Thanksgiving will not be stopped by COVID. The Tri-Area Community Meals Team will have hot meals available for pickup. Count on the same wonderful turkey, mashed potatoes and gravy, green beans, cranberry sauce and roll they been serving up every year to people wanting a little community on this holiday. Instead of a busy dining room inside, they will be handing out the meals from tents erected outside the Tri-Area Community Center. Reservations are required.
They will be serving from noon until 2 p.m. on Thanksgiving day. Deliveries are available for the homebound or those without transportation.
“We won’t need as many volunteers as in the past since we won’t be serving food or cleaning tables, etc.,” says Rita Hubbard, one of the organizers. “We’ll need volunteers on Wednesday late afternoon/evening to peel and cut potatoes, open cans of sauce, package cookies, etc. Thursday will be for serving only. Food handlers cards are not required but would be appreciated – those of us in the kitchen have cards.”
To make a reservation to pick up a Thanksgiving meal, or to arrange delivery, call 360-379-4228. Follow the recorded instructions, leave a message and the Tri-Area Community Meals Team will call back to confirm details.
Sponsors of this year’s Thanksgiving meal include First Security Bank, Jefferson Healthcare, OlyCap, GBF (“God Bless Food”) Catering, Hadlock Building Supply, and the East Jefferson Rotary Club.
“I found out we have 30 residents at the homeless shelter at the American Legion,” says Hubbard, “and was told there are at least 70 people in tents and cars at the fairgrounds – this includes children. I’m not sure yet how we’re going to get food out there – if it’s requested – but we’re working on it.”
More details and contact information is available at the group’s Facebook page, linked here.
My wife and I are hoping to again join in as volunteers. We will terribly miss that bustling dining room and music from Chicago Bob and friend. Here’s our story from last year. And here is the flyer for this year:
Jefferson County has 11% more voter registrations than it does eligible voters. That’s according to a study conducted by Judicial Watch, a Washington, D.C. watchdog group known for suing states with dodgy voter rolls.
The study revealed that 353 counties across the country had 1.8 million more voters on their rolls than they did eligible voting-age citizens. Eight states had registration rates higher than 100% of possible eligible voters: Alaska, Colorado, Maine, Maryland, Michigan, New Jersey, Rhode Island and Vermont.
The September 2020 study collected the most recent registration data posted online by the states themselves. This data was then compared to the Census Bureau’s most recent five-year population estimates, gathered by the American Community Survey (ACS) from 2014 through 2018. ACS surveys are sent to 3.5 million addresses each month, and its five-year estimates are considered to be the most reliable estimates outside of the decennial census.
“The data highlights the recklessness of mailing blindly ballots and ballot applications to voter registration lists. Dirty voting rolls can mean dirty elections,” said Judicial Watch President Tom Fitton.
Judicial Watch has successfully sued several states for having voting rolls that did not comply with the National Voter Registration Act of 1993.
Other Washington counties showed registration rates above the maximum eligible voter rate: Garfield County, Pend Oreille County, San Juan County, Wahkiakum County, Stevens County, Pacific County, Clark County, Island County, Klickitat County, Thurston County, Lincoln County, Whatcom County, and Asotin County.
The Judicial Watch study indicates that Jefferson County has 2,770 ghost voters on its rolls. The Auditor reports there were 27,701 registrations on record for the November 3 election. That number of ballots would have been mailed out to whatever addresses were on record. According to the Judicial Watch findings, 11% of that number are not eligible voters for one reason or another.
In August, Port Townsend Free Press reported on how Jefferson County had invited non-residents to vote as though they were county residents by sending ballots to a couple that had moved to Texas. We never got an explanation from Jefferson County Auditor Rose Ann Carroll. We are reaching out to her again to seek her response to the Judicial Watch study and will report what she has to say if she answers our questions. We will also contact the Secretary of State Kim Wyman for her response.
Update: The table that accompanied the press release seems to be missing the data for Washington state. I have contacted Judicial Watch and requested that information.
