|
Steve Fought -- City Council District 4 Representative
Newsletter
Earnest, open, informed debate
leads to good public policy.
16 December 2019
DISCLAIMER: One of my responsibilities as a member of the Georgetown City Council is to provide information to the community. This newsletter helps me fulfill that responsibility. However, this newsletter is not a publication of the City Council; the views contained in this newsletter are mine alone and should not be taken as representing the views of the City Council or other Council Members. Please feel free to send me an e-mail.
I hope everyone had a wonderful Thanksgiving, that your teams won, and that you enter the Holiday Season in good health, high spirits, and full of enthusiasm for the New Year.
Our last Council Meeting of the Year was eventful, including a spirited discussion with representatives from Suddenlink. I'll begin this final edition of 2019 with that topic, then move ahead with a preview of the "growth" that is on the horizon for 2020 with a new "development map", and then offer an invitation to join one of the City's Boards and Commissions, including the new GUS structure, in the coming year. I'll conclude with the usual, and ever-popular, "Curious minds want to know...." which I'll use this time to respond to some questions that have come up during a few presentations I've made in recent weeks.
|
|
Suddenlink
Over the last 6 months or so, I have received more complaints about Suddenlink than on any other topic. As a consequence, fellow Council Member Kevin Pitts (District 5) and I co-sponsored an item on the 10 December Council Agenda: "Consideration and possible direction to the City Attorney to draft a Resolution expressing City Council's dissatisfaction to the Public Utilities Commission of Texas regarding customer service provided by Suddenlink Communications on behalf of the citizens of the City of Georgetown and discussion and possible direction to the City Manager to investigate ways to incentivize and/or encourage competition to Suddenlink Communications' service offerings to the citizens of the City of Georgetown."
After considerable discussion, the Council voted unanimously in favor of the resolution. The Staff will bring back a draft letter, and recommendations for incentives to stimulate competition, in January. That's obviously important, but in my opinion the more immediate aspect of the discussions concerned how, as customers, we could get better service and more rapid problem resolution.
In that regard I really think it's important to actually view the video rather than having me attempt to repeat and summarize. I'll simply say that Suddenlink stressed they have just gone through some major software changes and believe they have more or less resolved most of the customer service issues. However, most of the individuals who spoke at the meeting (customers in the audience) expressed doubt about that claim.
Please click here to view the Agenda Item Summary Sheet and here, then go to Item "AS" to view the discussions on video.
In the end, I asked what we should do when a customer appears to have exhausted all reasonable attempts at problem resolution but the problem remains. The Suddenlink Representative (Mr. Travis Nance, Regional VP) said to contact him directly -- I have his contact information. OK, that seemed like a bold statement, but I'm willing to give that a shot, for a while. So here's what we can do.
First, let's give Suddenlink an opportunity to prove they have resolved the issue. Go through the reasonable and normal steps to solve whatever issue(s) you are facing. Then, if you have called, gone to the store, spent time on line, and generally feel as though you are at the end of the rope (exhausted all reasonable attempts to solve the problem, etc.), send me an e-mail with the information (and please include your full name and address so they can locate the account) and I'll shoot it up the line to Mr. Nance.
I suspect doing that will either: (1) establish that Suddenlink has indeed resolved the issues; (2) exhaust and so irritate the VP and that will get the system working as it should work; or, (3) prove that there is a larger problem, in which case we'll find another way to approach the issue.
One last comment -- yes, I do understand I am potentially going to get swamped with e-mails. I'm prepared for that -- gotta start somewhere, this problem has been festering for too long.....*
_____________________
* I am especially looking to identify billing issues -- issues where Suddenlink may have overcharged customers and is making it difficult to eliminate and/or recover the charges.
|
Development Pipeline
"Growth" continues to dominate the landscape. In order to accommodate this level of growth, the City Council has made a wide range of decisions on infrastructure, zoning, and economic development, much of which has been addressed in previous newsletters. The objective is to stay ahead of the growth curve, but not so far ahead as to incur a tax burden that is excessive.
So far I think we've been successful. Keep in mind that in the face of all this growth, we have the lowest City Property Tax Rate in the region and are among the lowest overall cost for City Services in the area. But there are new challenges every day.
Please click here for the latest development pipeline chart. You can use your computer keyboard to enlarge and move around the chart to focus in on specific areas. I will use this newsletter to keep you up to speed on significant developments in each area as they come before the Council or approach completion. |
Boards and Commissions (Especially GUS)
The City of Georgetown is currently recruiting highly qualified and dedicated individuals to serve on one of the City's thirty Advisory Boards or Commissions. The City Council depends on these citizen board members to assist in evaluating local issues which enrich, develop and promote the community.
There are 220 seats on the thirty active Boards and Commissions. Each member is asked to serve a two year term and the terms are staggered. This February approximately 100 seats will need to be filled. Individuals interested in serving as a board member must complete an application which are now open and being accepted online.
To read about specific Boards and Commissions, p lease click here and scroll down. To apply for a specific Board or Commission, simply click on the "APPLY" Tab in the upper right corner of the page for each Board or Commission.
