Doug Stanglin

USA TODAY

The armed group that took over a federal wildlife refuge in Oregon more than a week ago will host a community meeting Friday to explain its position and announce when it will leave, one of the leaders of the group said, according to local media.

The meeting will take place Friday at 7 p.m. PST, KTVZ-TV reported. It comes against a backdrop of growing resentment among residents of Burns, Ore., to the group, which arrived Jan. 2. There were no signs of an imminent departure, however.

"There should be a dialogue," LaVoy Finicum, a rancher from Arizona, said Tuesday while announcing the meeting, The Oregonian reported. It was not immediately clear where the gathering would be held.

The armed group, led by Ammon Bundy, son of a Nevada rancher in a longstanding battle with federal authorities over grazing rights, initially arrived in Burns to show support for two ranchers convicted of burning public land. The group then took over buildings at the Malheur National Wildlife Refuge and refused to leave despite appeals by Harney County Sheriff David Ward.

Not only did the group refuse to budge, but it also renamed the center the "Harney County Resource Center," to underscore its call for local — not federal — control of the land.

A lawyer for the Dwight and Steven Hammond, whose conviction for arson triggered the initial protest, said the armed group does not speak for the family.

Local residents, increasingly unhappy with the takeover by the out-of-state group, expressed their frustration at a community meeting Tuesday night. "There is an hourglass, and the fact is that time is running out," Ward told local residents.

At a similar meeting Monday, a 15-year-old high school freshman received a standing ovation when she said the group should leave.

"And I just want them to go home so I can feel safe and I can feel like it is home again," a tearful Ashlie Presley said, referring to the armed men, according to the Associated Press.

"I shouldn't have to be scared, none of us in Harney County should have to be scared in our own hometown," she said.

More than a dozen Burns residents reported to authorities that they were harassed in the lead-up to the occupation and afterwards by motorists in vehicles, mostly with out-of-state plates, The Oregonian reported Wednesday.

A pastor, who is opposed the occupation, and the wife of a local police officer told the newspaper motorists were driving slowly by their houses during the night or parking for lengthy periods in their driveways in an apparent attempt to intimidate them. The pastor said he decided to move his family out of the area temporarily as a precautionary measure.