West v. Port of Olympia

¶1 This case involves three separate public disclosure requests for documents from the Port of Olympia (Port) regarding its lease negotiations with Weyerhaeuser Company. Because the Port had already executed the lease with Weyerhaeuser at the time of this request, the Port’s reliance upon that exemption to withhold records was improper. Once an agency implements a policy or recommendation, records pertaining to that policy or recommendation no longer fall within the ambit of the deliberative process exemption of the Public Records Act (PRA).1 We reverse and remand to the trial court to…