DOT Inspector General

1200 New Jersey Ave SE

West Bldg 7th Floor
Washington, DC 20590
September 19, 2016
Re: Investigation into Washington State Department Of Transportation
(WSDOT) for fraud, misrepresentation or concealing of information
related to the SR 520 Bridge project.
Dear Inspector General:
For a number of years, WSDOT has been working on the construction
of the new SR 520 Bridge across Lake Washington in King County,
Washington. Since spring there has been substantial community
concern about the demolition portion of the SR 520 Bridge project.
First local citizens learned that processing (crushing) bridge cement
was planned for an open-air site in Kenmore, rather than within a
closed controlled facility for processing or recycling cement. Due to
litigation, Kenmore was eliminated for consideration as a site for
crushing bridge concrete, so the activity was moved south with almost
no prior public notice or environmental review to uncovered barges on
open water at the construction zone in Lake Washington itself.
It has been very difficult getting answers from WSDOT as to exactly
what was planned for bridge demolition in terms of local community
impacts. We have found, mostly from research after the project was
under way that WSDOT had either misrepresented the facts, withheld
requested information that they deemed unfavorable to their internally
chosen course of action, or lied to us.
Prior to the demolition, WSDOT became aware that the pontoon
superstructure cement of the SR 520 Bridge was contaminated with
arsenic (to this date WSDOT has not stated exactly when they became
aware, or provided the relevant sample data). In a document that
would eventually become public1, it is stated WSDOT has surveyed
the existing floating bridge for hazardous materials and has discovered
some areas of concrete with very low levels (less than 0.2 ppm) of
arsenic present. Although the arsenic levels in some of the concrete
are below those that would be expected to pose an issue for human

1 SR 520, I-5 to Medina: Bridge Replacement and HOV Project

NEPA/SEPA Environmental Reevaluation: Floating Bridge Demolition,
page 8,

health, WSDOT would transport all concrete containing arsenic to an

approved demolition and disposal site
The problem though is that this information was false and misleading,
it appears that WSDOT intended to conceal from the public that in the
concrete were arsenic levels orders of magnitude higher than what
WSDOT had initially claimed. Also, the cement waste fails to meet
both the arsenic and the pH limits for the selected disposal site2, yet is
currently being disposed of there anyhow. WSDOT has continued to
provide the public false and misleading information to avoid public
scrutiny or adequately evaluate public health, monitoring and reporting
requirements, worker health/exposure or disposal requirements for the
contaminated cement.
A month prior to issuing the NEPA/SEPA Environmental Reevaluation
(4/20/16), WSDOTs contractor KGM did a power point presentation for
Department of Ecology3 , on the demolition plan for the project. KGM
told Ecology that the Pontoon Superstructure material would be
processed and disposed of at Reserve Silica, that it was contaminated
with 50-65 ppm of arsenic, and that it failed to pass the pH test for that
site. Reserve Silica has a total metals arsenic limit of 20 mg/Kg (ppm),
and a pH limit of not higher than pH 8.5 standard units4.
Despite having this information in hand, WSDOT created a fabrication
by supplying the public with data limited to results that showed less
than the limits of detection from a special purpose test called a Toxicity
Characteristic Leaching Procedure (TCLP) method, and four total metals
samples tested specifically for arsenic, apparently from an area of the
bridge not contaminated with arsenic5. Our conclusion results from the
KGM presentation, stating that the area of concrete contaminated with
arsenic was limited to the Pontoon Superstructure, whereas the four
2 Arsenic is limited to 20 mg/Kg (ppm), see maximum concentration
limits at http://www.reservesilica.com/dumping/ pH is limited to a
range of 6.5 to 8.5, see Warning Letter, Department of Ecology to
Reserve Silica, May 20, 2013, in addition see Warning Letter, and
Notice of Violation, Department of Ecology to Reserve Silica, June 29,
2016
3 3/23/16 SR 520 Evergreen Point Floating Bridge and Landings Project
KGM, http://wsdot.wa.gov/NR/rdonlyres/539481BE-5A93-44A9-8427635BAB92EBAF/0/DepartmentofEcology_Emails_March16_May22_2016.
pdf , see starting at page 51 of 99, Pontoon Superstructure, and
specifically page 63 of 99, Concrete Recycle/Disposal
4 See footnote 2
5 520 Bridge Test Result Summary 5-20-16, Anchor QEA report for
City of Kenmore

