LYNNWOOD — A complaint alleging city leaders violated state election law by using public resources in support of a 2014 ballot measure has been dismissed by the Public Disclosure Commission.
But the agency’s executive director warned Lynnwood City Council members their efforts to gauge the public’s attitude toward that transportation tax proposal nearly crossed the line.
“This letter serves to warn officials of the Lynnwood Transportation Benefit District not to conduct surveys in the future to determine what taxation level the public would support,” Evelyn Fielding Lopez wrote in the May 10 dismissal letter.
“To engage in this type of survey work could be viewed as an effort to promote a ballot proposition because it tells agency officials which funding option is most likely to be approved by voters,” she wrote.
The president of the City Council and a spokeswoman for the mayor said they are glad the matter is ended after a 20-month process that resulted in a 103-page report.
“The city is relieved that the issue has been resolved,” said city spokeswoman Julie Moore. “We take the advice of the Public Disclosure Commission and move forward.”
Council President M. Christopher Boyer said there was “never any intention of doing anything underhanded.”
“It’s interesting because we hired a respected consultant that did that work for us,” he said. “I’m glad it came out the way it did. It is just a good reminder that we all have to be careful.”
Don Gough, former Lynnwood mayor, filed the complaint Aug. 18, 2014. It focused on actions of council members serving in their capacity as directors of the citywide Transportation Benefit District.
The complaint alleged they broke the law by using city funds for political purposes, in this instance to boost support for the measure that became Proposition 1. That measure would have raised the sales tax by two-tenths of a penny and steered the new revenue into road projects. Voters rejected Proposition 1 in the November 2014 election.
The complaint centered on public outreach efforts carried out in the months before the directors drafted the measure and put it on the ballot. Those efforts, conducted by PRR Inc. under a $60,000 contract, included mailing a survey to 5,000 homes.
The survey contained 11 questions. Of those, four dealt with attitudes toward increasing the sales tax or boosting the vehicle license registration fee as a means of generating revenue.
City Attorney Rosemary Larson, in her written response to the original complaint, acknowledged those four questions were “inconsistent” to different degrees with state guidelines that say agencies should not conduct surveys to determine what taxation level people might embrace.
But, she contended, the survey was part of a much broader outreach effort and the inclusion of those questions did not break state law.
PDC investigators came to the same conclusion determining there was “insufficient evidence” of a “material violation,” according to a letter Lopez sent to Gough.
“I didn’t expect anything more or anything less,” Gough said Tuesday. “It isn’t that they didn’t find a violation. They didn’t find a material violation. The saving grace in all of this is (the PDC) sent a poisoned pen letter to (the city) to not do it again.”
Meanwhile, the city is still awaiting resolution of a lawsuit filed by Gough and former Lynnwood Council Member Ted Hikel accusing the council members of holding illegal meetings to conduct the business of the benefit district.
Jerry Cornfield: 360-352-8623;
Talk to us
> Give us your news tips.
> Send us a letter to the editor.
> More Herald contact information.
