OTA contractors ask judge to recuse from turnpike lawsuit

Mindy Ragan Wood, The Norman Transcript, Okla.
·3 min read

Apr. 21—Seminole County District Judge Timothy L. Olsen has refused to recuse himself from hearing a lawsuit filed in January by Norman area residents who claim Oklahoma Turnpike Authority contractors were unlawfully paid $50 million last year.

OTA lost a separate lawsuit in December, after Olsen found the agency willfully violated the Open Meeting Act in January and February of 2022 when it announced plans to build toll roads in Norman.

Attorney Stan Ward, who represented more than 200 plaintiffs in that lawsuit, contends OTA must seek a return on contracts approved during and since those meetings because the contracts were awarded as the result of violating the open meeting law.

Ward subsequently filed a qui tam lawsuit seeking the refund of those dollars, an action which allows Oklahoma citizens to act as a private attorney general to demand the restitution of tax money unlawfully paid by a government agency.

Named in the qui tam lawsuit are 12 engineering contractors as well as OTA Director Tim Gatz, Deputy Director Joe Echelle, and the board.

Attorneys for the contractors have asked the judge to recuse because Olsen presided over the open meeting lawsuit, which is now on appeal before the Oklahoma Supreme Court.

Olsen refused in an order released Friday.

While the judge acknowledged judges must recuse when impartiality might be reasonably questioned under certain circumstances in a related case, contractors were not related to the open meeting lawsuit.

"The declaratory relief requested and granted in Hirschfeld v. OTA was limited to the OTA," the judge's order read. "The court made absolutely no findings regarding the engineering defendants. Engineering defendants are not even parties in Hirschfeld v. OTA."

Olsen also pointed out case law demonstrates a judge is not prevented from "presiding over a case simply because the judge previously presided over a related case."

If judges had to recuse on every related case, "they could not, as a practical matter, fulfill their duty to be available to decide matters that come before courts."

Attorneys for the engineers also pointed to Olsen hearing a third lawsuit, this one filed in May by Pike Off OTA on behalf of dozens of residents who alleged the agency did not have legislative authority to build Norman-area toll roads.

Olsen answered in his ruling that he dismissed the case to be heard by the Oklahoma Supreme Court because district court was not the proper venue to hear the issues raised in the lawsuit.

Olsen did not indulge the contractors' accusation of partiality other than to echo a rule which promised "nothing less than the cold neutrality of an impartial judge."

His order also noted all judges in the district declined to hear the qui tam lawsuit and neither the OTA's board nor its directors filed a motion for the judge to step aside.

Olsen wrote in closing that the unwarranted disqualification would bring disfavor on the court and the judge.

"The dignity of the court, the judge's respect for fulfillment of judicial duties, and a proper concern for the burdens that may be imposed upon the judge's colleagues require that a judge not use disqualification to avoid cases that present difficult, controversial, or unpopular issues," his order stated.

Following Olsens' rulings in the two lawsuits, OTA filed an appeal in the open meeting lawsuit in January when it also reauthorized contracts executed last year.

After the agency refused Ward's demand to seek a refund of unlawful contracts, he filed the qui tam lawsuit at the request of plaintiffs in the open meeting lawsuit.

The contractors named in the lawsuit are Poe & Associates; Garver Engineering; Olsson, Inc; MKEC Engineering, Inc; Transportation Alliance Group; Cowan Group, LLC; Benham Design, LLC; TEIM, LLC; CP&Y; CEC Corporation; MacArthur Associated Consultants, LLC and EST.

Citing lawsuit challenges and the absence of approved bond revenue, OTA announced as of April 14 it has ceased all work on turnpike projects associated with its ACCESS plan, including two planned in Norman.