L&I issues $650K in fines after ag worker death in East Wenatchee

Gubernatorial candidates Democrat Bob Ferguson and Republican Dave Reichert are set to debate twice in September, after an announcement Thursday that an October debate would not take place. 

“I’m looking forward to both of our September debates with Dave Reichert,” Ferguson said in a Twitter post Friday. “Encouraging everyone to watch on September 10th and September 18th!”

A televised debate hosted by The Seattle Times and KING 5 News will occur at 8 p.m. on Sept. 10 in Seattle. 

The Sept. 18 debate will be in Spokane. The Association of Washington Business and Greater Spokane Inc. will host and NonStop Local KHQ-TV will broadcast the event at 6 p.m.

Initial reports that Ferguson “withdrew” from the Oct. 11 event, planned by the Seattle City Club, were “too strong of a description to summarize what happened,” the organization’s executive director, Alicia Crank, clarified in a post on social media site X Friday. 

Seattle City Club scheduled the October debate to take place at Central Washington University in Ellensburg, and would have included the participation of Cascade PBS and three other news outlets.

Crank explained that while both campaigns agreed to “save the date” for the event and had proactive follow-up from each candidate after the primary, the organization was told a “formal confirmation would come if the other side did so first.” 

She noted that Reichert’s campaign initially declined, but that Ferguson’s campaign said they would participate if Reichert’s campaign changed their mind. 

“In good faith, we kept the lines of communication going, and the Reichert campaign decided to commit,” Crank said. “After notifying the Ferguson campaign of this update, they chose without explanation to decline anyway.”

Ferguson’s campaign told Cascade PBS in a phone call that the claims of Ferguson pulling out or withdrawing from the debate were “inaccurate,” as a formal agreement had never been made.

Reichert told news site The Center Square in an email that he was disappointed about the outcome. 

“I urge him to change course and join me on stage on October 11,” Reichert wrote. 

Ferguson, the current state attorney general, and Reichert, a former Congressman and King County Sheriff, will face off in November’s general election.

Elections officials throughout the state will conduct a hand recount to determine who will appear on the general election ballot in the Commissioner for Public Lands race.

Just 51 votes separate Democrat Dave Upthegrove and Republican Sue Kuehl Pederson in the contest to face former U.S. Rep. Jaime Herrera Beutler, a Republican, who came in first place in the August primary. 

After the first count, Upthegrove has 396,300 votes to Kuehl Pederson’s 396,249. That’s a difference of 0.0064%. In a primary, an automatic hand recount is triggered when the difference between the second- and third-place candidates is less than one quarter of one percent and also less than 1,000 votes.

The Office of the Secretary of State said that county election offices estimate the manual recount will take seven business days to complete. The Office certified the results of the Aug. 6 primary on Thursday.

Before this, the closest statewide race in a Washington primary was the 1960 superintendent of public instruction primary, in which A. T. Van Devanter and Harold L. Anderson were separated by 252 votes, according to the Secretary of State’s Office. (Van Devanter made it to the general election, but lost to Louis Bruno.)

The Secretary of State’s Office reported that 1.9 million voters, a turnout of 40.9%, took part in the Aug. 6 state primary. That was a higher turnout than in 2022 (40.4%), but a lower turnout than 2020 (54.4%). 

The Washington State Patrol admitted to losing an unknown amount of emails and public records after a data migration failure last year led to the permanent deletion of those documents.

Internal communications reviewed by Cascade PBS warned that “hundreds of thousands” of emails were potentially missing, but Chris Loftis, the patrol’s communications director, told the news outlet in an email that “the specific extent of unrecoverable emails is yet to be fully realized” as the agency has “no accurate inventory or method to calculate the total number.” Loftis stressed that the initial speculation of hundreds of thousands of missing documents is now determined to be excessive.

The issue became known to State Patrol staff in mid-2023, and internal emails show the issue was first noticed when folders for certain lawsuits, which should have contained emails, legal filings and attachments, were found to be empty. Emails regarding audits, policy changes, accreditations and claims are also missing, as are certain vaccine mandate emails.

“Importantly, we do not foresee impacts on active or past investigations and criminal records as any email would be replicated and recorded separately as part of a case file,” Loftis added. “Thus, at this point, we see this as a procedural and administrative challenge and not a challenge to our core responsibilities in law enforcement.”

