Thanks Cliff. So I'll call to order this 4 February 2026 meeting of the Seattle Ethics and Elections Commission. On the video we have Commissioner Hawes, Commissioner Smith,
Commissioner Pekelis and Vice-Chair Vassal, and myself, Commissioner Schirmer. A pretty short docket today starting with written public comment. Did we receive anything besides Mr. Chapman's written materials on the docket? No. Okay.
Perfect. Well we will go to our first action item, the appeal of dismissal in Case Number 2511061. Wayne, do you want to give us a quick introduction here? Yes. On 30 October, I consulted with then-Chair Commissioner Pekelis
about the fact that my wife at that time was in line for job if Katie Wilson was the Mayor. With that in mind, the Chair asked me to recuse myself on the matters relating to the Mayor's race, which I then did. Commissioner Pekelis then decided that Marc Mayo should be acting in my stead, which he did. One of the matters Marc handled was Mr. Chapman's 6 November complaint, which you have on the appeal
today involved alleging Bruce Harrell as Council President missused City resources in support of the Royal Esquire Club. Marc dismissed the complaint on 19 December citing the RCW 4.16.130, which is a catch-all provision that sets a two-year statute of limitations for matters in which there is NO statue of limitations assigned to the law.
Mr. Chapman filed an appeal on 2 January. Marc's last day in the office though was 23 January. So that is what brings us to today, and I'll do my best to defend Marc's dismissal and seek your approval of it
on the merits. I will be very brief. Mr. Mayo's analysis of the law is persuasive to me. Bainbridge Taxpayers Unite et al v. City of Bainbridge Island et al, No. 3:2022cv05491, involving Bainbridge Island's ethics code, a law which like ours has NO statute of limitations.
In that case prevailed with its argument before the US District Court here in Seattle that the limitation should be two years under that catch-all provision. I will note there that the plaintiffs even were not seeking that the
no limitation would be a bill. They were arguing for six-year extensional limitations. So that takes us through that case. The conduct on which KUOW reported, and about which Mr. Chapman complained, is eight- to ten-years-old at this point.
Testing the staff of the limitations sought by the plaintiffs in Bainbridge. In that time memories stayed and documentary evidence is destroyed. I will say not destroyed through malice or intent just by the faithful application of the City's records retention laws.
So, I will share with you also that the reporter asked me at the time if the Harrell office back in 2016-2018 had ever asked me for advice about how to deal with the Club. I told her what I will tell you.
I have zero recollection of having conversations with Council President Harrell's office about the Royal Esquire Club. That being said, though, I cannot state with confidence that I didn't. It's just too old. 2016. I can't remember what I did yesterday, so 2016 is just a little too far away.
One thing Mr. Chapman raises in this field which I do want to address here is his request at the Commission in its advisory role to pass judgment on former Mayor Harrell's conduct here. You take some opportunity here to like say that what he did was wrong.
I want to caution you against that. The reason we have these contested hearings is because City officials deserve due process like all of us, they deserve due process, and we shouldn't be saying that the Mayor or Council President did something wrong
without giving him the opportunity to be heard, and me doing a full investigation, and you being presented with all the evidence and making a waiting decision based on all that evidence. I ask that you affirm Mr. Mayo's dismissal here today. Thank you.
Wayne, what was the Bainbridge case cited? I didn't see that in any of the documents.
I'm not sure why Marc didn't reference it, but it is Bainbridge Taxpayers Unite et al v. City of Bainbridge Island et al, No. 3:2022cv05491. It was interpreting the Bainbridge Island ethics code.
The the WestLaw Citation or ?
It is WestLaw. It is 2023 WL 3075638. Thank you.
This is Joe Levan, with the City Attorney's Office. One clarification related to that case, is that that was a federal court decision and the question before that court was whether or not there were state law claims involved. So whether or not because there were only state law claims involved, the federal court should give up jurisdiction and the case should go back to the state court, which was Judge Forbes in the Kitsap County Superior Court. So that's what the court did. It didn't
rule on the statute limitations issue, it did provide analysis related to that issue and then it remanded to Judge Forbes and Kitsap County Superior Court and on remand, so when Judge Forbes took up the case, she ruled. She dismissed that case
with prejudiced based on the statue limitations and she applied the two-year statue limitations in RCW 04:16 01:30 based on the default or catch-all provision because it had to do with the city's ethics program that didn't provide otherwise for statue limitations or a limitations period, and it didn't involve a contract, so therefore the she she applied 04:16 01:30 and dismissed it because it was beyond the two-year period. So that's what happened with that case.
