THE BRIEF BUT
SUCCESSFUL CAMPAIGN TO SAVE THE FULL PARTNERSHIP BUDGET
The political resolve of the
newly signed city-utility partnership was put to the test before its board would
even met for the first time.
Upon the unanimous October 17th
vote, the partnership was allotted $150,000 in the city budget for the first
year, with further program funding to be coordinated among the city and the
utilities.
That is why it was so
unexpected that, on December 1st, 2014 City Council would vote 7-6 on a
budget amendment that included cutting the Clean Energy City-Utility
Partnership budget in half from $150,000 to $75,000.
To clarify the story on what happened December 1st there was never a clear up-or-down vote
that addressed the City-Utility Partnership all by itself. The same 7-6 vote to
cut the City-Utility Partnership budget in half was tied to a whole series of
budget amendments that cut funding for the One Minneapolis Fund and other
programs for the purpose of advancing equity and economic justice.
There was a
misconception among some City Council members that $75,000 would have been
enough for the Clean Energy Partnership. $75,000 would have been enough for the
utilities to have coffee with the mayor 4 times a year and win PR points for
giving the appearance of partnering with the city. However $75,000 would not
have been enough to provide the partnership with the resources to accomplish
the significant change Minneapolis Energy Options was determined for it to
achieve. Fortunately, we had an opening. Those $75,000 in cuts were not set in
stone because budget was not to be finalized until December 10th following
a public hearing.
Not only did I
as Minneapolis Energy Options send out email blasts for people to call their
city council member and/ or speak at the December 10th public
hearing. Minnesota Interfaith Power and Light, ISAIAH, and Neighbors Organizing
for Change also sent out similar email blasts to their members.
As a
result, hundreds of community members called their council members in their
support for fully funding the Partnership, and to reverse this cut when the
budget would be finalized on December 10th.
Close
to 300 community members showed up for the marathon public hearing on the
Minneapolis budget the city council held before they made their final decisions
the evening of Wednesday (12/10/2014). Over 60 members of the public gave
public testimony.
Not only did every single
speaker who mentioned the clean energy partnership speak in favor of it. Over 3/4 of speakers spoke about both
the clean energy partnership and economic justice goals, highlighting the
connections between the two.
Shortly before 10 PM on December 10th the City
Council voted 13-0 on a stand-alone amendment to restore the Clean Energy
Partnership to the full $150,000 proposed in the Mayor's budget (reversing the
proposed cut to $75,000). It was one of
relatively few items all council members agreed upon that night which did not
fall prey to a 6-7 divide.
The City Council also
voted unanimously to recover $150,000 out of a proposed $180,000 cut to the One
Minneapolis Fund. This mostly restored funding to supports the community
engagement, capacity building and leadership development among organizations
engaging and supporting communities many cultural backgrounds. That will make
Clean Energy Partnership programs accessible and relevant to low-income
communities and groups from that need them most and so that they can
effectively participate in a wide range of city bodies and issues, including
the Clean Energy Partnership.
THE LONG-TERM GOAL FOR THE CITY TO HONOR
COMMITMENTS TO THE PARTNERSHIP
The City-Utility
Partnership is about more than just money for staffing capacity. It is also
about trust and relationship building. If Xcel Energy and CenterPoint Energy
devote a full-time, high-level person – each – to this Partnership, then it is
only fair that the city can’t do any less.
The City staff
invested a huge amount of negotiation work bringing Xcel and CenterPoint to the
table so that they will invest big resources into energy democracy, clean
energy solutions, and helping people cut energy costs. In addition, the
Clean Energy Partnership that we now have on paper is the culmination of years’
worth of significant community involvement. These past investments are why,
going forward, we can’t afford to have the City give any counter-productive
message to our brand-new partners that this clean energy partnership is less
than a genuine priority. Instead the city needs to send a clear message to
the community that it has the political will to hold the
utilities accountable for reaching mutual energy goals or for
the programs and projects required to meet those goals.
I understand building
any new program can be challenging, and particularly so when powerful interests
in the fossil fuel lobby oppose the groundbreaking change this represents.
However, the last two years of community organizing that pushed to create
this City-Utility Partnership gives the city the political mandate to make the
City Energy Vision a reality in action and not just on paper.
Honoring that hard-won political mandate means not providing the
utilities the political space to be disengaged from the partnership or fold as
soon as anything gets challenging.
