The state department of transportation, along with representatives from the companies that have been chosen to build the deep-bore tunnel, is giving a presentation to the city council right now about the tunnel contract.

I'll have a full report on the presentation later this morning, but this seemed noteworthy on its own: Asked by council member Mike O'Brien whether the state had considered the contractor's history of lawsuits and cost overruns in choosing a tunnel construction team, WSDOT  viaduct planner Linea Laird called lawsuits and fraud claims "part of business. ... We don't consider claims and challenges a fatal flaw in contracting. It is something that occurs."

Viaduct project manager Ron Paananen added: "You saw a few stories from a couple of selected projects from companies that literally do thousands of projects across the country and the world, so to focus on those, I don't think would be representative" of the tunnel construction team.

As I reported last year, Tutor-Perini, one of the lead companies on the contract, has paid out millions of dollars in fraud and racketeering claims on projects around the world, and is currently being sued by the Los Angeles Metropolitan Transportation Authority, which claims the company falsely inflated costs on an LA subway job.