Steve Pomerance

The Colorado state constitution gives cities the absolute right to create their own electric utilities. We now have had positive votes in three elections — replacement of the franchise fee in 2010, conditional authorization to create the muni and provisions for funding the process in 2011, and this year when Xcel, through surrogates, put its own item on the ballot. The next steps are negotiations and court proceedings over the price for the distribution system and how the parts will be separated between the two utilities. And there will be proceedings at the Federal Energy Regulatory Commission over whether Boulder’s departure will “strand” any of Xcel’s generation facilities. The roots of this struggle go back about a century. Very briefly, to eliminate multiple sets of wires being run down streets and the resulting competition that dampened profits, both governments and electric companies opted for regulated monopoly status. The regulators were supposed to design rules that creat...

Congratulations to Mary Young, Matt Appelbaum, Sam Weaver, Andrew Shoemaker and Macon Cowles for their election to the Boulder City Council. Mary, Sam and Andrew, the three new members, all have served on the city planning board, so have a good start on the steep learning curve that occurs when new council members are faced with the myriad of issues that council deals with. Thanks to all the citizens who worked hard to support and oppose the various ballot issues. Participation is what makes democracy work, and the high level of involvement by Boulder citizens is what will keep Boulder such a great place. I especially appreciate the people at New Era Colorado, who did such a spectacular job of involving younger voters in the No on 310 campaign. For the older folks like me, it is heartening to see this level of engagement. It makes me hopeful that there will be people around to keep Boulder’s activist politics alive and well. The defeat of Ballot Question 310 by more than a 2 to...

A few months ago, I discussed “Disruptive Challenges,” a paper published by the Edison Electric Institute (EEI), the research arm of a large group of investor-owned utilities. The paper accurately describes renewable energy as potentially disrupting the business model used by these utilities to extract high profits with little risk. Disruption is now manifesting in Europe, where the growth of renewables has been extremely rapid. Apparently the initial subsidies led to lots of installations, which reduced overall costs, which then allowed subsidies to be reduced. According to a recent article in The Economist entitled “How to lose a half a trillion euros,” market valuation of European utilities has dropped by over half since 2008. One major factor is the inability of their coal-powered generation plants to integrate with the variable output of renewables. Because the Europeans require utilities to accept all the renewable energy generated, these slow-ramping plants are becoming fo...

Voters will face numerous ballot items, a slate of new council candidates, and an initiated charter amendment, Ballot Question 310, aka the “Xcel Profit Protection Plan.” The big tax issues are quite complicated. Ballot Question 2C extends the existing 0.33 percent sales tax for open space that expires in 2018, but converts it into a 0.22 percent tax for open space that would drop to 0.10 percent in 2035, with the remaining 0.11 percent through 2035 and 0.23 percent thereafter going to the general fund. Both of these would be permanent taxes thereafter. Ballot Issue 2B would increase sales taxes by an additional 0.15 percent from 2014 through 2019 to pay for transportation maintenance, transit, etc. Ballot Question 2D would convert the other temporary 0.15 percent open space tax that expires in 2019 to fund transportation infrastructure from then through 2029 and then be an undedicated tax through 2039. You might wonder why the tax extension for open space is on the ballot now,...

Last Friday, after we checked for flood damage, I emailed pictures of the flood to my brother, who was at a National Academy of Science workshop in Maryland. The scientists there were discussing the effects of the loss of arctic sea ice on the exact type of weather patterns that we were experiencing. In brief, the loss of ice cover has allowed more heat to be absorbed, reducing the temperature differential between the arctic and temperate latitudes. This has led to “blocking” of the jet stream, creating stalled weather patterns like the week of rain we experienced. And we can expect more extended periods of rain, drought, etc. in the future. In the vein of not letting a crisis go to waste, and as I suggested to the city manager last week, Boulder should hold neighborhood and area meetings to do a retrospective on Boulder’s flood preparations. When I was on the council, we put in place an extensive program to improve the carrying capacity of our floodways and remove a number of at-r...

A group of citizens called East Boulder County United has put what they are calling the Community Bill of Rights on the November ballot in Lafayette. Although this charter amendment focuses on limiting fracking in Lafayette, the implications are potentially game-changing in how we view the rights of people versus the rights of corporations. As you might expect, this threat to corporate profits has not gone unnoticed, and the Colorado Oil and Gas Association is pulling out all the stops to prevent its passage. Their tactics will be familiar to many readers. For example, according to Cliff Willmeng, spokesperson for EBCU, apparently COGA had someone register to vote and then file a complaint against the amendment a day later. The complaint was quashed by the city clerk, so then came the inevitable innuendos. As noted in this week’s Daily Camera, COGA implied that existing gas supplies to Lafayette might be affected, presumably referencing the language in paragraph i-3 in the amendmen...

Both of the announced candidates to replace term-limited State Rep. Claire Levy have asked me what I thought were the pressing state issues. It’s always nice to be asked for one’s opinion, but the more I thought about it, the longer the list has become. Here’s an abbreviated version: Roads and Schools – The proposed 0.7-cent state sales tax for transportation is exactly the wrong way to go. The legislature needs to impose statewide impact fees on new development to fund all new capacity needs, whether roads or transit. For the small remaining deficit, which is mostly maintenance costs, do some form of user fee (gas tax and/or VMT tax), as it is the most equitable and efficient. The proposed statewide school tax increase only addresses operating costs. So put impact fees in place to raise the money to build the new schools for the millions of additional residents expected over the next decades; that way existing residents don’t have to pay over and over. And get rid of the 2001 capi...

