PORT ANGELES — An advertisement on behalf of Hugh Haffner, a Clallam County Public Utility District commissioner seeking re-election, has been attacked by Haffner’s opponent, Bob Jensen, as an unsubstantiated smear.
The ad, placed by the Save Our PUD organization, claimed that Jensen, a partner in a Port Angeles telecommunications company, has “numerous conflicts of interest” with the office he wants to win from Haffner, who has been a PUD commissioner for 14 years.
The ad appeared in last Wednesday’s editions of the weekly Sequim Gazette and weekly Forks Forum, both owned by Sequim-based Olympic View Publishing Co.
Peninsula Daily News declined to publish the ad in its original form but later accepted a revised version that appears on Page C4 of today’s PDN.
Meanwhile, Haffner — who says he is proud of “standing up” for PUD customers on issues ranging from rate increases to annexation attempts by Port Angeles — sought to separate his campaign for re-election from the controversial “Save Our PUD” group headed by a Sequim contractor, Jay Ketchum.
“Jay and Jane [his wife] are friends,” Haffner said.
“They have wanted to help with my campaign, but his thing is a broader issue.”
As for Jensen, he says he is baffled by some of Ketchum’s allegations.
“I don’t mind losing to the truth,” he said, “but I do mind losing to this crap.”
Jensen added:
“If elected, I would no longer participate in bidding on any work or reaching any agreements with the PUD.
“I would have no business relations with the PUD.”
A statement released by the Jensen campaign accused Save Our PUD of being “a well-funded smear campaign.”
But Ketchum says he has legitimate concerns about “insider agreements” and is worried that Jensen would not be an “independent commissioner” if elected to the PUD.
Save Our PUD first drew attention when its signs began popping up beside Haffner’s late last month.
Since then, Haffner said that to meet state Public Disclosure Commission campaign financing requirements, he has repaid Ketchum for work and donations on his behalf and notified the PDC he had done so.
As for last week’s newspaper ad claiming “numerous conflicts of interest with the PUD” by Jenkins (this was changed to “numerous potential conflicts of interest” and “serious questions” in the revised ad), Haffner said he is focused on his own campaign.
“I’ve got my own ads, and they’re running,” he said.
However, Haffner said he won’t ask Ketchum to cease efforts on his behalf.
“I don’t think I have any right to ask him to stop,” he said.
“That would be like my asking Jensen, ‘Would you stop running ads?’ They have a right to say what they want.”
Haffner also shares Ketchum’s concerns that Jensen, because of a contract between CPI and Port Angeles, might side with the city in matters involving the PUD instead of being “independent” — an allegation that Jensen says is untrue.
Ketchum agreed that Save Our PUD was separate from Haffner’s campaign.
“As far as re-electing Hugh Haffner, it’s totally two separate filings with the state,” he said.
Ketchum said he was alarmed by potential conflicts of interest for Jensen due to Jensen’s co-ownership with Bill Roberds of a telecommunications company, Capacity Provisioning Inc.
Roberds unsuccessfully ran against Haffner in 2002.
CPI was founded in 2001 by Jensen, owner/partner of Angeles Communications; Roberts, owner-operator of Excel Utility Construction; and Craig Johnson, a telecommunications professional.
It operates a high-speed fiber-optic network that is used for data feeds by the city of Port Angeles, Peninsula College and by many Clallam County businesses, including Peninsula Daily News.
CPI purchases fiber-optic lines from both the Clallam County PUD and Wave Broadband, which provides cable TV and Internet services in the Port Angeles area.
The ad in the Sequim Gazette and Forks Forum implied the CPI contract, done in 2002, had a link to Roberds’ wife, Sue Roberds, the city’s planning manager, and City Council member Karen Rogers, who is a business consultant and has worked as a paid marketer and building manager for CPI.
Rogers did not return phone calls left Friday requesting comment.
Attempts to reach the Roberds on Saturday were also unsuccessful.
Rogers was a council member when the city and CPI reached its agreement.
But a statement written by a Jensen supporter, Charles Beaudette of Port Angeles, and released by Jensen’s campaign on Friday, said:
“There was nothing shady or underhanded about the [2002] deal.
“It was offered up openly and publicly before the city Utility Commission, and it was discussed in numerous public meetings where public input was sought.
“With the exception of only a few dissenters, the consensus of public opinion at these meetings was overwhelmingly in support of the proposal.
“Now, six years later, the project has proven a success for both the public and the private sector . . . other cities have looked to Port Angeles as [a] model for their plans to build similar networks.”
State law
Washington state law disallows any elected official from benefiting from any agreement made by the agency of which he or she is an officer.
That is true even if the official abstains from discussing or deciding such issues.
Conflicts and other issues raised by Ketchum — with comments from involved parties — include:
n Competition with PUD — Ketchum alleged that CPI competes directly against the PUD as a fiber-optic provider.
In fact, the PUD by state law is forbidden from providing retail fiber-optic service and is limited to providing wholesale service.
The only time the agency and CPI competed head to head was for providing fiber optics to the Port of Port Angeles in 2004 under special circumstances that allowed the PUD to bid “agency to agency.”
CPI bid $21,320, lower than the PUD’s bid of $22,280, and the company also offered $6,400 in free services.
Nevertheless, the port chose the PUD, saying it preferred to go into partnership with another public agency, and that its staff was more comfortable working with employees of the public utility.
Ted Simpson, who with Will Purser and Haffner make up the PUD’s three-member board of commissioners, said CPI also leases fiber from the PUD to connect to Dry Creek and Monroe schools.
