Port Angeles School District Demands 90-Day Delay to Release Records Used in Hamilton Censure
Just days after the Port Angeles School District Board of Directors passed a highly controversial resolution censuring newly elected Director Nancy Hamilton, the district is attempting to build a four-and-a-half-month bureaucratic wall around the very documents they used to justify the reprimand.
On June 22, I filed a Public Records Act request seeking the specific electronic communications explicitly referenced in the board’s eight-page censure document, Resolution 2526-18.
The district’s response arrived on June 29: an estimated 90-business-day delay.
In a standard “5-Day Letter,” HR Assistant and Public Records Officer Stacy McKnight claimed the district required the staggering timeline “to locate and assemble the records requested,” while also citing “reduced staff” as a primary reason for the delay.
The district’s justification is not only an affront to basic logic, but it operates in direct defiance of established Washington State transparency laws.
“Locating” Already-Assembled Records
My June 22 records request was narrowly tailored. I asked for electronic copies of the specific materials the board majority used to publicly condemn Hamilton on June 19. This included:
A June 11 email and attached letter sent by Hamilton to the board and district counsel regarding a May 26 executive session.
Seventeen emails sent by Hamilton to Superintendent Michelle Olsen between December 9, 2025, and May 21, 2026, containing inquiries on district operations.
Superintendent Olsen’s written responses to those 17 emails.
Written correspondence regarding anonymous constituent complaints referenced on Page 4 of the censure.
To draft Resolution 2526-18, the administration and the board majority had to have already located, reviewed, and compiled these exact digital records.
It is factually absurd for the district to now claim it will take until roughly November to “locate and assemble” documents that were sitting on their desks just last week.
‘Reduced Staff’ is Not a Legal Shield
Beyond the logistical impossibilities of their claim, the district’s reliance on “reduced staff” as an excuse to choke off public access is a legally dead argument in Washington State.
Under the Public Records Act (RCW 42.56), transparency is a mandate, not an optional administrative task to be completed when convenient.
The Washington State Court of Appeals has previously and emphatically shut down the “lack of manpower” defense.
As I formally reminded the district in a written objection Monday morning, the landmark legal precedent set in Zink v. City of Mesa completely dismissed the defense that strict PRA compliance could be ignored due to a “practical impossibility” stemming from limited staff or high volumes of requests.
Administrative inconvenience holds zero legal weight when it comes to the public’s right to know.
The Risk of Bad-Faith Penalties
By artificially delaying the release of explicitly identified, readily available digital communications, the Port Angeles School District is flirting with severe financial consequences.
Withholding the specific public records the board just utilized to publicly censure an elected official operates as bad-faith noncompliance.
If challenged in court, judges are required to use the 16 “Yousoufian factors”—established by the Washington State Supreme Court—to calculate daily fines for PRA violations.
Under those factors, courts must heavily weigh “bad faith” and “intentional noncompliance” as aggravating circumstances, which can send statutory penalties skyrocketing.
I have formally rejected the district’s 90-business-day timeline.
In my June 29 objection, I demanded the district fulfill its statutory obligations and begin releasing these readily available documents immediately on a rolling basis, starting with the June 11 correspondence.