Internal communications at the State Patrol showed concerns that the records management department would be “hampered in civil legal defense for years to come” as a result of the missing documents.

“Not only will we be blind to information we need and surprised in litigation, we may need to duplicate huge volumes of work,” the email read.

Loftis said the agency continues to “monitor the situation to mitigate potential challenges related to the unrecoverable emails,” but that so far they have not seen any “material impacts” and “are hopeful that trend continues.”

Asked if the agency had notified the governor’s or attorney general’s offices of the missing documents, Loftis confirmed that both offices were notified after Cascade PBS began inquiring about the issue, but he was “not sure what other communications may or may not have transpired” since 2023.

Krist Novoselić, Robert F. Kennedy Jr. and Cornel West have qualified to be among the eight minor-party presidential candidates and one independent ticket to appear this November on Washington’s general-election ballot. Barring challenges, they are slated to appear alongside the Republican and Democratic nominees for president.

The minor-party and independent tickets qualified for the general-election ballot with 1,000 signatures gathered during a state convention this year. Parties and candidates were notified Tuesday of their qualification for the Washington ballot.

The Republican Party, which held its convention in July, has nominated former President Donald Trump and his running mate JD Vance as its presidential ticket. The Democratic Party certified its presidential nominee Vice President Kamala Harris and her running mate Tim Walz earlier this month.

At stake are Washington’s 12 votes in the electoral college. Novoselić has said he is running only so that a new centrist party, the Cascade Party of Washington, will be recognized as a bona fide minor political party in this state.

The minor parties, presidential candidates and running mates are:

• We the People Party: Robert F. Kennedy Jr., Nicole Shanahan
• Green Party: Jill Stein, Samson LeBeau Kpadenou
• Socialism and Liberation Party: Claudia De la Cruz, Karina Garcia
• Socialist Workers Party: Rachele Fruit, Dennis Richter
• Socialist Equality Party: Joseph Kishore, Jerry White
• Libertarian Party: Chase Oliver, Mike ter Maat
• Cascade Party: Krist Novoselić, James Carroll
• Justice for All Party: Cornel West, Melina Abdullah
• Independent candidate: Shiva Ayyadurai, Crystal Ellis

Challenges to their nominations must be filed in Thurston County Superior Court by five days after the candidates were notified. The Washington Democratic Party is challenging Kennedy’s nomination, saying the signatures were not gathered at a party convention, according to the Washington State Standard.

General-election ballots will be mailed on Oct. 18 and must be returned by Nov. 5. On that ballot, alongside president, Washington voters will also choose the winners of ten statewide races, including governor, attorney general, U.S. senator, all its congressional representatives and a large portion of the state legislature, as well as weigh in on statewide ballot measures.

Correction Aug. 19, 2024: An earlier version of this story listed the incorrect number of statewide races.

Public Lands Commissioner Hilary Franz has conceded in her race to represent Washington’s 6th Congressional District.  

As of Thursday afternoon, Franz had placed third in the open seat contest with 25.6% of the vote, behind fellow Democrat Emily Randall with 33.7% and Republican Drew MacEwen with 30.3%.  

In a statement Thursday, Franz said she called Randall, a state senator from Bremerton, to congratulate her win in the primary and said they needed to work together to keep the seat Democratic and move the House toward a Democratic majority.  

“It is time for us to work harder than ever so we can flip the House, defeat Donald Trump and defend our democracy,” Franz said.  

Franz’s concession ends her nearly yearlong run to move up from her current state executive office. Franz briefly campaigned for governor before shifting to a run for Congress after U.S. Rep. Derek Kilmer announced his retirement. Kilmer endorsed Franz for the position.  

The district includes the Olympic and Kitsap peninsulas and large swaths of Tacoma. 

Republican Leslie Lewallen has conceded the race for the 3rd Congressional District seat and endorsed fellow Republican Joe Kent, who currently is second in the primary.

In what looks to be a repeat of the 2022 general election matchup, U.S. Rep. Marie Gluesenkamp Perez, a Democrat, is leading the pack in southwestern Washington with 46.87% of the vote in early returns. Kent is second with 38.32%.

