Two investigations are currently being conducted into a possible conflict of interest violation by Port of Centralia Commissioner Peter Lahmann, according to documents obtained by The Chronicle.
One investigation was started internally after the port’s own auditor, Amy Graber, submitted a memo detailing her concerns, while the other is being independently conducted by the Washington Department of Veterans Affairs (WDVA).
The investigations began after the auditor looked into Lahmann’s requests to utilize apprenticeship programs in port construction projects, which were made in four different meetings going back to February 2021. Lahmann currently serves as the WDVA apprenticeship program specialist.
“I am concerned that he is abusing his position as an elected port commissioner to coerce port tenants into meeting with him about his apprenticeship programs in connection with representing their issues to the port commission,” Graber wrote in a Jan. 19, 2023, memo to Port of Centralia Executive Director Kyle Heaton.
Lahmann had given a presentation in December 2022 at the Washington Public Ports Association (WPPA) conference regarding apprenticeships and hiring veterans. Graber also suspected Lahmann might have been using his position as commissioner to “push his apprenticeship program onto other port districts.”
She cited a Jan. 17, 2023, email from Lahmann’s WDVA account — in which he sent a copy for public records to his port email — to Jennifer Wray-Keene, executive director for the Port of Woodland.
In the email, Lahmann mentioned he works as a Port of Centralia commissioner while thanking her for her interest in hiring veterans after meeting her at the WPPA conference the month prior. He told Wray-Keene to let him know if she had any questions revolving around internships and hiring veterans.
“The goal of my position is to get transitioning service members, veterans, military spouses and families connected to good career opportunities,” Lahmann said in the email.
Graber raised concerns about Lahmann’s interactions with several port tenants that were outside of a commissioner’s role, including with Scot Industries and UNFI, stating he had been in contact with them both in public and via his commissioner email account.
In the Scot Industries case, Lahmann advocated for the company’s advertisements to be displayed on port signs in a July 2021 meeting after Heaton had addressed the issue several months prior in an email to Scot Industries. Graber’s memo included the email, in which Heaton informed Scot Industries the port selects and pays for tenant signage and changes the signs “from time to time.”
As for the UNFI case, Lahmann stated UNFI was looking for mid-level management and their employees were having issues finding affordable housing during an August 2022 port meeting.
Following the meeting, Graber met with Lahmann to ask if UNFI had recently held a hiring event where he heard these things. Lahmann told her UNFI representatives had visited his office to discuss “the military and other things,” and Lahmann had told them, “the port is here to help them with whatever they need,” according to Graber’s memo.
The memo ended with Graber stating, “I am not opposed to apprenticeship programs and believe that they provide an opportunity to many who want to enter the construction industry. My concerns are based on my position as port auditor.”
While WDVA representatives have confirmed its investigation is ongoing, no other details have been provided. The Chronicle has also reached out to Ray Liaw of Van Ness Feldman LLP in Seattle, legal counsel to the port. In an emailed response, Liaw said the investigation was still ongoing and is expected it to conclude in May.
Lahmann and fellow commissioners Kyle Markstrom and Julie Shaffley have been contacted for comment on the investigations, but according to an email from Heaton, the commissioners are not authorized to discuss an ongoing investigation.
While not directly related to the ongoing investigations, Lahmann has previously come under the port’s scrutiny, specifically in a July 2022 port meeting.
The incident in question revolved around confidential information relating to a port property purchase discussed in an executive session being leaked onto the Facebook group “Centralia Citizens for an Open and Honest Port,” according to the meeting minutes.
During the meeting, Heaton stated port employees he questioned had not shared the information discussed in the executive session with third parties, leading Markstrom to say on the record he believed it had been leaked by one of his fellow commissioners.
Lahmann and Shaffley both stated they did not leak the information. Markstrom then addressed Lahmann about the public support he regularly received from the Facebook group.
The minutes read, “(Markstrom) asked Commissioner Lahmann if he was sure that he did not discuss the information with anyone outside the commission. Commissioner Lahmann replied not to his knowledge and said that he honored the sanctity of executive session and never knowingly violated its trust.”
Markstrom was concerned because the leak jeopardized the purchase, though the sale was ultimately completed.
Shaffley was not asked the same type of followup questions during the meeting, according to the minutes.
Markstrom asked the port’s legal counsel to draft a resolution censuring the commissioner who may have leaked the information, though it never came to fruition as all three commissioners signed a sworn statement they did not leak the information.
No investigation to discover the source of the leak was ever launched, though Markstrom stated if more leaks happened an investigation would begin.