“That’s OK,” Simpson said.
“That is not a conflict. They [CPI] are purchasing a service from the PUD, just like me or you buying power.
“They also lease a little bit of fiber between the city limits and Peninsula College. They’d have to relinquish that” if Jensen is elected.
n Exclusive contract — The Gazette and Forum ads said CPI and “a PA city councilwoman paid CPI consultant with PA city planning manager who is a partner in CPI” evaded a competitive bidding process in the 2002 contract to provide fiber optics to city facilities.
Reports from the PDN archives show that the city in 2001 wanted to build a fiber optic ring around Port Angeles, estimated to cost almost $10.3 million if all built by Northland Cable, later purchased by Wave Broadband.
Instead, according to Jensen, CPI already had part of the network built and offered to work with Northland and the city.
In the end, Northland/Wave spent $4.1 million to build 65 percent of the project; CPI spent $1.3 million for 21 percent, and the city spent $893,000, or 14 percent.
“We own it, and WAVE owns it, and the city owns a piece of it,” Jensen said.
“What we did for the city was the same thing we did for [Clallam] County and the same thing we did for the [Port Angeles School] District and the same thing we did for Olympic Medical Center.”
He added that the city hired a consultant to negotiate the agreement with WAVE and CPI.
The pact was approved by the city Utility Advisory Committee and then by the City Council.
Said Simpson:
“CPI does have a franchise with the city of Port Angeles to install fiber within the city.
“They spent a lot of their own money to put that fiber throughout the city. I would hope they’re able to recover their costs, or even make some money.”
Glenn Cutler, Port Angeles Public Works director, also said that the city has a contract with CPI.
Jensen said the agreement for all parties totaled “definitely less than $2 million, and a quarter of that might have been to CPI.
“It helped me grow my business, because the city of Port Angeles is a pretty big customer.”
Regarding Rogers, Craig Johnson of CPI said she “was instrumental in starting the Tech Center [on Eighth Street in Port Angeles] with Vern Elkhart.
“Vern hired her also to market and manage the building for him.
“After CPI purchased the building from Vern, we kept Karen on as a paid marketer and manager. We also reimbursed her for furniture and equipment she purchased with her own money for the common areas of building.”
Ketchum provided no evidence that Rogers had anything to do with the agreement between the city and CPI.
And in regard to Sue Roberds, PDN stories show no connection whatsoever between her city job and CPI.
Jensen, however, said Ketchum’s antipathy toward CPI stemmed from Sue Roberds’ handling of citizen complaints about Ketchum’s parking his company vehicles on city streets.
Ketchum said he didn’t recall the issue.
n Demands on PUD — According to the ads and Ketchum’s follow-up explanation, Roberds attended a PUD commissioners meeting recently and criticized them for buying their own excavation equipment.
They should have contracted with a private company, he said, perhaps Roberds’ Excel Utility Construction.
But Haffner said keeping the excavation work in-house allowed the PUD to make full-time use of its line crews, who otherwise would be idle between power outages.
¬n Conflicts of interest ¬– Ketchum originally alleged that Jensen had “numerous” conflicts of interest, but Jensen said that was not true.
“On occasion, I do work for the PUD in the voice and data world,” Jensen said.
“If elected, I could no longer do work for or bid on that work. No problem.
“I own a wide-area network company that purchases some service from the PUD, the same service that is offered to the entire business world as a wholesale service.
“If this was actually an issue, then I would no longer purchase those services from the PUD if elected. No problem.”
Jensen compared his situation to Simpson’s.
Simpson owns Angeles Electric.
“Angeles Electric built substations [across Clallam County] prior to my being employed as commissioner, and we just had to quit doing that,” Simpson said.
Jensen reiterated:
“If elected, I would no longer participate in bidding on any work or reaching any agreements with the PUD. I would have no business relations with the PUD.”
Ketchum and Haffner
“I have nothing to lose or gain by any PUD race,” Ketchum said Friday.
But he added that he thought the CPI/PUD/Port Angeles issues amounted to “just another duck in a row” of insider agreements.
He also said he has asked for records of the city’s approval of the CPI franchise but had received no response.
“I’ve requested that information,” he said.
“You’d think that they’d want to be forthcoming with it.”
For his part, Haffner said, “I really care about the PUD, and I don’t want it to become like the city of Port Angeles.”
He said that after former City Manager Mark Madsen quit, the newcomers to the City Council were lectured in public meetings by a succession of “good old boys.”
But Madsen cost the city a $37,000 severance expense and signed a yet-unused consulting contract, Haffner noted.
Meanwhile, he said, “the city has no money to keep up a swimming pool for its kids and elders.”
Furthermore, Haffner said, Jensen might be so closely bound to the city that he would side with the city in matters involving the PUD instead of being an “independent” commissioner.”
Such a case, he said, was when the city threatened to shut off the water the PUD distributed to the Gales Addition in the Eastern Urban Growth Area unless residents agreed to be annexed to Port Angeles.
Haffner was a leader in standing up to the city and took the issue to court.
The city eventually backed off and signed a new agreement to provide water to the area through the PUD for 35 years.
Haffner also said many voters share his fears.
“When I was putting signs up, I had people all over the east side [of Port Angeles] that I never would have gotten before.
“I’m amazed. I’m a Democrat. I’ve had more Republicans let me put up signs.”
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Reporter Jim Casey can be reached at 360-417-3538 or at jim.casey@peninsuladailynews.com.