Update: In response to this article, I was contacted by a couple in Arizona saying they had received Jefferson County ballots, and woman in Jefferson County who says a ballot was delivered for her daughter who moved to Texas about 2 years ago.
Update: I have not yet received from Judicial Watch the data they used. I am trying to speak with their public information officer, and was told I could reach her tomorrow. If you read their data on other states, they are using several categories of data, not just a fixed “eligible” versus “registered” comparison.
Jefferson County Auditor Rose Ann Carroll in an email to County Manager Phillip Morley says the Judicial Watch analysis is incorrect. I will pass this on to Judicial Watch and seek their explanation. I also sent an email to the Auditor to ask how she calculated precisely 30,107 eligible voters and what steps her office takes to prevent people in other states from getting ballots, and why those measures appear to have failed.
The number of voters receiving ballots in Carroll’s email to the city manager, 7,704, differs from the number of registered voters on the 11/6/20 canvas, which is 7,751, and is different than the number of registered voters shown on the Auditor’s website for “Current Election Results,” which is 7,701.
Yet Another Update: I stumbled on the Washington data in the table accompanying the Judicial Watch press release. It was not near the alphabetical end of their table, but in the middle. They grouped states by two categories and I initially missed that. Their data is taken from the Secretary of State’s website which apparently differs greatly with what the Jefferson County Auditor is reporting. The Washington Secretary of State, according to Judicial Watch, shows a total voter registration figure of 29,221 (the last figure to the right). That is the sum of active and inactive registrations from the immediately two proceeding columns. The eligible voter population they are reporting is 26,780, based on the Census Bureau’s most recent five-year estimate, which comes from data collected the monthly American Community Surveys. We still have a lot of unanswered questions. Auditor Carroll has promised an explanation to the Chair of the Jefferson County GOP by week’s end. By then I may have more information from Judicial Watch, as well.
I checked the link to the Secretary of State’s data (not active in the above snipped image, but in the original table) and it does not match the total or even active registration numbers on the Judicial Watch table. The SOS reports a total Jefferson County registration of 7,704. That is what the SOS shows as of now. I can’t say if there were different numbers there when Judicial Watch gathered its data. Also, I don’t know the source of the “inactive” registration figure. Back to waiting to hear from Judicial Watch and the Auditor.
$100 million, that is the amount of the claims by Joe D’Amico and two of his companies against Jefferson County and former Sheriff David Stanko. This is by far the largest claim filed by D’Amico in his running court battles with Jefferson County spanning almost two decades. He has lost some, he’s won some. Here’s a look at what this lawsuit is about.
The Parties
The suit is pending in the United States District Court in Tacoma. Plaintiffs are Joe D’Amico and Fort Discovery Corp. and Security Services Northwest, Inc., two companies D’Amico owns. Plaintiffs’ attorneys are Greg Overstreet, who is in-house counsel for the corporations, Charles Maudell of Bellevue, and as lead counsel Wright Noel of the firm of Carson & Noel of Issaquah.
Defendants are Jefferson County, David Stanko and Robert Gebo. Stanko is the former Jefferson County Sheriff. Gebo worked for Stanko as an investigator. The current county commissioners and former county commissioner Kathleen Kler were originally named in the suit but have been dismissed. Attorneys for Defendants are Chief Civil Deputy Prosecuting Attorney Phillip Hunsucker and Andrew Cooley of the Seattle firm Keating, Bucklin & McCormack.
The Claims
Plaintiffs’ Amended Complaint begins with the statement: “As the demographics of Jefferson County changed from a rural mostly working-class population to a retirement community for the wealthy, Joseph D’Amico and his companies…were caught in the crosshairs….The political powers in the County do not like guns or people using guns.” As a result, D’Amico alleges that county officials conspired to run his businesses out of Jefferson County by various illegal means.
