December 9th, 2015
Port Angeles, WA – The Washington State Auditor’s Office has issued their findings regarding allegations from former County Commissioner, Mike Doherty, that two of his fellow commissioners violated the “Open Public Meetings Act.”
Back in July, Doherty questioned the ethics of Mike Chapman and Chairman Jim McEntire when they signed a letter of support for a state Department of Natural Resources timberland transfer in 2013. Doherty contended that the open meeting act was violated when he was absent during an August, 2013 meeting in which the matter was not posted on an agenda or in the board minutes.
The Washington Sate Auditor’s Office issued a letter of finding to Doherty on December 7th.
A copy of the letter from the Auditor’s Office was released to KONP this week. In it, the Auditor said that they did not identify and correspondence between Commissioners that took place outside of a meeting open to the public. They also determined the the Commissioners took official action in a regularly scheduled meeting which was open to the public with a quorum of Commissioners Present.
The Auditor found Doherty’s claim to be unsubstantiated.