The Olympia Washington Kiwanis members and their friends have cost the Washington State taxpayers over $50 million dollars (so far), because of their willful ignorance of long term, merciless and well known, child abuse that occurred at the Olympia Kiwanis Boys Ranch.

October 2006 note: This Olympia Kiwanis stuff is old news. I've left this information on the web, because I like the thought that someone will say to one of these Kiwanis friends or members: "Grandma, (Grandpa), are you still friends with those Olympia Kiwanians?"

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Back to the beginning Dick Thompson page

STATEMENT OF DICK THOMPSON ON December 20, 1995 95-687

I am Sergeant Glenn Cramer of the Washington State Patrol, Internal Affairs Section. The date is December 28, 1995. The time is 2:25 p.m. This is a statement of dictation notes from an interview Lieutenant Dan Eikum and I conducted on December 20, 1995 at 5:30 p.m. We met with Dick Thompson who was the Secretary for DSHS from January 1989 - May 1992.

Thompson started the conversation off by indicating that he is now the CEO in charge of the King County United Good Way. At the beginning of his professional career he started out as a private attorney. He later became an attorney for the City of Snohomish, then the Everett city manager. He moved on to be an advisor to the Governor in the Department of Community Development. Also, he was a member of the Governor's staff during Booth Gardner's term. In January of 1989 he became the acting Secretary for DSHS. He was going to be the acting Secretary for six months to develop a format on what qualifications would be needed for a new secretary. He said as he got into the position he received a call each day from Booth Gardner asking him if he wanted to become the Secretary. After six months he felt the person they were looking for was someone with his qualifications, so he went from acting Secretary to the Secretary. He was the Secretary until May of 1992.

Thompson said he was aware of the Olympia Kiwanis Boys Ranch during his time as Secretary, however, he was not aware of its particular circumstance. It wasn't until after he left DSHS that he became aware of the circumstance the OKBR was in. He attained his knowledge by reading the accounts of abuse in the paper.

Thompson said he had a working familiarity with the Federation of Resident Care Providers, although he wasn't very familiar with them. He indicated when he became the Secretary, Katherine Briar was an Assistant Secretary, and she'd been cutting deals with resident care providers to provide services. There was concern that if they didn't do this the resident care providers would not provide the service. This caused a problem because other resident care providers found out and wanted additional money to match what their colleagues had been getting.

Thompson said Brier was committed to the intent of eliminating beds for resident care providers who had a purpose to lobby for funds to maintain their resident care facilities. He went on to say that what ever amount someone else was receiving, another resident care provider would want more.

Thompson told us that the level of communications he expected as Secretary, was usually verbal orientation on issues. He received E-Mail updating him on issues and wanted any communication that had to deal with the legislature and policies. He had to rely on his staff and trust that they were telling him the truth. Again, he indicated that the first time he was really aware of the situation at the OKBR was after he left DSHS in May of 1992. It was in the Summer of 1992 when he read about it in the news paper. He went on to tell us that the audit conducted by Art Cantrall in 1988 was an exception in DSHS, particularly in region 6. Thompson said that areas of the state and other divisions of DSHS had problems, but they were always handled by the managers with the exception of region 6. He characterized the leadership in region 6 of DCFS as not being very good. He again said other areas had tough issues and they were handled by the management in those areas.

Thompson went on to say that other administrations didn't have the problems he had in DCFS. He related an incident that occurred in Aberdeen where a child was removed from a foster home. It caused quite a controversy in the area and at the Governor's Office. He overturned the case workers decision, which he said was absolutely wrong. The case worker had the mentality that he was interfering with her work duties, so she sued him. He said her decision was absolutely wrong and needed to be overturned. When he went down to the Aberdeen office to talk to the DCFS workers he realized there was very little leadership in region 6. There was either the street level social worker or head quarters, there was no in between leadership concerning the handling of issues in that region.

Thompson said in 1989 he personally wrote a letter to -147- legislatures inviting them to contact him directly if they had any issues they wanted to talk about. He indicated that he contacted most of these legislatures upon their request. One request was by Rose Bowman who was a legislature in Lewis County. In 1989 he and Wayne Ehlers went down to visit her. During this visit Representative Bowman took him to the Kiwanis Vocational Home because the Director wanted to talk to him. Chuck McCarthy wanted Thompson, as the Secretary, to guarantee 60 beds when they were only authorized for 48. Thompson said he was advised by Ehlers that he couldn't honor that request because the home was licensed for 48. He said approximately two to three months after this visit to the KVH, he was contacted by Paul Trause. Trause told him there was a complaint about there being a conflict of interest with KVH.