When D’Amico resisted in the courts, public forums, newspapers and the Internet, it is alleged, the county retaliated. He alleges that county officials sought to destroy his business by contacting his customers with false or harmful statements they knew would cause him injury. He alleges that county officials caused Facebook to suspend his advertising account. He alleges that the county opened a criminal investigation and issued press releases stating that he was under criminal investigation, with the intent and purpose of hurting his business–even though no criminal investigation was being conducted against him and no criminal charges have ever been filed. When D’Amico attempted to move his operations from Discovery Bay to remote forest land, he alleges the retaliation followed and resulted in preventing him from opening a commercial range on his newly acquired property.
Defendants deny all of D’Amico’s claims, though they do admit some facts.
Allegations Against Stanko and Gebo
To this writer, the most serious and troubling allegations, if true, concern former Sheriff Stanko and his investigator, Robert Gebo. Some of the other claims may not go anywhere, but this one, even at this early stage, seems to have legs. If true, this would be another case of what I wrote about in “Port Townsend’s Hatred and Intolerance Problem.” We have already too many instances of businesses run off for not toeing some unwritten conduct and thought code. Ironically, for a community that brands itself as welcoming and inclusive, the victims have been minority families. I believe someone named D’Amico falls into the category of a minority businessman, especially in this community. The family behind the Lobo del Mar enterprise in Port Hadlock, a racially and ethnically mixed extended family that suddenly left town, had also been the subject of a questionable Stanko-directed investigation that never produced any evidence of criminality. That incident may resurface as this litigation progresses.
This article will be limited to examining the documented claims and defenses surrounding D’Amico’s allegations against Stanko and his investigator. That is complicated enough for one report. Subsequent reporting will explain other claims. I appreciate the time and materials provided me by attorneys Overstreet and Hunsucker which make it possible for readers to get a picture of what is going on in the lawsuit.
Stanko was Sheriff from November 25, 2014 to December 31, 2018. Stanko lost his bid for re-election to his own Undersheriff, Joe Nole. What follows are allegations by both sides which must be proven in court. I do not express any opinion on whether they are true or false or whether, even if true, they would entitle D’Amico to judgment in his favor.
D’Amico’s Allegations:
In late 2016 or early 2017, Stanko “took the lead on behalf of the County on efforts to shut down the gun range,” D’Amico states. Stanko met personally with people described as “politically powerful” opponents to D’Amico’s gun range operations. After this meeting, Stanko “intensified” his efforts, and implemented an allegedly illegal plan to shut down the gun range, which was then called Fort Discovery and located on property on the western side of Discovery Bay.
Stanko and Gebo are accused of contacting D’Amico’s customers and telling them not to use the gun range, or feeding them information that resulted in driving them off. The damage was caused by telling them that D’Amico was under law enforcement investigation for violating a “2009 court order,” even though there was no such order, and that the Prosecuting Attorney would soon be filing a legal action to shut down the gun range, which never happened.
In a letter expanding on D’Amico’s Damage Claim Form (a document that must be filed before filing suit), attorney Overstreet lays out facts suggesting that Gebo’s investigation was pretextual. At one point, the county issued a statement that D’Amico was under “criminal investigation,” a very damaging allegation to someone in D’Amico’s line of work of serving law enforcement and military clients. The supposed “crime” being investigated, though, appears from Gebo’s emails to have been a question whether sandwiches and other food consumed by a handful of police officers at the Fort Discovery range was prepared there or elsewhere–two years prior to the inquiries being made. Not incidentally, there are no criminal penalties in the County’s health code sections pertaining to food service.
The plan to scare off D’Amico’s customers worked, the complaint alleges. By May 2017 all of Fort Discovery’s military and law enforcement customers had terminated their contracts with D’Amico, causing him hundreds of thousands of dollars in losses.
Current Sheriff Nole could be a key witness, not for the county and Stanko, but for D’Amico. It is alleged that as Undersheriff Nole told Stanko, then his boss, and Special Investigator Gebo, that it was improper to contact D’Amico’s customers to persuade them to stop doing business with D’Amico.
The County’s Response:
All defendants deny these allegations. In its answers to interrogatories, Defendants say that for fifteen years prior to 2001 there were no disputes until D’Amico began training law enforcement and military on his gun range and began making “A LOT OF NOISE.” (Upper case is used in the interrogatory answers.)
