Senn Clear Of All But 1 Allegation No Merit To 27 Of 28 Complaints Against State Insurance Chief

State Insurance Commissioner Deborah Senn was almost entirely cleared Tuesday of a variety of anonymous complaints, mainly from her employees, that she had violated myriad state rules.

Of 28 “whistleblower” complaints investigated by a firm hired by state Auditor Brian Sonntag, only one was found to have merit.

The firm, Miller & Miller, P.S., of Seattle, said Senn improperly had granted three employees two days of paid leave while their offices were being moved from Seattle to Olympia. The leaves were granted in May of last year.

Senn, who was elected to the post in 1992 and re-elected last year, said rules surrounding the granting of paid leave are unclear but that steps will be taken to ensure that problems won’t occur again.

For the most part, the whistleblower investigation - which cost the state $22,500 - was a bust. Senn said at the start that the complaints had been generated by people, mostly employees, who disagree with her approach to her job. Tuesday, she said the complaints had been “politically motivated” by people “trying to distract us from our mission” of protecting insurance consumers.

“There’s obviously people (employees) there who are unhappy,” investigator Steve Miller said in an interview. He said the unhappiness could be based on Senn’s style, possible deficiencies in management ability, or both. “I really can’t say,” he said.

The complaints were generated more than a year ago, at a time when Senn was under fire from the Washington Federation of State Employees, which contended she made it more difficult to organize than was necessary. The federation succeeded last spring in establishing a bargaining unit in Senn’s department. Senn concedes they had disagreements, but said she generally supported organizers’ efforts.

In the past year, the insurance chief - who has made enemies inside and outside the office - has been cleared of several other accusations. Among them, she was cleared of assertions of illegal lobbying, of requiring a top aide to perform campaign work on state time, of a variety of other whistleblower complaints from workers and others and of illegally shredding documents.

In this particular investigation, Miller & Miller said the 28 complaints generally involved allegations of violations of state laws or rules; abuse of authority; actions that would bring substantial and specific danger to the public health and safety; and gross waste of public funds.

“Many of the assertions dealt with inappropriate use of the state’s resources involving travel, office space, credit cards or cell phones. Some assertions dealt with employees or contractors performing inappropriate duties, unauthorized activities, unnecessary activities or who were unproductive,” the investigators said in a report.

“Other assertions dealt with a lack of supervision or supervisory instructions to perform improper activities. One assertion dealt with possible interference in a separate investigation. Another assertion dealt with inappropriate use of nonstate funds,” the investigators said.

“We substantiated only one of 28 assertions investigated,” they said.

The state’s 1982 Whistleblower Act allows people to ask the auditor anonymously to investigate allegations of wrongdoing against public officials.

By law, the substance of such complaints must remain confidential until the investigation is complete.