OLYMPIA, Wash. — A whistleblower lawsuit against the Washington State Department of Transportation will proceed, according to a Washington judge’s ruling on June 21.
In March, a former state economist filed a lawsuit against his former employer, the Washington State Department of Transportation (WSDOT), the governor’s office and its budget wing, the Office of Financial Management (OFM), for allegedly retaliating against him for refusing to keep quiet about his economic forecast on the state’s gas price, KING 5 Investigators previously reported.
“This isn’t just about me – it’s about state employees everywhere,” Scott Smith said in a June 21 news release. “I look forward to my day in court.”
Smith, who is from Tumwater, was a transportation planner for the Washington State Department of Transportation (WSDOT). He was the primary WSDOT employee tasked with forecasting fuel consumption, pricing and revenues from gas taxes and fees.
After 35 years working as a public sector economist, Smith said his career was ruined for his refusal to lie about how a new state policy, according to his mathematical calculations in early 2023, would jack up prices at the pump by 45 to 50 cents per gallon. He said the retaliation and pressure were so great he felt forced to resign.
On Friday, the Citizen Action Defense Fund (CADF) declared the judge’s decision not to dismiss the whistleblower suit as a win. WSDOT has 30 days to produce discovery.
“I think the court’s ruling today sends a great message to thousands of state employees that the government cannot retaliate against employees for refusing to comply with the state’s attempts to thwart transparency and accountability,” said Jackson Maynard, executive director and counsel to the conservative nonprofit Citizen Action Defense Fund. “We are happy to be representing Scott in this and we are confident the discovery process will further demonstrate the merit of our claims.”
Claims of keeping quiet about gas price calculations
After 35 years working as a public sector economist, Smith said his career was ruined for his refusal to lie about how a new state policy, according to his mathematical calculations in early 2023, would jack up prices at the pump by 45 to 50 cents per gallon. Smith was analyzing the cap-and-trade program, a component of Washington’s Climate Commitment Act passed by the legislature in 2021, that puts a cap on maximum emissions and issues allowances.
In a legal claim filed against WSDOT, the Office of Financial Management (OFM) and the Office of the Governor in November 2023, Smith alleges he was pressured in January to keep quiet about his calculation. He also says he was instructed not to write emails about it to avoid having to turn over the documentation if someone requested public records on the topic.
In the lawsuit, he said the retaliation was so bad he was “constructively discharged” on Nov. 2, 2023. Smith’s attorney, Maynard, said his superiors deliberately created working conditions so intolerable that his client had no option but to quit.