The county’s interrogatory answers go on to recount the subsequent long history of litigation with D’Amico. Sometimes D’Amico won. Sometimes the county won. They have paid each other’s attorney fees and costs over the years. D’Amico’s in-house attorney Greg Overstreet may be the state’s top attorney on the Inspection of Public Records Act. He authored the Bar Association’s voluminous manual on the law. After years of battling Overstreet in court, Jefferson County Chief Civil Prosecutor Hunsucker may also be up there in the ranks of the state’s top IPRA lawyers.
One very key legal fight the County says D’Amico lost was a decision by a hearing officer regarding the permissible scope of activities at the Fort Discovery range. The County asserts that the hearing officer ruled that training and use of the range by persons not employed by D’Amico was not a grandfathered use and not covered by any special use permit.
While not a “2009 court ruling,” it is a 2009 Hearing Examiner Decision. The County asserts that D’Amico violated the terms of the decision, indeed, that he effectively admits doing so in the complaint in this case.
The County also recounts receiving a high volume of complaints about noise from the Fort Discovery range and unsuccessful attempts to resolve the noise and land use issues with D’Amico.
The County generally states it has no information about the actions of Sheriff Stanko in regard to any investigation he conducted into D’Amico and his businesses, but appears to have been in possession of emails about contacts between Investigator Gebo and D’Amico’s customers.
Stanko’s Response:
Stanko’s answers to interrogatories state his side of the case, and sometimes conflict with what the county says. Sometimes he contradicts himself. He admits to meeting with people on Discovery Bay, but insists it was only about noise complaints. The county does have a noise ordinance and the Sheriff is charged with enforcing it. As for land use regulations, Stanko states unequivocally, “I do not enforce the land use code.” He says that he only enforced laws criminal in nature with exceptions such as animal control and noise. But when explaining why he investigated D’Amico he quickly contradicts himself: “We suspected [D’Amico] was violating the noise ordinance and possibly health codes.”
Enforcement of the health code is rarely a matter of criminal law. Stanko does not explain what part of the health code was possibly being violated. As discussed above, it may have been whether sandwiches were made on or off site.
Stanko admits that he had his investigator look into who D’Amico’s customers were on the grounds that D’Amico should not be allowing third parties to be there. That is not a criminal matter; it is a zoning issue, a land use regulation which the Sheriff earlier stated he did not enforce.
Stanko’s answers also stand in contrast to the interrogatory answer of the county as to what investigations have been launched against D’Amico. The county revealed that Stanko had Gebo investigate “possible violations of tax laws” as well as possible health and safety code violations. It is highly unusual, if not unprecedented for a county sheriff to launch an investigation of possible violations of tax laws. No information is provided as to what the tax laws in question may have been.
No prosecutions have been brought against D’Amico or any of his companies for criminal violation of tax laws, or violation of health or safety codes. Nor was D’Amico formally charged with violation of the county’s noise ordinance.
Jury Trial
All parties have demanded a jury trial, and the claims against Stanko and Gebo may make it there. There already appear to be plenty of issues of fact which will require a jury to decide. Plus, there will presumably be evidence from D’Amico’s former customers who will testify about what they were told by Gebo or Stanko. One key factual element D’Amico will have to prove is intent. Stanko’s denial that he enforced land use regulations when there are emails by Gebo stating he was investigating possible land use regulation violations at the Sheriff’s instruction do not help Stanko’s credibility. Stuff like investigating where sandwiches were made two years ago looks like a pretext for contacting D’Amico’s customers, knowing full well the damage that just the whiff of a law enforcement investigation would do to D’Amico’s business. There is much discovery to be conducted. Depositions will be taken. If Nole provides evidence, as the complaint alleges, that he told Stanko and Gebo it was improper to contact D’Amico’s customers with the goal of persuading them to not use D’Amico’s range, the case could get a significant boost and not require relying so much on the inference of intent from other facts.