Lewallen, who ran as an alternative to Kent, received 12.43% of the vote.

However, in a statement Tuesday night, Lewallen said her focus is to get a Republican back in the seat.

“We are at a pivotal crossroads right now between strength and success and weakness and failure. There is no margin for error and we have to flip this seat,” she said. “I support Joe Kent in his campaign to defeat Marie Gluesenkamp Perez. We need to get this country back on track because southwest Washington deserves better."

Perez defeated Kent in 2022, flipping the seat Democratic after incumbent U.S. Rep. Jaime Herrera Beutler did not advance to the general election — she placed behind both candidates in that year’s primary. Herrera Beutler was one of 10 Republicans, along with Dan Newhouse of Washington’s 4th Congressional District, who voted to impeach Trump in 2021. She returned to politics this year when she decided to run for Public Lands Commissioner, where she is currently leading in the primary.

Kent, a Trump-endorsed candidate, has gained a higher profile through frequent appearances on FOX News.

The 3rd Congressional District includes Klickitat, Skamania, Clark, Cowlitz, Wahkiakum, Pacific and Lewis counties and a small part of southern Thurston County.

A new state audit found that the future of the Marysville School District could be in jeopardy as the financial condition of the district declines.

The report from the Office of the Washington State Auditor, released on Monday, said the eroding financial situation in the district, with approximately 9,700 students, “raises substantial doubt about its ability to continue.”

“This is the most alarming audit of a public school’s finances in 17 years,” said State Auditor Pat McCarthy in a news release. “Local leaders have a financial and a community responsibility to right their ship. The stakes are too high for Marysville and its children.”

The last time a public school district in Washington was in a comparable situation was when the smaller Vader School District dissolved in 2007 after its financial condition deteriorated and a maintenance and operation levy failed.

Revenue decreases in Marysville stem from declining enrollment as well as a double levy failure in 2022, the report noted. Additionally, executive management and the school board have not “taken the necessary steps to guarantee the district can meet its financial obligations.”

Those challenges were amplified by staffing transitions in key decision-making roles, the report added.

Ideally, school districts should have more than 60 days’ worth of operating expenses in their general fund, but at the end of August 2023, Marysville School District maintained only about 18.6 days’ worth of operating expenditures. Recent audits of the district’s financial reports through June 2024 showed more expenditures than funds — a negative balance equaling 11.6 days of operating expenses.

Auditors originally set out to review Marysville’s finances ending in August 2023, but they continued to work through the current fiscal year due to “subsequent events involving the school’s financial condition.”

The Office of Superintendent of Public Instruction and the local educational service district assisted the district in August of last year, after it was unable to submit a balanced budget and OSPI placed it in binding conditions. OSPI then convened a financial oversight committee to work with the Marysville School District. 

The Washington State Library and its counterpart in Wisconsin will work together for the next three years to encourage libraries at the public, tribal and community college level to implement tabletop role-playing game activities. 

The federal Institute of Museum and Library Services gave Wisconsin and Washington a $249,500 grant to make it happen. 

Seattle nonprofit Game to Grow, the University of Wisconsin-Madison and Heart of the Deernicorn, an Olympia-based gaming studio and workshop, will collaborate on creating a digital toolkit guide for libraries to implement games-based services. 

The Wisconsin/Washington project builds on an existing program that has awarded more than 50 grants to Washington libraries for tabletop game programs. 

Wizards of the Coast donated 75 boxes of the popular tabletop game Dungeons & Dragons to the Washington State Library in March so all library system in the state could have a gaming kit for patrons to use. Break from Reality Games, a Seattle-based company, also donated grip mats to Washington libraries. 

“We are so thankful for the support from the Institute of Museum and Library Services,” Washington State Librarian Sara Jones said in the press release. “This project will provide libraries with recommendations for equitable and accessible games-based services that will greatly benefit the community.”

CORRECTION: This brief has been updated to state that 75 boxes of the game Dungeons & Dragons was donated for all library systems, not all libraries in the state. 

As many as 675,000 low- and moderate-income Washington families are eligible for a $200 credit on their electric bills this fall.

The $150 million for the new program comes from the Climate Commitment Act, Washington’s new carbon-pricing system, which has already brought in more than $2 billion to invest in climate-related projects. 