Was there an appeal?
No, there was not as far as I know. There was not.
Do you have a copy of Judge Forbes's order?
I think I do. Sometimes those are challenging to get it.
If they're.
And it's very brief, just so they.
Well, if you could send it to us at some point after today. Appreciate it.
Yeah.
Thanks Joe. Mr. Chapman, we will give you 5 min to make any additional comments. We have your written materials, but any additional comments you want to make?
The case that was just being discussed was that in reference in the dismissal? My recollection was a separate case that was
the Irwin Law Firm, Inc. v. Ferry Cnty., was referenced in the dismissal.
I'll try to be brief here and reserve time. My appeal is based upon the following. One, in other cases, a two-year statute of limitations was not invoked by
the Director's office. Number 2, a 2-year statute of limitations in my read of Washington Code is not, does not follow. There is a stipulation of three years.
However, that three years statute of limitations is based upon discovery, not data backed. Additionally,
the actions in this case were either discovered or discoverable at the time of an investigation of another allegation. If they were discovered and not investigated, that is an
issue that should be addressed. If they were not discovered at that time, then a question that I have is why a reporter was able to discover these recently making them known to the public. And again referring back to the Washington code, which talks about
the statue of limitations commencing at discovery of the act, the public became aware of these through the reporting, not at time of action which was done within the privacy of the Mayor's Office
that the public had NO privilege to know. And, as the Director said, because these acts were committed by
the Mayor when he was on Council and very well could have become re-elected to Mayor. I do think it's important for the SEEC to clarify whether acts of this sort
are acceptable by a public official. I do believe that there is since the KUOW did reporting on this and per my understanding of their reporting, they have the discovery of
emails from the Mayor, from the then Council Members office, there is discovery that could be done here to see what acts were done, were committed and a ruling made upon that basis.
I think that's all I have for for now.
Questions from the Commissioners for Mr. Chapman?
I think what Mr. Chapman is arguing is essentially for a discovery rule where even assuming the two-year statute of limitations applies that if a particular claimant or complaintant discovers the alleged ethical breach
later, then he should be able to file a complaint, but I mean, I think that the problem with that Mr. Chapman is that a fair summary of your argument?
No, ok. What I'm saying is that the dismissal was based upon a presumption that there's a two-year statute of limitations. I am saying one, that is a wrong presumption. One could make the case from Washington law that there's a three-year statute of limitations, and I reference that in my doc.
Okay, but either.
However, the discovery there that.
And you're saying your position is that any complaint and any person who discovers the alleged malfeasants later in time should then be able to assert a claim if they didn't know about it earlier. I'm saying that either. Oh, ok.
I'm saying that the agrieved party in this case is the Seattle public. The Seattle public was not made aware of this until last summer when there was public reporting done on it.
That is the data discovery. So, somebody who is learning of this case tomorrow, today, I do not feel has standing to say that they were discovering it today when there was public reporting on this.
Back last summer. However, a year ago when the public was not privy to this because there had been NO reporting on this, I am saying I do not believe that these actions could have been deemed to have been discovered. Does that make sense.
No, that does make sense, and I think it points to the challenge here. The discovery rule is a very common concept in applying statute of limitations bars, but usually it applies to a particular victim, you know, in a tort case, you know, someone whose property is damaged, it's the question is when they discover the the damage to their property, not the public at large. So because this is a public rights type statute, you know, the rule that you're proposing is, well.
There has to be some sort of public disclosure of the underlying conduct, but what constitutes a public disclosure would, does it have to be in a public column of The Seattle Times? What if it's just a blog post? What if the blog has millions of viewers? What if it's a new story that nobody watches from a, you know, it creates a very
difficult standard in terms of like, how do we conceptualize the discovery rule in the context of like the public as a whole? I don't know, Wayne, have you thought about that problem and how the discovery rule might relate to the statute of limitations in a case like this?
