vandalism.

"We hate to see this type of behavior," agency spokesman Dan Nelson told the Olympian (which, by the way, is where we're stealing all of this info from), "it's a waste of public resources."

Thickening the plot (like a toxic cloud of released CO2 thickens the air), authorities say an official protest at the Olympic Region Clean Air Agency building was planned for Tuesday afternoon. Nelson told the paper a protest was also scheduled the day after the previous act of vandalism in October.

Nelson was ballsy enough to go on record with the Olympian, saying he was "inclined to believe" the vandalism was "politically motivated."

Police estimate the damage from Monday night's attack at $2,000. The Olympia Police Department is currently investigating all known hippies in the area - which will take a while. - Ted Begley Jr., Environmental Crime Correspondent