The announcement by Fort Worden Hospitality (FWH) that it is not only curtailing operations but stiffing customers of deposits, many of whom put down thousands of dollars, is not only disappointing but just plain scurrilous.

The FWH blames Fort Worden PDA for its decision, claiming the “financial and legal challenges” of its landlord compelled their decision. While indeed the PDA debacle likely precipitated the FWH shutdown, asserting that the landlord’s problems resulted in their own rip-off of customer’s funds is not simply disingenuous---it may well be fraudulent as FWH has known of these issues for many months but accepted deposits nevertheless.

Landlords frequently suffer bankruptcy, but their tenant’s financial affairs are their own matters. Customer deposits taken in by a tenant are not assets of the landlord. Instead those deposits are to be held in good faith for the benefit of the customer. In this case FWH converted those funds to its own use, breaching their promise to the customer to supply the expected facility or refund the deposit.

To compound their perfidy the FWH is telling customers (friends of ours have also been scammed) to take the matter up with their credit card companies. Deposits were made months ago. FWH knows full well that those transactions have cleared and that funds have already been transferred to FWH’s account.

This amounts to suggesting that the customer join them in credit card fraud by trying to convince the card company to return their deposit despite the fact that FWH has retained the funds. This is a deceptive business practice intended to double down on FWH’s rip-off by trying to pass that along to the bank.

Neither the customer nor credit card company or bank is at fault here. This is an intentional act by FWH that bears no relationship to the problems of the PDA. FWH’s customers were its own and it’s incumbent on FWH to make those customers whole and refund deposits. Should they fail to promptly do so this matter should be investigated by the District Attorney and the state Attorney General’s Consumer Protection division.

FWH’s actions have already been widely reported by news media all down the west coast. Their actions will stain the reputation of Port Townsend as a tourist and event destination, and inure to the detriment of other lodging and hospitality businesses in town. Such actions cannot be tolerated.

Mark Roye

Port Townsend