I haven't really given that any thoughts. Like I said, most of the time we don't, we've never looked at a statual of limitations before. We take pride the fact that our law doesn't have one. We tell people this is never done. But if this is eight- to ten-years-old, this is past the point like I feel like statual limitations, they don't exist to like forgive stuff after a while, they exist to like, because evidence is very hard to come by at this point. So I feel like that's why we have
cash limitations and I don't think I think that's why we have to apply one here. But I do think.
But if I can respond to that.
Mr. Chapman, I think you had 2 min left. We'll give you 2 min, but I just ask you not to talk over others while they're speaking. I think the Public Records Act is an important thing to keep in fact in mind here. All these records were public all along, so I don't think the Mayor could ever said you'd be doing this in secret. It was not, he wasn't concealing it. It was just not publicized.
To address those.
Again, appreciate the fact that discovery maybe difficult in old cases. However, the reporting from last summer indicates that there is documentary evidence
of these alleged acts, and thus using the argument that it would be difficult to investigate this when there is in fact reporting with documentary evidence
doesn't appear to me to have a rational basis. Number two, to say that the SEEC's oversight is predicated upon individuals making public records requests
to control the City government to determine if somebody has violated a law and then submitting a complaint boggles the mind. We should not have to
submit continual public public records requests in order to determine if Bruce Harrell is violating the law. And that is why when a reporter or somebody happens to.
And that information becomes public, that seems to me to start a clear discovery period. And I would also add it appears that we have a pattern of behavior
by Bruce Harrell in this, which I think lends to the weight to my argument that we need a ruling here by the Commission so that future public officials don't try to attempt what he has repeatedly done.
Thank you, Mr. Chapman, that's your two additional minutes. I sort of have the same questions as Commissioner Pekelis; I think what you're asking for is the discovery rule, which is, as Commissioner Pekelis says, very common in tort law and contract law, but reading your appeal, I mean it's confusing to me when that discovery
would start, and I don't know how we craft a rule here. I mean your appeal references a 2022 public records request that reportedly uncovered the emails that are the basis of your complaints, so I guess my question to you: is it your position that these emails weren't discovered in 2022 when that public records request was submitted?
Who would you consider the agrieved party in a case like this?
Mr. Chapman, I'm just asking about the position in your appeal.
I'm responding, but who would the Commission consider to be an agrieved party in a case of this sort?
Mr. Chapman, you're the complaintant. It's your complaint. We're here to evaluate the appeal of it and see if there's a rational basis for the dismissal. So the burden's on you.
Indicates that the discovery period commences with the discovery by the agrieved party. My position is that the Seattle public is the agrieved party when a Council Member uses City resources for private benefit.
My position is that that requires that the public know. The public was not made aware of this until the KUOW reporting. That seems to me in this case
to be fairly clear discovery, a discovery date for these actions. Now, one could argue that with a public records request, which was found by somebody who was looking into a prior ethics violation
which the Director encouraged to go away that perhaps the Director could have and should have found these same things back when that investigation was done.
In which case one could say that these were discovered back at that point. Apparently, though, this was never discovered as part of that investigation.
Alright, thank you Mr. Chapman. Questions from any of the other Commissioners for Mr. Chapman?
So Mr. Chapman, when did you become aware of these allegations?
At the same time as the rest of the Seattle public, which was when the KUOW reporting happened.
Got it. Wayne, can you talk a little bit about the authority of the Commission to impose sanctions on non-employees or former employees?
You have the authority to impose sanctions on people, on acts committed by people when they were City employees, so you can find a former City employee, a former elected official for contact, they can if the conduct related to their time in office, if it was committed during their time of office.
What's the mechanism for actually assessing that, given that they're NO longer employed?
I would have to turn that one over to I'd have to ask Law for that one. Gary or Joe, do you have any thoughts?
You would have to look at the code to figure out the exact mechanism to pursue that.
Yeah, well I think it would just be the same mechanism will be there there'll be a complaint filed and and potentially sanctions even post employment I think is what the point that Wayne was making.
Does that answer your question, Commissioner or am I missing your question?
Okay.
I mean I think so. It just strikes me as, you know, I think normally you would garnish an employee's wages or something if you had to, but if they're not receiving any wages from the City any longer, I don't know I suppose we would have to seek judicial enforcement if necessary.