Apparently Thompson's personal attorney, George Darkenwald, was a friend of his and a member of the Kiwanis Club. He was also the attorney representing the KVH. Trause told Thompson that he had to recuse himself of the situation. Thompson said he called Darkenwald and told him he was out of the situation concerning the KVH. It wasn't until sometime later, one evening, Trause had come in to Thompson's office stating that KVH was "coming down," Thompson was under the impression that the director or someone in the staff was going to be fired.

I showed Thompson page five of Jean Soliz's testimony of November 30, 1995 where it implied that a deputy secretary later to become the acting secretary, interfered with the closing of KVH. Thompson said that was not accurate and he had confidence in Trause's judgement. He also said the deputy sometimes needs to be tougher than the actual secretary to make sure that policies are followed through. He indicated that it was their philosophy if a group home could be worked with in order to bring them into compliance, they would do so as long as it didn't endanger the safety of any children. Thompson went on to tell us that in theory DSHS has a standard complaint procedure. However, in reality, their complaint procedure lacks stability because of the constant changing in the upper administration, and there is passive resistance by the employees in the lower service level to the complaint procedure. He said many have the attitude that it was too risky to "bitch" because you don't know who may be in the upper administration at a later time.

Thompson told us that in 1990, there was 80 million dollars specifically allocated from the legislature to do the hiring of more CPS/CWS case workers. He said at the time they had an approximate 20 percent efficient rate during the year and they just couldn't keep up with the hiring process. Also, there was a requirement that all social workers would have a masters degree. They never could keep up with the hiring process to keep up with the 80 million dollars. He then indicated that in 1991 and 1993, fiscal biennium, they had to cut 100 million dollars eliminating positions, none of them being CPS positions. Thompson told us that part of the riffing procedure was a function of a formula. It was strictly mechanical where one person would revert back to their last previous position. He said in many cases, three or four positions would get bumped resulting in people who would end up in positions they weren't familiar with and didn't know what they were doing.

Thompson said there was an audit tracking system in place. It was part of the support division that reported up the chain of command to Bob Benson. The two tracks of an audit would go up the chain of command to Benson and then over to the operational level which should of been the area manager closest to the execution level of services. He also indicted that the audit results were expected to get to the people who were placing the kids.

Thompson told us that he's read in the news paper about the consensual sex at the OKBR. He said there was never a policy at DSHS that condoned consensual or any sex at group homes. He did not know if the audit would go to licensing, however, he felt that it should. Thompson went on to tell us that the top licensing position would or should report to the area manager.

Thompson indicated that one of the systemic problems he noticed in his tenure as the DSHS Secretary, was the position of area manager. No one was in charge of the office on a day to day operation. The area manager was on the road from one office to another, so there wasn't anyone in the office on a daily basis to make decisions. Thompson went on to say that a person at Mark Redal's level could have received amass of training and it would have been supported by DSHS administration. However, the person in that position needs to take the initiative to request the training. Thompson said their lowest supervisory levels had mandatory training, although he wasn't sure which levels they were.

He told us the case load level quoted in the papers was inaccurate. He said DSHS combines the case load of a CPS worker and a CWS worker to come out with an average. He told us the average case load for a CPS worker is 10 to 20 cases, and for a CWS worker it is 20 to 40. When they put those numbers together they come up with a case load of 30 to 35. He said that is not an accurate figure concerning CPS. In his assumption, Thompson feels the problems with CPS are in the "back end" of it. He described the back end as the Divisions of Adoption Placement and Foster Placement. The two divisions are vastly over worked which causes a back up in the system. Thompson told us there are times when it appears that DSHS has contradicting policies. There will be media opinion to "check the children." However, when CPS or CWS workers attempt to do so, there may be media scrutiny saying "don't take the children." He feels this is a systemic issue. Thompson said some systemic issues are legislative driven and some are budget driven.

In conclusion, he indicated that the people who should be accountable are the highest people who had to know about the OKBR and had in their authority the ability to do something.

Until Oct 1999, I believed that the Kiwanians and their friends were guilty of careless neglect or callous indifference. After hearing frightening audio depositions from some of the abused kids, I now believe that these people were involved with an "active collaboration with evil". The OKBR staff was apparently actively involved in long-term molestation and sadistic abuse of these kids. The Kiwanians and their friends could/should have stopped the abuse.

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