Its financial reports have never been reliable, according to all the audits conducted of the Fort Worden Public Development Authority by the State Auditor. Every audit since the FWPDA opened its doors has found inaccuracies, omissions and failures to comply with required accounting practices. Recent discoveries, which will be addressed in upcoming audits, have uncovered massive malfeasance and irresponsibility that jeopardize the organization’s continued existence.
The first audit of FWPDA by the State Auditor found that for its first two years of operation, 2014 and 2015, the organization grossly misstated income and revenue.
The full audit report for 2014 and 2015 may be read by clicking here.
In response to these findings, the PDA informed the State Auditor that it was “implementing procedures to ensure internal controls are put in place and adhere[d] to in order to address this finding….” The PDA stated that this action was “our priority.” Further, the PDA said that it “has also established an Audit Committee to oversee future annual reporting as an extra measure to make sure accurate reporting takes place.”
The State Auditor recommended strongly that staff receive the adequate training and resources needed to do their job of preparing accurate accounts. PDA pledged this would be done.
But problems got worse.
In its audit for 2016 and 2017, the State Auditor reported an even longer list of adverse findings. This time the FWPDA attempted to blame its own failures on the State Auditor.
The full report of the 2016 and 2017 audit may be read by clicking here.
The adverse finding include:
–reports filed late by 544 days for 2016 and 180 days for 2017.
–failure to disclose $3.5 million of debt.
–cash flow statements with mathematical errors for both years.
–deposit liabilities misclassified as deposit inflows in the amount of about half a million dollars each year.
–operating expenses and liabilities misstated for both years.
–failure each year to prepare the required Management’s Discussion and Analysis.
–failure to observe generally accepted accounting practices in the presentation of basic financial statements.
Once again the State Auditor recommended that FWPDA adequately train staff responsible for preparing financial statements “and implement effective secondary review to ensure financial statements are accurate, complete and submitted in accordance with GAPP [Generally Accepted Principles and Practices].”
In response, FWPDA argued it was the State Auditor’s fault that its reports were late. It additionally tried claiming that the reports had actually been uploaded timely, but someone just had not hit “send” for a period of more than a year and a half for the 2016 report and half a year for the 2017 report.
The State Auditor responded to this attempt at blame shifting by stating, “The Authority provided our office multiple revisions to the financial statements resulting in additional procedures which elongated the audit.”
The State Auditor and FWPDA also argued about whether the Fort Worden Foundation should be reported as a component unit of FWPDA. The Foundation was created in 2016 to conduct year-round fundraising for FWPDA. At its most recent Board of Directors meeting, October 28, 2020, that issue again surfaced when Acting Executive Director David Timmons agreed with the State Auditor and said that the Foundation must be included from now on in the PDA’s financial reporting.
Once again, the State Auditor urged FWPDA to adequately train and equip its financial reporting staff to do its job right. And, once again, FWPDA responded with the same promise it used to answer the Auditor’s adverse findings for 2014 and 2015:
The State Auditor will next audit and report findings for 2018 and 2019. Acting Executive Director Timmons has announced that as part of its preparation of reports for the State Auditor, an “accountability audit” will be conducted to investigate how FWPDA’s financial affairs have reached the point where, to use his words, it has become “a house of cards” with any one of many events capable of triggering a “cascade” of catastrophic failures and defaults.
In our first report on this matter, we discuss how Timmons has stepped in after FWPDA’s long-time Executive Director retired and the bad news he has delivered to the Board as he uncovered “an overwhelming” volume of serious financial problems. You may read that report by clicking here.
Fort Worden is in big trouble. The public development authority that runs the commercial operations at the state park is teetering on the brink of financial collapse. This should not have come as a surprise to the people charged with the fiduciary duty of overseeing Fort Worden’s operations.
