IDHW asks Labrador to pay its attorney fees

Attorneys for the Idaho Department of Health and Welfare’s outgoing director and other employees are asking the Idaho Attorney General’s Office to pay more than $119,000 in attorneys fees for a case related to an investigation into a health department grant program.

Department of Health and Welfare Director Dave Jeppesen, Deputy Director Jennifer Palagi and Self-Reliance Division Administrator Shane Leach had petitioned the court to end the attorney general’s civil investigative demands, or CIDs, which are a kind of subpoena.

In documents filed Monday in Ada County District Court, Jeppesen’s attorney Trudy Fouser asked the court to require Attorney General Raul Labrador’s office to pay $119,112.50 in costs and fees associated with the case. Fouser argues the CIDs should have never been issued in the first place because an audit of the program in question was already underway.

“Attorney General Labrador created this situation, and he should bear the consequences of his actions,” Fouser wrote.

She argues that Labrador’s CIDs created an adversarial relationship with his own client, the health department, and they “lacked a reasonable basis of law.”

Labrador had issued the CIDs amid an investigation into whether the health department administered its Community Partners Grants in accordance with the state law. A special prosecutor in the case recently withdrew the CIDs, because the information sought had been provided in an audit report released this August.

Because the CIDs were withdrawn, the case was dismissed; however, the matter of attorneys fees was left undetermined.

In a 22-page court filing, Fouser makes many of the same arguments she made during the case as a whole, which is that the grant program was appropriately distributed, there was no reason for the attorney general to issue the CIDs, and that he could have made a more simple request for the information regarding the program directly to the agency.

The CIDs were served over concerns the grants were given to ineligible programs under state law. The budget bill that granted the health department authority the spend the federal funds required that they go toward programs for school-aged children aged 5 to 13. Leaders of the budget-writing committee learned that some programs seemed to serve younger children and raised the concern to the attorney general’s office.

“The Attorney General’s Office was informed by the legislature of a possible misuse of appropriated monies,” the office said in March, when the CIDs were served. “Any inquiry we make related to this matter is to ensure all evidence is preserved and the public is ultimately informed of the faces. Our role here is to ensure the actions of our state government are clear and transparent for the people.”

The Joint Finance and Appropriation Committee also voted to authorize an audit of the program. The audit, released Aug. 21, found eight significant findings related to the administration of the program. The department disagreed with all of the findings.

Guido covers Idaho politics for the Lewiston Tribune, Moscow-Pullman Daily News and Idaho Press of Nampa. She may be contacted at lguido@idahopress.com and can be found on Twitter @EyeOnBoiseGuido.