Opinion: An election to be remembered


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 1 margin was a singular event. The citizen coalition, Empower Our Future, that opposed 310 was once again outspent, and massively so considering all of Xcel’s pre-campaign polling and its advertising that was not directly targeting this issue and thus was not reported as campaign expenditures. 310’s defeat will allow Boulder to continue on the path toward creating a clean energy utility, rather than being stuck with Xcel’s coal plants and ever-increasing rates.
The comments in Wednesday’s paper by the 310 proponents that this was a “partial victory” sounded like they were trying to extract a very small drop of lemonade from a very bitter lemon. It’s true that Ballot Question 2E imposes a debt limit on the cost of purchasing the distribution system from Xcel. But many people voted for 2E as an insurance policy against 310; if 310 passed, but 2E got more votes, then according to its language, 2E would have superseded 310.
The probability is extremely remote that Xcel will be awarded anything close to the $214 million debt limit under 2E for its distribution system. Let’s remember that Xcel is not a normal business — it doesn’t make profit like a normal company in a competitive market. When it wants to build something, it uses funds from its shareholders and bondholders to pay for construction. Then it collects money from the ratepayers to pay this money back over time, plus dividends and interest to compensate those investors during the interim. Once all this money is paid back, the ratepayers pay nothing to the stockholders and bondholders, and only pay for operations and expenses. So all Boulder should ever owe Xcel is the equity and debt that hasn’t yet been paid back to these investors. There is no other profit to be made, so there is no business “going concern” value to be compensated for. And if there is deferred maintenance, it should be Xcel’s job to bring the system up to date before Boulder takes over, or else that cost should be deducted from the price.
I feel quite positive about the new council members. I don’t know Andrew very well, but Mary and Sam are strong people who want to get things gone. So I expect to see more focus on the big issues that have been avoided in recent years, like dealing with growth and its impacts on our transportation system. The passage of 2B and 2D have provided funding for an expanded level of transportation maintenance, but without addressing the need for user fees and development impact fees, we will end up with unacceptable levels of traffic congestion. The council cannot let the 2B/2D short-term financial fix tranquilize them so that they fail to take further action.
Here are a few suggestions that may help the new council’s meetings get started in the right direction: Keep comments and questions brief and to the point, and hold others to this standard; nothing kills a good discussion faster than someone droning on. The agenda committee needs to ensure that items are ready for as vote; no more word-smithing at council meetings. Limit the goals set at the retreat to critical items that gain majority agreement. Open up communication with staff, and give both compliments and critiques at the meetings; it’s always better to openly acknowledge mistakes so citizens know that course corrections are being made.


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