Kitsap County may have violated records rules with NASCAR project

PORT ORCHARD — Kitsap County officials may have ducked state public-records laws to try to keep negotiations about a proposed NASCAR track secret, county prosecutor Russell Hauge said yesterday.

Hauge is asking the state Attorney General's Office to inquire about why some studies and other documents created by county staff were handed over to the private Kitsap Regional Economic Development Council and the International Speedway Corporation (ISC). Taking them out of the county record meant they didn't turn up when a local resident filed a request under the state Public Disclosure Act to see all documents pertaining to the proposed racetrack.

"Representatives of the county may have given away work product," Hauge said. "That is a potential law violation."

ISC announced June 23 that it had chosen a site near Bremerton for a NASCAR racetrack. The decision came after escalating costs drove the developer to scrap plans for a track in Snohomish County late last year. Now, the speedway corporation has an option on about 900 acres of land near the Mason-Kitsap county line.

Kitsap County economic development officials have been exceedingly careful to keep their negotiations quiet, urging employees in e-mails not to volunteer any information about the county's interest in a track and even offering a script of vague answers to common media questions.

The county anticipates a proposal from ISC later this month. ISC officials reached last night referred questions to Grant Lynch, who has headed the search for a track site in the Northwest. Lynch could not be reached for comment.

Economic Development Council Director David Porter said he routinely asked Kitsap County employees to sign non-disclosure agreements before helping him gather information for his pitch to ISC about a track in Kitsap County. Over the past two years, records show, 13 county elected officials and staff members signed the agreements.

"I'm protecting the anonymity of a client," Porter said. "It's a very common practice in our field."

Local activist Charlie Burrow said the negotiations were a "backroom process." "I never understood why all the secrecy was necessary," he said.

County Commissioner Chris Endresen brought the potential violations to the prosecuting attorney's attention. She said work done by public employees should have remained in the public record.

"In order for government to be accountable, we need to be accountable for how we spend our time," she said.

She asked the county public works department last week for copies of work they had done regarding the proposed track. A traffic planner wrote her back and said he had given all his work to the Economic Development Council.

"I don't know whether anybody did anything wrong," she said. "We just want to make sure that that's the case, and we just want to make sure that if there is an issue, we correct it."

Emily Heffter: 425-783-0624 or eheffter@seattletimes.com