Articles

• The City's case, from this side of the Looking Glass
• A more complete history of Steve Eugster's, Cherie Rodgers', and the City's challenges to the City's loan obligation
• Real and imagined fraud, and why the City's fraud claim against the Cowles was dismissed
• Value of Settlement Analysis

What you haven't learned about the River Park Square litigation from Camas Magazine

For seven years, Camas Magazine has reported on the ill-fated "public-private partnership" through which the City of Spokane lent financial support to the Cowles family to redevelop the River Park Square mall. They've spent more time working the story than anyone else.

But "time spent" hasn't always translated into "issues understood" or "facts accurately reported." As lawsuits advanced, pleadings were numbered in the thousands and documents were measured by the roomful, other local media couldn't or wouldn't keep up and Camas began taking increasing liberties in reporting on the litigation and eventual settlements. Loss and cost figures that were already substantial were wildly exaggerated. Spokesman-Review editor Steve Smith has reportedly said that what Camas can't figure out, they make up. I would say, at a minimum, that what Camas doesn't understand, they ignore. With no legal background and detached from the tedium of reality, every Camas story is a blockbuster peopled by heroes, villains and fools. Other reporters didn't have the command to call Camas on their distortions and, given waning interest in the litigation, probably didn't care.

So why am I correcting Camas, and why now?

As the City's outside attorney on River Park Square litigation for almost seven years, the exaggerations and distortions are obvious to me. And any reader of the Camas website will know that I'm depicted as one of the villains. Or fools. Or both. But that doesn't explain it, because I've been content to ignore them for years.

The explanation for "why this, why now" began in June of this year, when I first saw a story that had evidently been posted on the Camas website in February. It accused members of the 2004 City Council of committing "a second RPS fraud" on the citizens of Spokane by settling the litigation with the Cowles family for, according to Camas, only $400,000; ostensibly over the written objection of one of the City's trial attorneys. The story was dead wrong. I don't know how many people read the Camas website anymore; I assume not many. But with this story, fantasy was so over the top that I had to say something.

So I checked the Camas website, found that it had a "Letters to Editors" page, and noted where letters to the editor were to be sent. I checked my facts and figures and wrote a letter that pointed out inaccuracies and omissions in the story and provided accurate information for their readers.

I addressed my letter to "Editor" and emailed it to the address provided on the website. I received a response thanking me for my letter to the editor and asking that I provide it in "text" form so that they would not have to retype it. Upon receiving assurances that Camas would not edit my letter, I complied.

But Camas never published my letter on its Letters to the Editor page. In fact, rather than run my letter as requested, Camas actually got rid of its Letters to Editor page! When I went to the website a couple of weeks after sending my letter and clicked "Letters to the Editor," I got a standard Internet "The page can not be found" message. When I wrote to ask Camas where "Letters to the Editor" had gone, I was told that "Camas's letters to the editor are now found under archives. They end with the year 2004." To add insult to obscurity, Camas then appropriated my "letter to the editor" as a footnote to a further story attacking me.

This was not the first time that Camas has behaved in unjournalistic ways. Years earlier, Camas refused to provide me with copies (at my expense) of their taped interviews of me. (Although in fairness, only Tim Connor takes the position that he has no obligation to make a copy of my interview tapes available to me. Larry Shook has provided copies of tapes of his interviews of me upon request.)

In mid-August, I followed up with a letter to Camas providing additional information demonstrating that their "Second RPS Fraud" attack on the 2004 City Council was wrong in every respect, including by failing to disclose that decisions of the federal court ultimately capped the City's recoverable damages at less than the Cowles had paid to settle. The City had done better by settlement than it could have at trial. I asked that they retract the article or remove it from their website. As of this writing, the story ("A New RPS Fraud") is still posted, uncorrected.

In response to my incredulity at Camas' handling of my letter, my son Dan offered to create this forum for correction. As he put it, "if they won't give up an inch of their turf, create your own."

So --- this is the turf that Dan built. For my part, at least, it is a modest undertaking. This has been after-hours work, and I do have a life. And frankly, ignoring Camas has proved good policy and one that, after this, I will continue to follow.

The basic information you'll find here should give you a reliable grasp of the key developments in the federal litigation for the City, and the settlement decisions made by Spokane mayors and City Council members consistent with positions and principles that were first articulated in 2001. It assumes familiarity with the River Park Square controversy and its actors and I hope is not too technical.

What you will find --- what Camas hasn't told you --- is that the elected officials who inherited the River Park Square problem, looking realistically at the City's situation and acting with cool heads, have, so far, mitigated the City's financial exposure by tens of millions of dollars.