One of the major changes this time around in the Board structure will be to divide the Georgetown Utility Board into two parts, one for Electric and one for Water and Wastewater. The composition of those two boards will obviously change, and will require new levels of experience/expertise.
Although the Council has not yet finalized the decision, I anticipate the presentation we received at the 10 December workshop to be very close to the final product. Please click here for the Agenda Item Summary Sheet and link to Presentation, and here and go to Item "D" to view the video. If either of these new boards interests you, please let me, or your Council Representative know, and submit an application once the decision to open applications for those new Boards is announced.
|
Curious minds want to know....
Question-1. I read the other day where the City Council "reallocated" money in the GUS-Electric fund. Looks like smoke and mirrors to me. What's going on?
ANS-1. The GUS-Electric fund has long been a "cash-cow" for other funds. Over the years, a lot of overhead has been assigned to GUS-Electric which was more a matter of convenience than logic (e.g., the entire cost of the computer system which serves GUS Water, Wastewater and GUS-Electric, the entire cost of the Westside Service Center, which serves all of GUS, etc). Those costs needed to be apportioned properly to other parts of GUS. Prior actions have corrected some of these allocations. The actions recommended at the end of the 2019 budget cycle continued that strategy.
The Council also decided to sell some long-standing energy credits along with transferring other assets between funds in order to align fund accounting properly. The entire set of transactions can be seen by clicking here, and linking to the presentation.
I'll add that these are not only proper adjustments, as I mentioned during the discussions (and as reinforced by Council Member Triggs, District-3), but they are a prerequisite to consideration of putting GUS-Electric on the market (for sale) or for opening the GUS-Electric market to competition, both of which will be discussed at a future date. (Please click here and go to Item "B" to view a video of the discussions).
Question-2. Why in the world is the City Council giving $20 Million to COSTCO to build a store here?
ANS-2. The simple answer is, "We are not giving $20 Million to COSTCO to build a new store. Quite the contrary, COSTCO is investing at least $20 Million of their own funds to build a new store." But, given the way numbers seem to be getting tossed around these days, I can understand things getting confused. So, let me see if I can provide some clarity.
The City has entered into several agreements bringing COSTCO to Georgetown and as part of developing the area around the COSTCO site. COSTCO is expected to create 235 new jobs and have a net benefit (taxes) to the City of more than $11 Million over 10 years.
The area around COSTCO will eventually include other commercial development. Part of overall COSTCO agreement includes widening a road that will service the entire area. COSTCO's developer will build the road and the City will reimburse COSTCO for a portion of the cost of the road ($2 Million) once the project is complete.
Another project is a partnership with ATMOS Energy, to expand natural gas service in the area, which ATMOS Energy will accomplish, and which the City (through the Georgetown Economic Development Corporation) will provide a partial reimbursement ($400,000) once it is complete. That will provide natural gas to COSTCO as well as other development in the area.
Finally, the City will refund, through Sales Tax, an amount not to exceed $2 Million over a period of 10 years, to COSTCO, if and only if COSTCO's investment in the project exceeds $20 Million and if COSTCO's sales produce sufficient sales tax to earn that amount of refund (50% share). This is not an "up front" award, it must be earned, and the earnings are shared with the City as well as capped.
Now, in order to earn any of those amounts, COSTCO must invest a minimum of $20 Million in the project. That's where the $20 Million figure comes from -- it's COSTCO's minimum investment. To summarize, the City's contribution to the project is, at a maximum:
-- $2 Million (Cost Sharing with COSTCO on road construction as a reimbursement upon completion of the road)
-- $400,000 (Cost Sharing with ATMOS to add natural gas to the area for economic develop)
-- $2 Million (maximum), paid in annual increments over a 10 year period to COSTCO as a 50% reimbursement from sales tax if they meet sales and investment targets.
Question-3. Why are we giving Citigroup such a sweetheart deal on electricity and not even requiring that they buy a minimum amount from us before they get discounts. Sounds like we gave away the store and didn't get anything for it. What's going on here?
ANS-3. Let's begin by noting that Citigroup is the single largest customer in the GUS-Electric account (8% of the demand). As the biggest user, a discount of some sort is logical to retain their business and even encourage expansion. There are two agreements with Citigroup. Both require them to use a base amount of energy.
The first agreement is a retention agreement and reduces Citigroup's current electric rate, but requires the company to use 4,000 Megawatt hours of energy each month. (To put that in perspective, recall that one Megawatt is 1,000 Kilowatts. An average house uses 1,000 Kilowatt hours per month (i.e., 1 Megawatt hour). In order to get the discounted rate under the agreement Citigroup has to use 4,000 Megawatts hours per month, or 4 Thousand times the rate of the average house.
The second agreement encourages Citigroup to expand its operations through incentive reimbursements. After exceeding electric usage above an average of 5,000 Megawatt hours per month (or 5 Millions time the rate of the average house, and a 25% increase above the retention rate just mentioned).
Sales tax payments above the base amount of $1.25 million per year would be eligible for a 25 percent reimbursement.
Property tax payments above the base amount of $275 million would be eligible for a 50 percent reimbursement.
|
|
|
|
No comments:
Post a Comment