(The Center Square) – Washington state lawmakers are calling on Attorney General Bob Ferguson to investigate alleged inappropriate and potentially criminal behavior in Mason County Fire District 12.
In a letter sent to Ferguson last week by Rep. Dan Griffey, R-Allyn, and Rep. Travis Couture, R-Allyn, the lawmakers urged an investigation based on a report issued by the Washington State Auditor’s Office that found misappropriation of public funds and other questionable activity.
The September 2022 report found the fire chief used a taxpayer-funded vehicle for personal purposes.
“We found the Fire Chief used the District vehicle for shopping and going to her spouse’s place of employment in Shelton, which is approximately 30 minutes away,” the report said.
The report also mentioned serious conflict of interest violations at the all-volunteer department.
The report goes on to say, “One of the commissioners is married to the District Secretary, the fire chief is their daughter, and those three are the only paid employees in the district,”
The audit also revealed the difficulty in getting cooperation from the chief and Board of Commissioners members.
“We asked the Fire Chief multiple times for supporting records such as credit card statements, invoices and receipts,” the report stated. “Many of our requests, made by email or telephone, were unanswered. When they send us documents, we got records that had been created by the District’s own internal computer system, and were therefore not source documents that allow us to independently verify expenditures were valid.”
Couture says constituents in the service area have lost all trust in the Board of Commissioners.
“This is a very rural area, and the fire station buildings are in disrepair; they’ve got old equipment and trucks,” he told The Center Square. “They need to be able to answer a call to save a life or put out a fire.”
Couture says the improper things that were going on a few years ago, have mostly been cleaned up, but “because of those actions and those bad things that occurred, it’s much harder for that district to do the things they need to, because the public has lost trust in them.”
He was referring to several fire district levies failing.
“We think if you break public trust and steal taxpayer dollars when you’re an elected public official, you should be investigated and held accountable,” Couture said.
So far, there has been no legal action taken on the audit findings.
The Center Square reached out to the State Auditor’s Office.
“We will be auditing the fire district again, and we will follow up on the issues we identified in our last report. The next audit is in the planning stages now,” an SAO spokesperson replied in an email. “Auditor Pat McCarthy made a personal effort to convey the seriousness of the issues at Fire District 12, including misappropriation of public funds and violations of the Open Public Meetings Act, to the commissioners and the local community. The State Auditor’s Office would hope to see significant improvement in our next review.”
The Center Square also reached out to the AGO.
“We will be responding to the legislators,” a spokesperson replied in an email. “In short, as the legislators hopefully know, we do not have criminal jurisdiction without a formal referral from the county prosecutor. We do not have that referral. The State Auditor did not refer the matter to us. We understand that it has been referred to law enforcement in Mason County that has jurisdiction. We trust the legislators do not want us to engage in an unlawful investigation.”
“District 12 has completely lost the respect of the community, so we have called on the attorney general to investigate,” Griffey, a career firefighter, explained.
Both lawmakers believe the AGO has the authority to investigate.
“I have a bill that addresses this, but it probably won’t get a hearing. It says if malfeasance, misfeasance are founded by the auditor, then commissioners are suspended, not terminated but suspended and temporary commissioners can be appointed, until we find out the truth,” Griffey said.
“We have asked the Mason County Prosecutor to get involved, but he is absolutely overwhelmed; I think he’s only got two deputy prosecutors now, and the caseload is through the roof.”
Griffey added that the Mason County Sheriff’s Department “has done yeoman’s work in looking into all this and we’re very grateful.”