THE PARTNERSHIP IS AN OPPORTUNITY FOR
ECONOMIC JUSTICE
Minneapolis residents and
businesses spend $450 million annually on electricity and gas, and national
research shows that at least 30% of our energy use is preventable waste. This
Clean Energy Partnership is a long-term effort to move tens of millions of
energy dollars annually back into the pockets of Minneapolis families and
businesses, while creating local jobs with a special focus on neighborhoods
suffering the worst effects of energy poverty. This Partnership has the
potential to transform energy management for Minneapolis energy consumers
enough to meet very aggressive greenhouse gas emissions reduction targets and
produce very significant savings to Minneapolis residents and businesses. These
benefits could amount to tens of millions of dollars per year. This is not
the kind of work we want to nickel and dime.
This Partnership was
inspired by a vision of helping save money on energy for everyone, particularly
low-income residents who pay such a huge proportion of their income for energy.
A City-Utility partnership will be far more effective in reaching renters and
giving everyone the tools to take control of their energy future than the usual
programs where the city and the utility work in isolation from each other. A
multifamily unit residential energy efficiency program is a prime example of
something that will only be successful if there is a strong, fully funded
City-Utility partnership.
GOALS FOR THE
PARTNERSHIP TO ACCOMPLISH
Here are summaries of
the 9 near-term work
plan items that Community Power recommended the Partnership to advance!
We can use community-based
social outreach to secure and sustain broad and deep participation in
stream-lined, well-coordinated residential energy efficiency projects.
We can develop an integrated
rental and multi-family energy efficiency program that can finally overcome the
split incentive problem where land landlords are responsible for energy
efficiency building upgrades while the tenants often pay the energy utility
bills.
The city can partner with
Xcel to transition Xcel-owned streetlights to LED bulbs through a new servicing
agreement based on the city’s reduced energy usage and maintenance costs. LED
streetlights could possibly be matched with pole-mounted solar which can reduce
peak demand load for utilities.
We can adapt the Community
Solar Gardens (CSG) model so that subscriptions are affordable to low-income
families with low upfront costs and so that job training and economic
development in solar energy benefits communities of color, which face severe
disparities in employment here in Minneapolis.
If the partnership is
successful at developing on-bill repayment system, then residential and commercial
customers can pay for insulation, air sealing, furnace upgrades, community
solar, residential solar, and appliance upgrades through the convenience of
their monthly utility bill. This is a path to resolve the usual problem of
people needing the credit score to quality for taking a loan on such projects,
particularly for improvements whose average monthly savings from energy
efficiency results is greater than the monthly payment.
The City of Minneapolis can
contract through Xcel Energy’s grid for outside renewable energy supply in ways
that directly benefit disadvantaged groups, such as tribal reservations or
economically distressed rural communities. Such an arrangement would provide
community-based economic development through clean energy.
This type of competition
could engage all downtown building owners into a highly visible way to raise
awareness about city-utility partnership program offerings. A key example is an
energy coaching program to help businesses successfully implement energy
savings measures. Rewarding buildings successful in saving energy will
effectively motivate the owners to take action.
We can combine utility
incentives with city zoning and ordinance authority to make it financially
easier for developers to build according to Sustainable Building 2030
standards.
The City if Minneapolis could
use its commercial benchmarking ordinance as a model for transforming energy
efficiency in the residential sector as well. It would provide better
information about a home's energy performance so that energy efficiency is
incorporated into the market for new home- buyers.
THE VISION OF
LOCAL RENEWABLE POWER GENERATION BY ZONING AUTHORITY
The next few years will prove if indeed there a way for
Minneapolis to accomplish these local renewable energy goals without purchasing
the assets of Xcel and doing the billing.
Couldn’t Minneapolis use zoning authority to
mandate the use of solar panels and vertical axis wind turbines over parking
ramps etc? Could the city have the authority to offer rebates and incentives to
the citizens and businesses of the city to install these technologies? In
principle, is wisest to increase the renewable energy supply in the city, where
the demand is greatest; reducing carbon emission output without the need to pay
for additional transmission lines. By making renewable energy local, there are
bound to be a lot less power losses from stray voltage issues when Xcel wires
in energy from distant places. Can’t Minneapolis just simply install solar panels on all
of its buildings, generate local renewable
energy in additional ways, put that electricity back into the grid and either
sell it back to Xcel ask Xcel to deduct the savings from the ratepayer’s bills
on a pro-rate basis? If the answer to these questions is yes then we
have a back door way to get to a home-grown decentralized electrical utility!
An affirmative answer is a deal where green energy goals would be
met or exceeded, utility customers will save, jobs will be created and the
capital investment will be much lower than buying back the electric grid.
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