Correct yes, so yes, if you're, if you're speaking to the actual collection of a, of a fine from a former employee, then, then yes, it would be a, I suppose a collections matter like any other, any other money owed to the City.
In the the provisions for actions on violations under 04:16 100 of the Seattle Municiple Code, report are quite a lot of different options, so it's the Commission may take one or more of the following actions for violation of any provision of chapter 04:16, and it has to
monetary fines, reimbursement for damages, all kinds of different, that there's many different remedies available to pursue in terms of violations that occurred and and enforcing those vio enforcing the code as to those violations.
And another example that for context would be a situation that there there are provisions in the code as you know, the ethics code related to former officials doing certain things while they're NO longer in office for some period of time. So just as that's enforceable, so something like this potentially could be enforceable.
Further questions by any of the Commissioners?
I can further clarify one thing on the case law that was relied upon by Marc Mayo. I think it's important to know from his decision making that he cites to that Erwin decision, which is in his decision document. So that's
the important court decision that's an issue here because that's what he relied upon. And he notes that it's an unpublished decision, so it doesn't have presidential value, presidential value, but that that decision was argued about in that Bainbridge decision that was mentioned and but iit's, you know, it's
noted that that's the legal authority that he's basing his decision from or on because it's at least that court, at least one court has looked at this and in that that decision, the court looked at it in part in reference to the state law.
Code of Ethics for municipal officers, which is in chapter 4223 because that was part of the claims that were brought, and because 4223 doesn't have an applicable statute limitations specifically.
That's how the court found that that two-year special limitations applied. You'll note another source of guidance here potentially would be what's in state law related to the state law Code of Ethics for state officers.
And so that particular provisioned in 4252I can pull this up, 540I believe, and that just gives an example of that for state officers in the state law Code of ethics, there is a statute of limitation
but our City code doesn't have it and for municipal officers under state law, for city officials, in four chapter 4223, there isn't one. So that's why that Irving decision looked at that analysis. It didn't refer to that other provision I mentioned 4252, but it looked to what would apply for a city ethics code, and that that's what baymbridge.
Did looked at the city ethics code, but in the early decision it that wasn't, that that case didn't deal with the city ethics code that dealt with, other matters, but it did refer specifically to 4223, and that's how that's, that was the basis for what Mark Mayo looked at in terms of here because there is NO statue limit.
Provided for otherwise that that would, that would be an applicable statute limitations also from the perspective that it wouldn't make sense that NO statue limitations would apply. So whether whether the two years is the one that the commission thinks is the appropriate statute limitations, that's for the commission to.
Decide, of course, but, but that mark look to what would be based on any kind of court authority, what would be potentially applicable limitations period and that's, that was supported by that Irving decision which is in the decision document.
Thanks Joe. Any commissioners have any final questions?
Alright, we will now go into a brief closed executive section to discuss this quasi-judicial matter. I expect to be very brief, so let's say we'll come back at 04:40 at the open session. Okay, I'm just pausing the recording at 04:30 P.M..
Right, thanks Cliff.
All right. We are back from our closed executive session considering this quasi-judicial matter considering the appeal with Mr. Chapman. I'm going to
poll the Commissioners individually on whether to affirm or reverse Mr. Mayo's dismissal of the complaint, keeping in mind that under administrative rule four we are deciding whether or not the complaint had a or the dismissal of the complaint had a rational basis. I will start at the
top of the screen, Commissioner Pekelis do you vote to affirm or reverse?
Affirm.
Commissioner Smith, do you vote to affirm or reverse?
Affirm.
Commissioner Vassall, do you vote to affirm or reverse?
Affirm.
Commissioner Hawes do you vote to a firm or reverse?
I vote to affirm.
Okay, and I also vote to affirm all the decision to affirm the dismissal. There will be a written decision to follow by the Commissioners. Thank you Mr. Chapman for your remarks and for permitting your written materials.
We appreciate you bringing this to the attention of the Commission. We rely on folks like you to bring these issues to us, so we appreciate your time. Okay, turning to the next item, we have adoption of the 7 January 2026 regular meeting minutes. Has any Commissioner not had a chance to review the meeting minutes? Right, do I have a motion to adopt the 7 January 2026?
