Ted Dahlstrom, executive director of Forward Washington, says founder, president and likely gubernatorial candidate Dino Rossi resigned as the group's president two weeks ago because he was attracting negative attention to the group. Forward Washington is under investigation by the Public Disclosure Commission to see if it is — as Democrats alleged in a complaint — a front for a Rossi gubernatorial campaign.

I can't reach Rossi this evening. But Dahlstrom told me:

"He felt that this was becoming burdensome on the foundation — that we were not able to do what we wanted to do because we were being investigated. There was a lot of stuff that came with him being president. He wanted to step aside for the future success of the foundation, so it could live beyond him, which was always his intention.

...

"We're a non-partisan foundation here and he thought this attention he was attracting wouldn't be good for the future of the foundation so he wanted to step away."

But Rossi is still collecting a paycheck from the group. He has been earning $75,000 a year as president. Dahlstrom said Rossi will continue to be paid through the end of October as he completes speaking engagements he agreed to while president of Forward Washington.

That will allow him to continue to travel the state while financed by unknown sources. That's the basis of the Democrats' complaint.

The continuing salary from Forward Washington may support Rossi almost until he makes a decision about the governor's race. That announcement is expected before the year is out. (In fact, Rossi just told Ralph Thomas that he will spend about the next six weeks considering his options before making a decision about the race, or a bit past his Forward Washington salary ends.)

At his blog, Rich Roesler, who broke this news this afternoon, quotes an e-mail from Dahlstrom to Forward Washington supporters that blames the Democrats' complaint for putting a crimp on fundraising.

The "baseless" complaint by "the governor's political agents," he wrote, had hurt the foundation's fundraising

Dahlstrom just forwarded a copy of the e-mail. It says, in part:

"The Governor's political agents filed a baseless complaint with the Public Disclosure Foundation (PDC) against our non-partisan Foundation. It is baseless because we were informed, in writing, by the PDC that as long as the Foundation did not expend funds to lobby or influence elections we would not be subject to PDC regulation — and we have never engaged in those activities," said Dahlstrom. "But the complaint has hurt our fundraising and would have made it impossible for the Foundation to focus on its mission successfully if Dino had remained as President. They may have achieved their goal of hurting the Foundation — but they will not stop us."

Dahlstrom told me that the PDC has been conducting interviews about Forward Washignton but he does not know when the investigation will be complete. I wondered if Rossi's resignation was at all an attempt to end the investigation and remove the question of his candidacy. Dahlstrom said absolutely not, that the two things are not connected.

State Democratic Party spokesman Kelly Steele said that Rossi "has spent months illegally campaigning with his sleazy front group, and now he's blaming others because he got caught."