GRANITE FALLS — The Granite Falls Civil Service Board, a police oversight commission, in March launched an investigation into allegations that Mayor Haroon Saleem has been meddling in police affairs.
The board’s investigation already was under way when Saleem requested an internal investigation into Police Chief Tony Domish’s behavior.
Police officers filed a complaint with the board alleging that their safety may have been compromised and suggested there may have been some sort of illegal conduct, according to city documents. The documents, obtained by The Herald under the state’s public disclosure laws, offer no specifics but inform the mayor that he may be under investigation.
The Herald also obtained a March 11 letter signed by Domish and all the police department’s full-time officers, asking the civil service commission to investigate.
The police officers wrote that a reserve officer’s identity may have been revealed while working an undercover drug investigation at the Timberline Cafe, a tavern owned and operated by Saleem. Among the dozen other allegations made were claims that Saleem threatened to fire police officers and had otherwise undermined their law enforcement authority.
Saleem said Thursday he welcomed the scrutiny.
“I’ve always welcomed that. I am like an open book,” he said.
He said he hasn’t been interviewed by the board, but he has seen the legal bills their work has created. The mayor said he questioned the spending because he’s trying to save the city money and carefully review all costs.
The board investigation does not appear to be connected to the Snohomish County Sheriff’s Office investigation of Domish, who Saleem on April 23 placed on leave.
The Domish investigation is focusing on “certain alleged actions and inactions” by the chief, according to a statement issued Wednesday by an attorney for the city. The statement clarified it was not a criminal investigation.
Civil service board chairman Bob Littlejohn did not return calls seeking comment and Paul Lutz, another member of the three-person board, said Thursday he wasn’t authorized to talk about the investigation.
The action by the civil service board in unusual, said Bob Meinig, an attorney with the Municipal Research and Services Center of Washington. Typically civil service boards review specific disciplinary action against civil service employees.
There’s likely little precedent for a civil service commission to investigate a mayor, he said.
Some information about the board’s investigation was in public records on file at City Hall.
The officers complained to the board that they had been forced to work in an “antagonistic work environment” that robbed them of their “peace of mind.”
Littlejohn in a March 18 letter to Saleem advised him that he planned to contact the city attorney. The board would then determine if additional resources were needed.
Saleem replied on April 12 after he’d received a bill from the attorney.
“In the future, I stress that all contact with our city attorneys is cleared by me first,” Saleem wrote, warning that otherwise the board would have to pay the legal bills on their own.
Littlejohn wrote back on April 30, saying that state law gives the board permission to use the city attorney. Because of Saleem’s “potential involvement in the situation under investigation it was not deemed appropriate for the board to ask for your permission,” Littlejohn wrote.
During the run-up to the November election, the police chief and Saleem sparred publicly. In mid-December, they announced they’d ironed out their differences.
In April, Domish conducted a drug sweep in the city. Saleem questioned Domish’s decision to invite television news crews to town to film some of the arrests.
A week later, Saleem removed Domish from his post.
In the days that followed the mayor was handed a petition supporting the chief. There were about 700 signatures.
Saleem on Thursday said many of the signatures are from schoolchildren and people who live outside the city limits.
“It is not a true reflection of the voters who voted me into office,” he said.
Saleem won 60 percent support from voters in November. About 800 people cast ballots in this town of about 3,000.
Jackson Holtz: 425-339-3437, jholtz@heraldnet.com.
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