Opinion: Things just aren’t what they seem


The news in the last few weeks makes me wonder if we are on the edge of some new paradigm, with appearances almost totally divorced from reality.
Internationally, much has been made about the “successful” bailout for Greece and the “haircut” that bond-holders were taking. But on March 10, the New York Times analyzed the total debt owed by the Greek government. As it turns out, there was only a minimal reduction. Although privately held bonds lost nearly two thirds of their value, total Greek government debt was reduced by less than 25 percent. Success is apparently now measured by just having put off the inevitable.
Nationally, the Federal Reserve has bought massive amounts of government debt and mortgage backed securities. This was allegedly to keep interest rates low so that businesses and consumers can borrow cheaply to kick-start the economy. Of course, it also forces ordinary citizens to accept very low returns on their savings. But according to a story in the Times on March 12, the Fed is also providing incentives to banks to hang on to the money and prevent it from circulating, allegedly to prevent inflation. So we have “cheap money” that can’t be borrowed, with the only real beneficiaries arguably being the banks.
The private sector is in the game too. MF Global, the commodities trading company run by former Goldman-Sachs executive and N.J. senator and governor Jon Corzine went bankrupt after disappearing $1.6 billion of customers’ funds. Months went by with the various trustees looking for the money. Now Wall Street banks and others are offering 90 cents on the dollar for MF Global clients’ accounts. Presumably the banks figure that they can recover close to 100 percent of the value, or why make this offer? But the public coverage of MF Global story has repeatedly said any recovery is highly uncertain. The Wall Street types seem to have an inside line on the situation that the small farmers and grain storage operators who lost their shirts don’t have.
More locally, we have the continuing revelations in the Daily Camera about University of Colorado executive pay. Administrators are getting their retirement benefits, while at the same time receiving six-figure salaries for working part time. And if I understand it correctly, some salaries were raised in the last few years of employment with the apparent purpose of increasing those same retirement benefits. The lack of transparency, the attempts to circumvent press coverage, and the immediate changes that were made once all this became public, demonstrates that the regents need to clean up their process. Additionally, this has once again raised the issue of the public employees’ retirement system apparently being used to push costs off to the future, thereby avoiding dealing with them in current budgets.
Not to be outdone, Xcel, our local investor owned monopoly utility whose motto is “Responsible By Nature” showed up in the Denver Post on March 13. Xcel’s request, buried in their $142 million rate hike proposal, is that we customers pay for part of the cost for two Xcel employees to use Xcel’s jets “to commute weekly between their homes in Denver and their offices at Xcel headquarters in Minneapolis.” As the PUC staff understatedly said, “The ratepayers do not benefit by these two employees commuting via the two corporate jets to their primary place of employment…”
On the SmartGridCity scene, Xcel is finally deploying some in-home devices that will allow the utility to turn down air conditioning loads in private homes during time of peak electricity usage. But according to the material given to the homeowners and reports from local experts, the equipment is not hooked to Xcel’s vastly expensive SmartGridCity private fiber optics system and also operates completely independently of the “smart meters” Xcel previously installed. Instead, the equipment uses separate meters and communicates wirelessly and over the Internet. So, in spite of “SmartGridCity” being on the covers of the printed material Xcel provided, it appears that this hardware could be used pretty much anywhere in the state. Will the PUC grant Xcel its final millions of cost recovery on SmartGridCity based on this apparently completely independent project? Stay tuned to see if once again perception and reality don’t match.


Popular Posts

Opinion: Opportunity for the new Boulder City Council

Congratulations to the four new Boulder City Council members! You have a great opportunity to make a contribution to the Boulder community, but it will take a lot of work to do it responsibly; the learning curve is pretty steep. Here are some suggestions for you (and other Council members) that may help improve the process. Read the Charter. It is the document that governs how you, city staff, and board and commission members operate, and how you relate to each other. It defines the limits of your and their power, and can only be amended by a citizen vote. You don’t have to remember every word. But just knowing what’s there makes you more self reliant and less at the mercy of others’ opinions. For example, relative to the recent meeting discussion over diversity, the council does  not  have the power to suspend the rules as to when the mayor is selected. Charter Section 14 specifies, “The mayor shall be chosen by the council from its own number, upon the convening of t...
Read more

Opinion: Is this the end of Boulder as we know it?

Much of what has made Boulder such a great place to live has been the work of people half a century ago. These people recognized what I call the “ ratchet effect ,” that bad development decisions cannot be undone, so policies needed to be put in place to prevent, or at least limit, the damage that a growth-at-all-costs majority of the council could do. These policies include charter limits, like the Blue Line that prevents city water for development from being supplied above a certain altitude, the 55-foot height limit that has prevented high-rise development from cutting off our views, and the open space referendum process that allows a 60-day window for citizens to challenge disposals of open space. Other constraints include the Boulder Valley Comprehensive Plan’s requirement for Planning Board agreement for land-use changes in the area inside the city limits (Area I) and additional agreement by the county commissioners and county Planning Commission for urban development further...
Read more

Policy Documents: Impact Fees and Adequate Public Facilities

I am writing this to correct some of the apparent inaccuracies put forward at the 10/14 CC/PB study session about charging growth for its costs. I do not claim to be an expert in the field, but I have studied it long enough and consulted with enough supposed experts and legal types to understand most of the basics. In addition, I have found that the experts don’t necessarily know everything and won’t necessarily put forward the most appropriate solutions. The fundamental rule, both legal and equitable, is that growth should pay to address its impacts so as to maintain existing levels of service (LOS) for existing residents and businesses. But growth cannot be required to improve levels of service. LOS is measured in all sorts of ways depending on the facility and/or service being measured. For transportation, it could be total VMT, travel time, intersection waits, access to transit, etc. For schools, it might be square footage per pupil, etc. For water, it could be water righ...
Read more