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Vote for Belleair on Nov. 8
Article published on Friday, Oct. 28, 2005 |
Editor:
I want to respond to correct several misinformed statements and provide some food for thought.
First, Progress Energy is a monopoly and has no incentive to be efficient. In fact, they have a disincentive with their guaranteed long-term rates of return. Further, it is well documented in every major newspaper that the Public Service Commission staff and commission are far too friendly and sympathetic to the investor-owned utilities. The municipal owned system, while it is a monopoly, does create competition. As you know, the town has bid the supply of electricity in one contract and the operation and maintenance in another contract to the various potential vendors.
Progress Energy’s wholesale energy supply unit was our best bid in energy supply, and Coastal Electrical and Construction was our best bid in operation and maintenance. Seasoned professionals will always be in charge of our town’s power supply. The bids from these companies were used in the last independent study which incorporated court ordered arbitration results and the bids for energy and operation and maintenance. Most importantly, the oversight of the utility director will be through the electric franchise committee to the commission.
All of these people are Belleair residents that you can contact every day. These same people are ratepayers, just like you, and, they are owners of the utility, just like every Belleair citizen. If they fail, you decide by your vote.
Local control! You have no control over some greedy executive that comes from North Carolina and is paid, after 12 years of service to retire, $38 million in stock and $1.3 million a year for the rest of his and his wife’s lives. His decisions are self-serving and for the benefit of his options and Wall Street expectations.
With regards to undergrounding our power lines: This is something the governor of this state thinks is the right thing to do. If we vote for Belleair on Tuesday, Nov. 8, the cash flow represents the opportunity to underground without raising rates; either by undergrounding in segments over approximately five years or by covering debt service if the citizens-ratepayers-owners felt a more rapid undergrounding was desirous. Progress Energy’s response is that the citizens or the town will pay for it, and give it to Progress Energy. This would cost the typical homeowner in the town approximately $1,000 a year extra.
With regards to Power To The People: Power to the People is completely legal, ethical and truthful. As I discussed in the beginning of this campaign, I have no secret or hidden agenda. I am a Political Science major that believes in getting involved on important issues facing our town. I know I am doing the right thing for Belleair, a place I truly love and cherish, unlike a billion dollar international power conglomerate from North Carolina.
Progress Energy, on the other hand has been manipulating the town’s political system, lying to the Public Service Commission, and lying to and intimidating the citizens of Belleair and the state for years. Only Progress Energy is guilty of “sound bites and misquotes.” I suspect a short review of Progress Energy’s and the IOU’s (Investor Owned Utilities) history over the last 10 years would be eye opening. Why should Belleair sign a second agreement with a company that failed to honor the first agreement?
In summary: I have spent a lot of time in this, and have examined the numbers and statistics. There are more than 2,000 municipal utilities in the country. Belleair will be larger than 55 percent of them. Winter Park has proven its success recently. Fort Meade as well as the 33 other municipalities that make up the Florida Municipal Electric Association have demonstrated fiscal responsibility, lower rates, superior reliability, superior storm response, mutual aid and local control. I firmly believe that this would be the single greatest improvement to the town and its future since the citizens of Belleair successfully fought the destruction of the town by U.S. Steel in the early 1970s.
Jim Harrison
Belleair
Power To The People
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Article published on Friday, Oct. 28, 2005
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