total metal arsenic samples were taken from the Approach Structure
(see footnote 3, page 15 of 17).
It appears that despite knowing there were elevated levels of arsenic in
a portion of the concrete, rather than releasing that data to the public,
WSDOT substituted data with results they found more acceptable.
Rather than releasing the original data to the public, WSDOT appears
to have attempted to deceive the public into believing that the TCLP
results and four total metals approach structure samples were all the
available data.
The public had to go to substantial effort and only uncovered this
deception by happenstance. While requesting answers from
WSDOT/KGM about these matters a concerned citizen had also filed a
records request with the City of Kenmore. The request was for records
related to WSDOTs original plan to process (crush) cement at the
Kenmore Yard site. The City provided documents in installments.
On or about July 29th, the City provided records related to a settlement
between KGM and the City of Kenmore due to litigation over the City
refusing to allow WSDOT/KGM to carry out demolition of bridge
materials at the Kenmore Yard. Those records included an email
discussion between attorneys for KGM and the City of Kenmore on the
potential terms of settlement. This included the following statement:
A couple of items we need additional information on and some buy in
from your client. First, concern has been expressed about how the
arsenic contaminated concrete will be handled (emphasis added). That
is, will it be separated from other concrete, where, and how. A
description of the process as well as a representation that this has
been accepted by the WSDOT and King County would help. Also, the
identity of the handling facility would help. We also still need the
testing data that shows the level of arsenic and other contaminants,
and any reports that reflect assurances about how these and any other
contaminated items will be handled.6
In August, citizens found the power point presentation referred to in
footnote 2, buried amongst two months worth of emails that Ecology
put on the WSDOT SR 520 web page under thousands of pages of
documents pertaining to permitting matters for the site.
So the record establishes that some time prior to March 2016,
WSDOT/KGM became aware that some portion of the SR 520 Bridge
6 Email from William A. Linton to Pat Schneider, Tuesday, May 10, 2016
1:34pm

was contaminated with arsenic at the 50-65 ppm range, and that
contaminated concrete failed to meet the pH limit for the site they
chose to dispose of the material at. Despite having this information in
hand and discussing it with other state agencies (Ecology), WSDOT
filed a false and misleading NEPA/SEPA reevaluation with the Federal
Highway Administration in April 2016. Additionally, WSDOT withheld
the data from the City of Kenmore in May 2016, and instead only
provided data that comported to the claims WSDOT/FHWA made in the
NEPA/SEPA reevaluation, and didnt provide the 50-65 ppm arsenic
data they presented to Ecology the previous month. Furthermore, in
July there was a meeting between WSDOT, KGM, multiple citizen
groups, Ecology and State Legislators at WSDOTs office in Seattle7.
Despite specifically being questioned about data results from the SR
520 Bridge, and while the issue that the material being disposed of at
Reserve Silica didnt meet disposal requirements was raised by the
community members present, WSDOT/KGM continued the false
narrative with the public, by pretending that the 50-65ppm arsenic
data discussed in their March 2016 presentation did not exist, and
refusing to provide it in response to records requests to this date.
The public remained unaware of the higher level of arsenic data and
the failed pH results, as WSDOT/KGM intended until the information
was inadvertently uncovered in August, by which time demolition of
the concrete was already well under way, as was disposal of the
arsenic and the high pH contaminated cement at the Reserve Silica
site. It should be further noted that Reserve Silica is a contaminated
site listed with the states Toxic Cleanup Program and cited by Ecology
in June 2016 for violating its NPDES permit for high pH discharges from
cement waste.8 These circumstances alone should have eliminated the
Reserve Silica site from consideration for disposal of SR 520 Bridge
demolition waste disposal.
The available evidence and records demonstrate that WSDOT,
including by and through its contractor KGM, have engaged in
concealment, providing false or misleading information to the public,
and submitting false or misleading reports and/or evaluations. It
appears this was done to avoid processes or actions that WSDOT didnt
want to engage in, and included and includes ongoing deception of the
public to purposefully deny the public any right of comment or
7 Meeting at WSDOTs Seattle office July 14, 2016, additional
documents available on request.
8 See Ecology Toxic Cleanup Program webpage for site hazard ranking,
and notification letter
https://fortress.wa.gov/ecy/gsp/CleanupSiteDocuments.aspx?
csid=4728 , and see Ecology Notice of Violation 13465, June 29, 2016

challenge to WSDOTs activities related to the SR 520 Bridge

demolition project.
For these reasons we respectfully request that the Inspector General
open an investigation into WSDOT, to determine the nature and extent
of wrong doing related to this federally funded project.
Sincerely,
Colleen Sust,
Laurelhurst Community Club
PMB #373
4616 25 Ave NE
Seattle, WA 98105
Elizabeth Mooney,
People for Environmentally
5934 NE 201st
Kenmore 98028
Greg Wingard,
Green River Coalition
PO Box 7021
Covington, WA 98042