By a far and wide margin, the single most significant item discussed at Tuesday’s (Feb. 6th) BOS meeting occurred in the waning moments immediately prior to adjournment when the Supes were giving their usually routine reports on their recent activities.
There was nothing routine about Glenn McGourty’s report starting with an ominous introduction warning that a “big shock” was in store for folks.
I’ll let McGourty tell the story, ticking time bomb and all:
Last week was a very big shock with good and bad things happening to us with regards to water transfers from the Eel River. The first was we had the first meeting of the JPA (Joint Powers Authority) Eel-Russian River Project. This would be the group that would be taking over the diversion from PG&E and designing a new one that would move Eel River water to continue the flow of Eel River water to our region. So, we had that [meeting] on Tuesday (Jan. 30).
On Wednesday (Jan. 31), we found out that PG&E had dropped us [Mendocino County and its newly formed JPA] from inclusion in their decommissioning proposal, which was extremely bad news. Originally, they were going to try to move everything forward so it would be kind of seamless and that we would be included in the decommissioning, and that we would be working with federal agencies to continue the Project.
So, PG&E basically said, “Nope, we don’t want to do that anymore,” even though they had invited us to participate.
Something has changed in their own view of their risk management [most likely related to pulling down the dams, ending diversion, etc.] and we’re no longer included.
It’s kind of a shock and we’re still reeling from it. It’s very much, it feels very much like [the Peanuts’ characters] Lucy and Charlie Brown with the football every time we deal with PG&E trying to come up with some kind of solution for how do we take over that Project, which is so essential to our economy. About 600,000 people are affected by that diversion from Potter Valley to the Marin County line.
So we still have studies going on about if we’re going to do it, how should the diversion be designed. We have financing for that. We have a lot of buy-in from the state and other environmental groups that are ok with the proposal that we have for diversions, and so we’re still going to continue.
This is a significant existential threat to us and our water supply. We’re trying to figure out how do we respond. What do we do?
We’ll be meeting with Inland Water and Power (a county water agency in the Ukiah Valley) this week.
I just want to make everybody aware that PG&E, if they want to, could probably just shut the water off and that’s the end of the Potter Valley diversion.
There doesn’t seem to be any commitment on their (PG&E) part to work with us at the moment.
They’ve said some things like, “Yep, we’ll try to accommodate you if we can,” but it’s not a priority such as they want to get their dams down and out of there.
So, we’re in a very bad spot now for continuing that diversion.
Indeed, we are all in a very bad spot now.
Supe John Haschak, commented, “I’m certainly very concerned about the Potter Valley Project and what PG&E is doing because it sounds like they’re just wanting to walk away from it. But they have a liability there, and I say they have an obligation to the people who depend on that water too. So I’m curious to hear what’s going on next.”
Well, what we’re hearing now is the first shoe hitting the floor, perhaps just prior to the bomb being detonated.
I think most people know I’ve been involved in various County water matters over the years, including most recently the proposed resurrection of the defunct County Water Agency. I cautioned the people I was working with, to be wary of PG&E and the decommissioning of the Potter Valley project because I believed they were playing the long game and had several extra cards up their sleeves. It was always in their best interests to eliminate their liability by bringing down the dams, cut a trail, and leave the wreckage for us suckers to deal with. To mix metaphors, it would be a real blood bath with everybody at each other’s throats.
Dan Gjerde was the only other Supe to weigh in on PG&E’s opening, if not closing, gambit. He kept it short: “On PG&E, in the last two years, their CEO has earned over $65 million in compensation — something to keep in mind.”
I guess we have a lot to keep in mind.
We have a governor, a state legislature, and a public utilities commission who have all, long ago abandoned their statutory roles as watchdogs on this publicly created, legal electrical monopoly. Our state, twice in the past 20 years has bailed out PG&E from its own, self-inflicted bankruptcy. California ratepayers and taxpayers are still paying for PG&E’s malfeasance, including murderous gas line explosions and hell-defying wildland infernos. While the PG&E-Potter Valley Project is almost exclusively under federal jurisdiction, there is nothing to stop the state of California from stepping into the ring and cold-cocking PG&E with punitive “either/or” behavior modification sledgehammers forcing them back to good-faith negotiations with local governments over the decommissioned Potter Valley Project.
You might say it’s the right thing to do amidst so much that is wrong.
(Jim Shields is the Mendocino County Observer’s editor and publisher, observer@pacific.net, the long-time district manager of the Laytonville County Water District, and is also chairman of the Laytonville Area Municipal Advisory Council. Listen to his radio program “This and That” every Saturday at noon on KPFN 105.1 FM, also streamed live: http://www.kpfn.org.)
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