Back in 2017 the State Auditor issued findings of deficiencies in internal financial controls of the Fort Worden Public Development Authority (FWPDA). That is the entity that runs all of Fort Worden except for the camping areas and trails, which remain under the control of the State Parks Department. The deficiencies identified by the State Auditor undermined the ability of the FWPDA to produce reliable and accurate financial statements, or to account accurately for how it was spending money. As reported by the Port Townsend Leader:
After receiving the audit, which was published March 9, the FWPDA board designated its executive committee – chair Norm Tonina, vice chair Gee Heckscher, treasurer Jeff Jackson and secretary Jane Kilburn – as the audit committee. CEO Dave Robison and CFO Diane Moody are also in place to support the committee. The executive committee meets monthly, with any audit-related topics to be scheduled for these meetings.
Despite that enhanced oversight and the monthly meetings, the State Auditor in a report released this year again found material failures in FWPDA’s financial statements for a two-year period, including 2017, when the enhanced oversight was supposed to be detecting, correcting and preventing deficiencies in internal controls and reporting. As reported by the Peninsula Daily News, “Diane Moody, the PDA’s chief financial officer, and Executive Director Dave Robison issued a memo to the board last week that said the PDA is forming a finance and audit committee as a result.”
The question arises: what happened to the executive committee that was supposed to have been meeting since March 2017 to scrutinize financial affairs?
Now the State Auditor is taking an even more critical look in the wake of revelations that FWPDA’s financial condition is a “house of cards” ready to topple in weeks and facing long term shortfalls in the millions of dollars. The Leader’s front-page story quotes acting CEO David Timmons at length about numerous discoveries of malfeasance, irresponsibility and recklessness.
Timmons stepped in after Dave Robison, CEO for 9 years, retired in September. Timmons has discovered that the FWPDA had been using 19 credit cards, and run up a balance of $60,000 on one card. With millions of dollars in lines of credit, the FWPDA was using credit cards with 29% interest rates to make purchases and cover expenses. Loan proceeds designated for capital projects were being used to cover operating costs. Like the Cherry Street Project, costs were vastly underestimated and funds are not available to pay contractors and finish construction projects.
The numbers are so huge, the shortfalls so staggering, FWPDA may collapse early next year when its multi-million dollar lines of credit expire and other major loans come due.
How could this have happened?
I submit this is another manifestation of the Cherry Street Project Disease. This affliction plagues local ambitious public undertakings and is caused by a political insularity and monoculture that admits no dissension or critical thinking. The afflicted project develops symptoms of irresponsible grandiosity and detachment from hard realities.
Just as the Cherry Street Project got no hard look from a City Council that shamed dissent and critical thinking, the FWPDA has succumbed to the same malady. It was created out of the same closed circles that comprise the city’s elite. Early questioning and criticism from those outside the circles of Mayor-for-Life Michelle Sandoval were brushed aside, ridiculed and ignored. Group think prevailed. The self-serving dream of large, generous infusions of taxpayer money, to be delivered by political allies, made it possible to suppress doubts and obviate the necessity for just a little healthy skepticism and vigilance.
Former FWPDA CEO Robison worked in City Hall from 1990 to 1996. When it was discovered he had misrepresented his qualifications to get his job, he seamlessly landed on his feet at the Northwest Maritime Center. After that, he became CEO of the FWPDA in 2010.
Unlike the amateurish group behind the failed $2.3 million-and-counting Cherry Street Project, the FWPDA Board should have known better. Its Board members are highly experienced people with backgrounds in business and finance. Norm Tonina, its co-chair and a founder, is a Director of First Federal Savings & Loan. He was supposed to be a member of the enhanced oversight group created in March 2017, but needing resurrection this year. Treasurer Jeffrey Jackson is managing director of a venture capital firm, and for 13 years was chief financial officer of a $3 billion corporation.
The FWPDA Board says it is stunned by what Timmons has discovered.
The consequences of a collapse of the FWPDA will be a lot more devastating for Port Townsend than the demise of the Cherry Street Project. It is past time for the elites and decision-makers to welcome to the table a few people from outside their circles who are unafraid to ask hard questions, and push courageously for uncomfortable answers. Steel sharpens steel. Diversity makes us stronger. What we have now is like a family seeing the consequences of generations of inbreeding. New blood from other gene pools is desperately needed.
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