Tuesday, October 09, 2007

The day the District bought a brownfield.

"On May 10, 2005, two board members met with AMEC and Reid Middleton to talk directly with them regarding their analysis of the site. Following that meeting the board instructed me to proceed with the negotiations to purchase the site." Marla Miller

I have posed the question twice and I have not received a response from Marla Miller for this simple question: "Which two board members attended the May 10, 2005 meeting?" It is a very easy question and shouldn't require 30 days to find documentation that proves which board members made the decision to buy a brownfield.

May 10th was the day the District decided to start a limited evaluation of groundwater. It was the day the District decided to hire a licensed well driller to drill and install three wells. It was the day the District decided to start logging soil and groundwater conditions. It was the day the District decided to have the groundwater analysed for cPAHs and VOCs. It was the day the District decided to have petroleum screening analysis performed on the detention pond for HCID and PAHs. In a nutshell, it was the day the District decided to start the process toward determining the extent of contamination.

Who in their right mind would start the process of negotiations without knowing the extent of contamination? Who in their right mind would ask the Executive Director of Business and Operations to start working toward determining a price for the property when no one had any idea how expensive the clean-up would be? Who in their right mind would even momentarily think this was a good way to spend public money? Who were these unknown board members?

Since Marla Miller doesn't seem to know, I will provide her with some clues - and she won't even have to wait 30 days. Board member #1 has a medical practice in the City of Edmonds and recently resigned for violating Board policy. Board member #2 had been appointed just two months before making such a monumental and disastrous decision and currently lives in Brier.

5 comments:

Anonymous said...

Marla isn't stupid. There must have been a hidden agenda somewhere. Anyone have ideas?

Anonymous said...

Motivation: Kah-Ching!

Anonymous said...

Who's pocket? And how?

Anonymous said...

I know the pocket from which the money was originally extracted. It is a pocket kept full by taxpayers.

Anonymous said...

You seem to be suggesting that at some point Marla may not have been of sound mind. Is this a suggestion to her for assembling her defense?