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Port of Tacoma fined for violating Public Records Act

The port was delivered a $159,000 fine for withholding public information.
Port of Tacoma.

A Pierce County Superior Court Judge fined the Port of Tacoma $159,000 after determining they were negligent in withholding public information.

This comes after some citizens tried to stop the methanol plant and the LNG plant with a ballot initiative.

In 2016, a Tacoma citizens group called Save Tacoma Water tried to get an initiative on the ballot that would require a public vote on businesses that want to build and use large volumes of water.

The initiative aimed to put a halt to the proposed Methanol Plant and LNG Plant.

After the port and other groups challenged it in court, the initiative didn't get on the ballot.

That's when Arthur West, a self-proclaimed ‘open government activist’ stepped-in.

"The government withholding records is always bad for the citizens," said West.

He's been the man behind several lawsuits against government agencies including the most recent battle against the Port of Tacoma.

"Under the campaign laws public agencies aren't supposed to get involved in initiative processes,” said West.

He filed a Public Record Request to get emails between the port and other agencies including Tacoma Pierce Chamber of Commerce and the Economic Development Council.

But, according to the judge’s ruling, the Port didn't hand over all of the documents it should have at the time.

"The Port of Tacoma had engaged in actual campaigning with the EDC and the chamber of commerce to squash the initiative," said West.

In a decision handed down by a Superior Court Judge in Pierce County, it said the port claimed it misinterpreted the request, never asked for clarification and was grossly negligent.

In a statement from the Port of Tacoma a spokesperson wrote:

The Port of Tacoma is a government agency accountable to the public, and we take those responsibilities very seriously.

We have a disciplined system to respond to public records requests as quickly and accurately as possible, and we continually look at procedures, tools, training and other ways to improve.

We are disappointed in the ruling, especially since we rectified the response as soon as we realized we had overlooked a few records. We also believe the ruling is inconsistent with similar case law.

We have not made any decisions about whether to appeal.

To help prevent this from happening again, we have changed our protocol for the initial response to a records request to ensure that we understand the request.

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