Chair, a question. I think that the minutes do not reflect Chairman Pekelis's comments about the Wilson campaign decision. He had sort of dissenting remarks, and I don't believe the minutes capture those. I don't know what the procedure would be to remedy it, but that stood out to me.
Thank you for bringing that my attention to Commissioner Smith. I don't have a copy of the minutes in front of me, but I think in the past we've simply revised the minutes and then adopted them at the next subsequent meetings so we can take that action here. Thank you.
Alright, moving on to discussion items, number one is the work group. Wayne, do you want to give us a brief background? Yes, I sent a letter
to Joy Hollingsworth and Katie Wilson just last week, advising them with the language in the ordinance and saying that the Commission is ready to help them in whatever they would like in setting up the workgroup. So I'm waiting on the answer to that. Great. I assume they're very busy getting but I think it's good that you've reached out. Comments, questions from any of the other Commissioners?
Alright, we will move on to our next discussion item, the Democracy Voucher Program report. Okay, Rene. So 2025, we finally got all the data and other accounting wrapped up, so we will start working on our post election
report which is basically just a snapshot of what occurred in the 2025cycle. We also have requested that the external analysis to be continued for the 2025 cycle. That is with the Jennifer Heerwig and Brian McCabe.
That won't get started until June, probably the soon. So that's out there on the table, it's just gonna take a bit of time to get there. 2026: so we've got a few things coming up. Just overall we are on target to get our mailing update the week of 16 March. Ahead of that mailing, we will be sending a probably around a six by nine postcard after the households and just
District Five just sort of like, hey, vouchers are coming through D5, let us know contact our office to make sure they're ready to receive them and so forth. Next week we begin our training with our four Community-Based Organizations. We do some brief training and introduction to the program. I think only one of them we have not previously worked with, so that should be fairly quick. Actually I have a candidate update.
So we have three candidates who have filed their reports to run for office in D5. Two of them are officially pledged to be in the Democracy Voucher Program although the 3rd we believe is intending to join at at some point.
Two have submitted qualifying materials and one of them has already qualified so we are off and running for 2026. And that's my brief update for now. For the next meeting
in March, I'll have some artwork available just to view of all the things that we've new this year that we've got ready now. So that's all I have. Any questions? Great, thanks. Any questions from any of the Commissioners?
Alright, we'll move on to our next item, the Executive Director's report. Alright, I'll just update you on my efforts to get two new Commissioners appointed to replace Commissioner Pekelis, Commissioner Hawes, and Richard Shordt. So I did talk
to Joy Hollingsworth the other day about the Council appointment. I asked her if she could do anything to give us a person as quickly as possible. She did say she'd wanted to do some recruitment, so I think that is underway right now. I did forward along the name of one person who approached me a long time ago.
I'm still waiting to hear from her. And I did reach out to the Mayor's Office and Caedmon Cahill, the Mayor's new counsel, to let them both know we are urgently seeking people to replace Commissioner Hawes. This is her last meeting. Thank you Commissioner Hawes so much, and you Pekelis are also going off, so
yeah, that work continues. I will stay on. All right. Thank you. You're welcome. That's all the items today. As the Executive Director pointed out, this is Commissioner Hawes' last meeting with us. So it's the last time we get to see you, so we just want to thank you for your service to the Commission.
You've always come with great questions, offered mentorship to the Commissioners, and we will miss your presence on the Commission. But our loss is someone else's gain, so good luck on your next endeavor and personally I'll miss seeing you around the bookstore, but I'm sure you'll be having a blast, whatever it is you're doing. So thank you for your
service.
Thanks Chair. Thanks everyone. It's been a pleasure working with all of you. And we'll look forward to watching your work from afar.
Well, we'll look for you to tune in.
Oh yeah. Yeah, I'll be quiet though, I promise.
Alright, so we'll call this 4 February meeting to a close. 1st we just wanna wish good luck to the Seahawks this weekend, so I know we'll all be rooting for them, everyone wear their Jerseys or blue and green tomorrow, so thank you everyone. Thanks Gang. See you.
Thanks everyone. Bye Kristin. Thank you. Thank you.