Port of Seattle Facing Stormy Federal Inquiry

Last week federal subpoenas were flying around downtown, irking the hell out of anyone who did business with the Mic Dinsmore-era Port of Seattle and was told its practices were just "unconventional."

If you can't wait to read the depositions, there's a terrific Seattle Times story about the "Steakhouse deal", which seems to involve ex-Port CEO Dinsmore, airport director Mark Reis, and contractor Gary Merlino in an illegal three-way at "Spencer's for Steak and Chops, known for its dark wood and gleaming martinis."

The auditors found: The Port's deal with Merlino's company, TTI Constructors, broke state contracting laws; Port staff hid important information about the contract from the Port Commission; and most of the purported contract savings were, in fact, "cosmetic" and never materialized, with the Port paying Merlino's company $124.8 million — the same amount as its original bid.

David Cotton, the lead auditor, said he believes the actions by Dinsmore and the Port staff were aimed at keeping the contract out of the public spotlight.

Our favorite part? To justify a lowered price on the awarded contract, Port staff said Dinsmore had told them he'd "read somewhere" that the cost of diesel was going to fall, to $2/gal, and to reprice things accordingly. Dinsmore says he said no such thing and he's never seen these Port staffers before in his life.

Over at Eat the State, Geov Parrish recalls Pat Davis's public defense of this very same no-bid contract: "I think you call it market forces and gripe and complain about the contractor, but you can't do anything about it because that is the marketplace." And then Parrish goes on to put the Steakhouse deal into perspective:

Thing is, the state audit of the Port of Seattle barely scratched the surface. It focused almost entirely on the third runway construction project. Nothing about the maritime operations, which are basically run as a massive wealth transfer scheme between King County taxpayers and the cruise lines and shipping companies that "do business" with the Port. Nothing about the entire terminal that was torn down so that a cruise ship dock could be built, only to have that facility torn down and the original shipping facility rebuilt (at a cost of many millions) four years later.