Some municipalization supporters recently did an analysis of Xcel’s Colorado pre-tax profits, based on Xcel’s multi-state corporate filings: Colorado now accounts for nearly half of Xcel’s profits, although our customer base is far smaller than Xcel’s in Minnesota, and even a smaller fraction if you include the other six states where Xcel also provides power. In the eight years from 2004 to 2012, Xcel’s Colorado pre-tax profit more than doubled, even though sales and generation capacity were essentially flat. Amazingly, the same data was presented in a strong article in  redstate.com , a notorious conservative website. (Google “kyle forti xcel colorado” .) Apparently both the left and the right are upset about the increase in Xcel’s Colorado profits. Boulder, of course, is part of Xcel’s profit machine. The same local people calculated that Boulder contributes something like $35 million a year to Xcel’s windfall. This excess is, to some extent, a function of the exorbitant al...

On Tuesday night the City Council had a useful discussion on possible sales tax ballot items for the open space and transportation departments and the general fund. Their discussions yielded significant improvements over the proposal that was floated at previous meetings. And many council members have finally acknowledged that there are some serious problems coming for the city’s transportation system that are not going to be solved by a few million additional dollars a year. Paramount of these is dealing with the impacts of growth and shifting funding to some form of user fee. But there was still the vestige of the idea that, just because Boulder voters re-approved in 1997 a 0.33 percent sales tax for open space, now set to expire in 2018, that they will meekly accept a new 0.33 percent sales tax that is partially for other purposes. Boulder voters are much more focused on how their money will be spent and whether there is real value to be gained, than whether the new taxes add up...

Xcel is spending massive sums of money chattering about the dangers of Boulder creating a green electric utility and firing criticisms at Boulder’s analyses. If all Xcel says were true, it would be in Xcel’s interest to stop its barrage of negativity and just let Boulder pursue its own future. Then, if the disaster that Xcel keeps predicting actually occurs, other cities would not even think about following Boulder toward a cleaner energy future. And Xcel’s nearly $700 million of pre-tax income from Colorado would be protected forever. Or at least until ratepayers revolt over skyrocketing rates from rapidly increasing coal costs, and carbon taxes make an albatross of Xcel’s new billion dollar Comanche 3 coal plant. ( sourcewatch.org/index.php /Existing_U.S._Coal_Plants) In spite of essentially flat electric sales, Xcel’s Colorado pre-tax/after-expense income more than doubled in six years — from $323 million in 2006 to $690 million in 2012 (per PSCo’s 10K filings.) So the $8.2 mill...

Boulder’s open space program has probably provided more benefits to Boulder residents than any other single program. Our prime water supply, the 55-foot height limit, the Blue Line, the Boulder Valley Comprehensive Plan, etc. all are important. But open space has provided us with unparalleled protection from sprawl and fantastic access to the outdoors. On Tuesday night, the City Council discussed options for extending the current open space taxes. Low interest rates and favorable land prices make this the time to go full out to complete the property purchase program. Here’s the way I see it: The council has already identified a long list of properties that it wants to acquire, called the Accelerated Acquisition Plan, estimated to cost nearly $90 million. It includes very visible parcels along the road to Lyons, and others east and south of town. In addition, the council is looking to open space to purchase oil and gas drilling rights, help build a regional trail network, and incr...

The Boulder City Council was on the right track Tuesday night when it unanimously approved a one-year fracking moratorium. Whether fracking can be done in a way that is environmentally benign is still an open question, but it is clear that this is not currently occurring on a consistent basis. So hitting the pause button until critical research is completed is the prudent thing to do. Whether the council will be able to hold that line after the first year is still an open question. It would have been a lot easier if the Legislature had moved forward on some of its fracking bills this session. But that would have required Gov. Hickenlooper to support the citizens rather than the oil and gas industry. Unfortunately, neither Tom Tancredo nor Scott Gessler, who are in the running to be his Republican opponent in 2014, represent a sufficient threat at this point to force the governor to shift his allegiance. Interestingly, new technology is emerging that could reduce fracking’s enviro...

Clearly, Xcel is behind the current attempt to amend Boulder’s charter in a way that could stop Boulder from creating a clean, innovative, and financially responsible electric utility. The proposed language was taken word-for-word from a poll Xcel did, and Xcel is intending to fund this effort to maintain its highly profitable monopoly. (See Camera stories of May 16 and 22.) Here’s what the initiative says, and what it means: The first paragraph requires that, “Before the utility issues any debt, voters must approve the amount of the utility’s debt limit and the total cost of debt repayment that the utility will incur…” This requires voter approval of both a debt limit and the total cost of debt repayment. This is much more stringent than even the Taxpayers Bill of Rights (TABOR). It forces a vote on the exact total cost of repayment, not on the maximum as TABOR requires. This means that the utility will have to guess at the final interest rate, because the vote will occur well b...

On April 26, the Boulder Planning Board finished its three-day review of the proposed annexation and development of the Hogan-Pancost property, located adjacent to the East Boulder Community Center. The city staff did not identify significant downsides in their memo, thereby effectively endorsing the project, but the planning board still turned down the annexation request 7-0. This unanimous vote raises fundamental questions about the suitability of the site for development in general, as well as about the proposed development plans in particular. City staff and the planning board members are smart, capable people. So how did they come down 180 degrees apart? Or, to generalize, when should city staff be advocates and when is their role to just provide information? The planning board had concerns about flooding, ground water, wetlands, riparian areas and neighborhood impact. All these issues are covered by policies in the Boulder Valley Comprehensive Plan, with which annexations m...