The Times Blows It

With slightly different spins, media accounts in today's Seattle Weekly and Seattle Post-Intelligencer pretty much agreed on the basic facts surrounding yesterday's court decision on the lawsuit against the city of Seattle and One Reel by Friends of Gas Works Park: Judge Dean Lum ruled that the city needed to do an environmental review of the impact of the concerts on Gas Works (which is situated atop soil badly contaminated with toxic waste); the city can raise other issues, appeal, or comply; Judge Lum's ruling doesn't stop the 2007 Summer Nights concert series from happening at Gas Works (Friends of Gas Works' goal), but it is a win for the neighborhood activists.

But you'd never know it by reading this morning's Seattle Times.

Under the headline "Judge decides Gas Works concert suits can go ahead," the article leads with the following sentence:

Opponents of moving a popular summer concert series to Gas Works Park won a small court victory Tuesday when a judge ruled that their lawsuit against the city of Seattle and the concert promoter can go forward.

Technically, this is correct; Judge Lum did, in fact, dismiss the city's motion for summary judgment against Friends of Gas Works. (Meaning that the plaintiff's decision could go forward to a decision.) But a few seconds later, in a far more significant ruling, Lum then made that decision. He upheld the plaintiff's motion for summary judgment, on the grounds that the city was required to do a State Environmental Policy Act (SEPA) review to hold the 2007 summer concert series at Gas Works Park.

If the group does go to court and wins its lawsuit, the city and concert promoter One Reel would have to do a full environmental review before holding the shows at Gas Works.

Well, the group was already in court, and it just won its lawsuit. The city now has the option of raising other issues and going back to Judge Lum, appealing his ruling, or complying with it. Should the city take no further legal action, they will be required by law to do the environmental review.

That's not just a "small court victory," though Parks Department spokeswoman Dewey Potter undoubtably said it was. But then, Potter is the same Parks employee who, last February, insisted publicly that the Parks Department wouldn't respond to a planned protest by city-wide neighborhood groups—one day after she sent out an ethically dubious mass e-mail to people who have "been a supporter of one or more of the projects listed on the [protest] flier," asking them to "express that support in whatever way you feel is appropriate" in response to the protest.

In the news business, Potter is what is called an unreliable source. The Times should have known better.