People can apply for the credit at wacleanenergycredits.com, which will be distributed by Sept. 15, according to the Washington Department of Commerce.

Utility customers who are already enrolled in ratepayer assistance programs for seniors or low-income families, for example, may automatically receive a credit from their utility without applying. The state has set up a simple application for those who think they may also be qualified. 

To be eligible, a single person or family will have an income at or below 80 percent of the median income for their region of Washington. In Seattle, that threshold is $77,800 for a single person, $88,800 for a family of two and $111,000 for a family of four.

The rebate — which was proposed by the governor and legislative leaders and passed in the state budget this past March — is to be distributed as a $150 million grant to the state’s utilities to pass on to their customers. The clean-energy rebates are designed to help people deal with any financial burdens related to the cap-and-invest program.

Inslee, whose tenure as governor expires next January, said at a news conference in Seattle on Monday that the Legislature can easily keep the $200 credit program going in future budgets.

“It’s a great thing for 675,000 families to be eligible for this credit,” Inslee said.

Brian Heywood, main financial backer of an initiative to repeal the cap-and-invest program in a November referendum, criticized the credits, saying they are an attempt to “bribe people into keeping the [Climate Commitment Act] operational even though it’s done nothing to curb carbon emissions.”

While opponents of the cap-and-invest program focus mostly on gas prices, supporters point to industries being pushed to decrease harmful carbon emissions while raising money to fund more than 100 energy-saving, health, and ferry-related projects, including insulation and heat pumps to shrink energy costs.

Inslee said that if opponents of the cap-and-invest program are successful in repealing it in November, there is no guarantee it would shrink gas prices.

“The [opponents] are trying to take $200 from these families,” Inslee said, noting that the credits are provided by cap-and-invest revenue. “I think that was reprehensible. They are trying to eliminate something that already exists.”

A lawsuit was filed Monday against the Office of the Attorney General for withholding documents in response to a public records request and violating the state’s Public Records Act.

The lawsuit filed Monday noted that while the AG’s office is legally obligated to represent state agencies, three private law firms were instead hired to defend the Department of Children, Youth and Families in Le’taxione v. State of Washington, DCYF et al.The plaintiff in the larger case alleging civil rights violations has been unsuccessful through public records requests in seeking contracts and communications regarding the other law firms.

Plaintiff Le’taxione first filed a public records request with the AG’s office in May pertaining to the relationship between the AG’s office and the three law firms, but to date the office has not provided sufficient contracts or communications pursuant to the request. Some documents have been released according to the lawsuit, but key records have still not been provided.

DCYF and caseworkers for the agency have illegally prevented Le’taxione from visitation with his daughter, the lawsuit noted.

“DCYF colluded with, and used, the Office of the Attorney General to submit false documents to the Court, prevent visits and cover up for DCYF’s illegal, racist treatment of Le’taxione,” the lawsuit claims. “This alarmed the Spokane County Superior Court, which questioned ‘whether or not virtually any of the information [provided by the AG’s Office] can be trusted.’”

The attorney representing Le’taxione, David P. Moody, said in an email to Cascade PBS that his client is entitled to the readily available public records from the AG’s office, “but all we get are stall tactics and excuses.”

“We have seen this time and time again from this Office of the Attorney General,” Moody added.

The AG's office said they could not comment on the lawsuit until they had time to review the case. Spokeswoman Brionna Aho said the office hadn't been served as of Monday afternoon. She said the office relies on outside attorneys for a variety of reasons, including a lack of capacity, a need for particular expertise, or to avoid a conflict of interest or the appearance of a conflict.

As the lawsuit noted, discovery sanctions have previously been imposed against the AG’s office in several other cases, including a 2014 lawsuit in which the office was sanctioned for more than $107,000 for withholding documents; a 2016 lawsuit in which the office was sanctioned for failure to preserve documents related to the Oso landslide; and most recently a 2023 lawsuit in which a King County judge sanctioned the office for the “cavalier” withholding of thousands of discovery documents in a lawsuit against a developmentally disabled woman.

The PRA lawsuit, filed Monday in Spokane, is asking for a judge’s order to produce all records requested by the plaintiff and for statutory penalties against the AG’s office, plus attorney’s fees and fines.