Collateral Damage: Fayetteville Citizens and PWC Rate Payers

Fayetteville residents are assured that we will get through this unfortunate City of Fayetteville/PWC crisis. Sadly, we have allowed a stranger to our community (City Manager Ted Voorhees) to come in and intentionally deceive and misguide the city’s staff and elected officials into thinking that he actually knows more about what is good for Fayetteville and its residents than they do. Really? How can this be?

No doubt, our elected city officials are sincere in their desire to better serve the community. Do they have the talent? Yes. Do they have the desire? Yes! Do they have access to the facts and truth about our current city operations? I don’t think so, and I’m not alone in that thought!

Without accurate and crucial information, they are incapable of doing their jobs and taking the actions that are in the city’s best interest. It amazes me how they so easily acquiesced to Voorhees and allowed him to pass a snap judgment on our public utility, PWC, after it has successfully and efficiently operated and served this community faithfully for decades.

Numerous accolades and awards have been heaped on PWC for its management style, operations and fiscal accountability and responsibility. In 2014 alone, PWC earned the following honors:

• Five Public Power Awards of Excellence presented by ElectriCities of North Carolina. The awards honor outstanding efforts in five key areas: Service Excellence, Energy Efficiency, Financial Stability, Competitive Business Environment and Legislative Involvement on Public Power Issues.

• The Government Finance Officers Association recognized PWC with the Distinguished Budget Presentation Award, the Certificate of Achievement for Excellence in Financial Reporting and gave special Capital Recognition for the Capital Improvement Budget. PWC was one of only six organizations in the Country to earn all three awards for FY2013. It’s the 19th consecutive year PWC has earned the Budget Award and the seventh straight year for the CAFR.

• The American Pubic Power Association honored PWC with the E.F. Scattergood System Achievement Award, which honors APPA member systems that have enhanced the prestige of public power utilities through sustained achievement and customer service. PWC was one of only two systems honored with this award out of more than 2,000 in the U.S.

Now, after contracting a study from an Aberdeen-based consultant, DavenportLawrence, PWC’s operations are no longer adequate or acceptable. Really? Consultants will say whatever you want them to say since you are paying the bill.

It’s no secret now that PWC has filed a legal complaint against the City of Fayetteville stemming from the DavenportLawrence report. Last week, the City of Fayetteville’s legal office, City attorney Karen McDonald, replied to the complaint. If you study her reply, you will be amazed. Unfortunately, we believe it is a preview of things to come if the members of the city council do not do their due diligence and weigh the facts of PWC’s history and successful past performance against the recommendations in the consultant’s report. The consultants do not know this community or the track record of PWC.

If PWC’s transgressions were so egregious, we think there would be more for the city’s legal counsel to argue than “irresponsible and wasteful” charitable spending. So, let’s break down the city’s charges against PWC and compare them to the overall mission and mandates of the utility and the City of Fayetteville, which are, to my knowledge, to serve the community, promote economic development and enhance our city’s image and quality of life as a place that nurtures “History, Heroes and a Hometown Feeling.” This being the case, why is it that the city manager and city council are finding fault with PWC for spending money to enhance its hometown? And, if the city takes over the finances of PWC it makes you wonder — what will happen to those donations and enhancements?

Here is what the city objects to:

Spending $46,000 a year on special events, music festivals, concerts, soirées*, theater and arts venues.

Truth and Reality: No enhancement of quality-of-life or municipal support for cultural venues.

*Soirees? Interesting. The only soiree I am familiar with is the one conducted by the Partnership for Children as a countywide fundraiser. If this complaint is about that, then perhaps City Attorney Karen McDonald can address the issue since she was the president of the board of this organization when The Soiree was launched and her request was made for sponsorship.

Spending $4,000 a year on golf tournaments.

Truth and Reality: No, these aren’t company outings. These are venues that support education, child advocacy and medical assistance to young children in Fayetteville and Cumberland County. Bad PWC! How dare a Hometown Utility invest some of its revenues that come from the community back into the community?

Spending $20,000 in “a single year on a local cemetery.” Yes, they are finding fault with PWC for helping the Sandhills State Veterans Cemetery in Spring Lake.

Truth and Reality: This request of PWC was made by the city. This statewide fundraising initiative to build an enclosed committal shelter for the comfort of families when honoring and burying their loved ones is also a bad thing? Really? Locally, Rev. Archie Barringer and community activist George Breece led the successful fundraising effort by raising more than $300,000 for the project.

Senator Wesley Meredith sponsored a bill that resulted in a $125,000 contribution. Let’s put the pieces together here. This cemetery honors veterans and Fayetteville is the “most military community in the United States.” Our leadership at that time, along with PWC, understood the importance of the project and the significance of this project and the importance of paying respect to our veterans and holding in high regard our military residents.

Spending $10,000 sponsoring basketball tournaments.

Truth and Reality: Fayetteville, as a youth sports event destination, has for many years been looked at as a fast-growing opportunity for economic development. We wouldn’t want to support that, would we?

Spending $5,000 with the Fayetteville Area Homebuilder’s Parade of Homes and Annual Home Show and spending $1,000 on the plumbing contractors association.

Truth and Reality: Local homebuilders want to build safe and energy efficient homes and PWC wants to help them do just that. This industry works in partnership with PWC. At the annual Home and Garden Show, PWC offers classes, seminars and free advice to professional builders, homeowners and general consumers on ways to better use, manage and conserve water and electricity. That is their mission. When it comes to plumbers, I don’t think anyone would dispute that if your business is “water” then it is important to have a supportive and professional relationship with plumbing contractors and their trade association.

I could go on and on, but I think you can begin to see the point. It is obvious here they do not understand the mission of PWC. More concerning, it doesn’t look like they care. If the only defense the city staff has when calling out PWC is to chastise them for supporting the community, then you better believe that they missed their mark and that they are not that good. In addition, it makes you wonder what other intentions they have for these funds. Rest assured, it will have nothing to do with lowering your utility rates, improving your services or preparing for a potential disaster.

Needless to say, we want this conflict between the city and PWC to be resolved quickly. It is taking up way too much precious time, which can be better spent improving our community and our businesses. It is also our hope that the current city council will do its due diligence and investigate every aspect of this situation not through the eyes of someone who will only be here for a brief time and who is probably looking for the next big paycheck, but rather through the eyes of our long-term, lifetime citizens – the 204,408 residents of Fayetteville who are “all in,” and who celebrate the one hundred year track record of PWC’s success, fiscal responsibility and well defined stewardship.

When all is said and done, it will come down to one question: Whom do you trust? Do you trust a consultant who spends a few weeks cherry-picking our community? Or do you trust the staff at PWC who live here, work here, raise their children here, who are your neighbors and your friends? Are you going to trust a consultant who chastises PWC for community involvement and community enhancement, while filling their pockets with the city’s money? Maybe you can see the irony in the current defense. The consultant pointed out our Hometown Utility’s investment in the community as a bad thing. Ironically, the same consultant’s previous job was to do the exact same thing with Progress Energy. Who are you going to trust?

I am banking on local!