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Biologist suspected of abusing former state post

Ethics board says he promised special treatment to firms

By Kathie Durbin
Published: April 8, 2010, 12:00am

A state ethics board says former state wildlife biologist William Weiler used his government job to promise “special treatment” to wind energy corporations in exchange for donations to his nonprofit organization.

The Washington State Executive Ethics Board said in a March 10 finding that there is reason to believe Weiler arranged habitat mitigation projects for wind developers in Klickitat County in exchange for donations to the Columbia Gorge Ecology Institute.

Weiler founded the Hood River, Ore.-based nonprofit environmental science organization in 1995. He was voted off its board two weeks ago after the ethics report became public.

In an interview with The Columbian, Weiler denied any wrongdoing and said he will ask for a hearing to contest the ethics board’s findings. If the board upholds the findings, Weiler could be subject to a civil fine of $5,000 per violation, or up to three times the amount of personal gain.

State ethics investigators said the Columbia Gorge Ecology Institute’s purpose “conflicted with Mr. Weiler’s state duties, yet he did not disclose this relationship to his agency.”

“He helped broker projects between his agency and his nonprofit organization that would profit his organization,” the investigative report said. “He contracted with his own state agency while acting for the nonprofit organization.”

State law prohibits any state employee from having an interest, financial or otherwise, or engaging in a business transaction or professional activity that conflicts with the proper discharge of his or her official duties.

Investigators said Weiler’s former job with the Washington Department of Fish and Wildlife gave him “prior knowledge” of proposed wind farms and their impact on wildlife habitat. They said he used that information to convince energy companies to propose mitigation projects that benefited his institute — including projects on wetlands owned by the institute — in exchange for WDFW’s support for the wind projects.

In an incident that investigators called particularly “egregious,” Weiler persuaded WDFW to let his institute manage money collected by wind developers to support a state study of how wind farms affect raptor behavior — and take a 10 percent cut.

Windy Point Partners, the developer of a 92-turbine wind farm in the Columbia Hills southeast of Goldendale, paid a total of $30,000 toward the study.

After a ferruginous hawk was killed at the Bighorn Wind Farm near Bickleton, Weiler’s state supervisor, Tim Rymer, contacted the wind farm’s owner, PPM Energy, and asked for a $15,000 donation toward the raptor study. The company agreed to pay $15,000 provided that the donation be considered “full mitigation” for the hawk’s death.

In all, the institute pocketed $12,000 of the $120,000 energy developers paid for the raptor study.

Weiler resigned from WDFW “in lieu of termination” last August, said Joe Stohr, the agency’s deputy director.

Stohr said he could not comment specifically on the termination under a settlement agreement negotiated with Weiler’s union.

Investigation sought

In February, the Klickitat County Board of Commissioners asked the ethics board to investigate Weiler for alleged violations of conflict of interest laws. As part of the investigation, Weiler’s computers were seized and his hard drives were subjected to forensic analysis.

On March 25, shortly after the ethics board report became public, the institute’s board asked for Weiler’s resignation. Aaron Morehouse, the institute’s executive director, said the board was concerned that “our organization could be perceived as being painted with the same brush.”

The report attracted the attention of state Sen. Jim Honeyford, R-Sunnyside, whose 15th District includes Klickitat County. In an April 2 letter, Honeyford demanded answers from WDFW Director Phil Anderson about how the alleged violations could have occurred undetected and what actions, if any, would be taken against Weiler’s supervisor.

“The findings are deeply troubling to us,” Stohr told The Columbian. “I know the public has entrusted us to carry out our responsibility in a way that is consistent with the resource protection standards that we have. What this alleges is clearly not representative of how we at Fish and Wildlife take our responsibilities. We are reviewing our protocols and our contract oversight procedures.”

Reached Tuesday at his home in Lyle, Weiler said, “I don’t think the charges are at all true.” He said he would ask for a hearing before the ethics panel.

Weiler said Klickitat County officials had no reason to seek an investigation.

“It is sad that it was brought up after I had already left the state (job),” Weiler said. “What is the motive? Why would you bring this out in the open unless it was to defame someone?”

Klickitat County Commission Chairman David Sauter did not return calls seeking comment. But Melanie Deleon, executive director of the Executive Ethics Board, said Weiler’s current job status is irrelevant.

“All of this happened while he was a state employee,” she said “The fact that he has left that employment does not wipe the slate clean.”

Courting wind power

In the past decade, rural Klickitat County has become a magnet for wind power development. The south end of the county is ideally situated to harness the strong winds that blow through the Columbia River Gorge, and the county has courted wind developers with a special “energy overlay zone” that permits wind farms outright on two-thirds of the county’s land base.

The most intensive development has taken place in the wildlife-rich Columbia Hills southeast of Goldendale, which is designated by the National Audubon Society as an Important Bird Area.

The Windy Point/Windy Flats project alone will be one of the world’s largest once it is completed: 26 contiguous miles of ridgeline wind turbines above the Columbia River, with an expected capacity of more than 500 megawatts, enough to power 250,000 houses.

Weiler said all the wind power companies he worked with in Klickitat County agreed to follow voluntary state guidelines for protecting wildlife from the effects of the giant turbine blades. “To work with them to make that happen was my job,” he said.

But most of the habitat mitigation projects he recommended were never implemented because the county opposed them, he said.

Dave Thies, president of the Columbia Gorge Audubon Society, said it’s hard to measure the long-term consequences of Weiler’s alleged habitat deals.

“The state’s wildlife resources belong to the people, not to Mr. Weiler and his nonprofit, nor the industrial wind energy corporations,” he said in a statement. “If the ethics board got it right, Weiler may have used his public position as a habitat biologist to compromise the best wildlife and habitat in the Gorge.”

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