Once again, there are those three words that poison the well of public information: “attorney-client privilege.”

Some residents of the Deep Creek area west of Spokane want to see the Army Corps of Engineers’ report on whether the federal government is responsible for tainting their ground water.

The Corps says it does not accept responsibility but cannot release information because the head of the investigation is an attorney.

This twisted way of concealing information isn’t original. For years, various local governments in Washington state have abused that privilege as a way to sit on public records and avoid accountability.

One of the excuses for invoking the privilege is to limit legal exposure. Now it looks like a lawsuit will be the only way to shake the information loose.

To Deep Creek residents, the debate goes beyond legal wrangling. Their wells are tainted, and if the government won’t take responsibility, they are left with devalued property and, possibly, health issues.

The Corps isn’t just stonewalling Deep Creek residents; it is also being tight-lipped with the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency and U.S. Rep. Cathy McMorris, R-Wash.

This saga began when the EPA was performing a routine review of former defense sites in 2004. The agency found that a well near the former Nike missile site near Fairchild Air Force Base had been tainted with chemicals typically found in rocket fuels. Further study produced more tainted wells.

The EPA strongly suspects that the missile sites, which were constructed in the 1950s, are the culprits. It urged the Army Corps of Engineers, which is responsible for defense-related environmental cleanups, to conduct a historical investigation.

Since then, the Corps has announced that it won’t be take responsibility because of the possibility that other sites could’ve been the source of the contamination. However, it has refused to answer simple inquiries from the EPA and McMorris on the nature and details of its investigation.

Instead, the Corps has labeled all of that information “privileged,” because the review was conducted by its Seattle District Office of Counsel.

This blatant attempt to protect a public agency from the very public it serves is ridiculous, but at least it provides another great example of how attorney-client privilege can be abused.

Don’t want to release information? Just put an attorney – paid for by taxpayers – in the information loop, whether legal expertise is needed or not.

The question of whether the wells were contaminated by the missile program should be answered by scientists, not attorneys. If that answer carries legal implications, so be it.

The principle of personal responsibility, not trickery, should dictate the government’s course of action.