This is the last of a two-part series on ECP and HGS. The first part can be found here.
The city of Great Falls plays a unique role in the power industry and right now, the city’s power board Electric City Power faces a million-dollar deficit.
A key to the finical success of ECP and the city’s future role in the industry is the construction of Highwood Generating Station. Recently major changes to the plant’s design were announced that could affect the city’s investment. However, most city officials say their investment is still safe now that developers are considering burning natural gas instead of coal.
“In the long run I expect to see the city’s investment paid back. Southern Montana or SME has not abandoned plans to build a facility out there. Once a gas plant is up and operating and becomes part of their portfolio, we as an original investor in the project hope to see some returns from that,” said City Commissioner Bill Bronson.
“We’ve put in about 2.2 million dollars…a lot of those costs still have value to the project whatever it ends up being,” said ECP Executive Director Coleen Balzarini.
But City Commissioner Mary Jolley says changing from coal to gas won’t change existing problems. “It already has the same problems. How can you have a productive, cost effective gas plant if you’re already according to various pronouncements of the backers of the past plant 20-30-40 million dollars has already been spent on a coal plant? The main question is where is our 2.3 million dollars…is it down a rathole? I suggest it is,” said Mary Jolley.
According to some critics much more than that will be lost because they believe the plant will never actually be built. “The concern about the impacts from this facility on air and water led us to go digging through the city’s files and try to determine what was going on and how the city was involved in this plant,” said Anne Hedges with the Montana Environmental Information Council. “Our estimates are that they’re about six million dollars into this project and that doesn’t take into account the staff time and their travels going back and forth to billings on a regular basis,” said Hedges.
“Between 6 and 6 and a half million dollars is the amount is that the city has invested in this potentially lost as a result of the operations of Electric City Power and the investment in Highwood Generating Station,” said local CPA Larry Rezentes. City Manager Greg Doyon acknowledges millions could be lost if the project folds. “There’s no doubt that the city took a risk up front when then embarked on this and um I’m not sure if they knew at the time the extent of that risk,” he said.
Critics say the potential loss of public funds through Electric City Power and investment in Highwood is unacceptable. “The city does not have a problem with their continuing to operate Electric City Power in violation of the law. As a result the taxpayers have continued to loose money and to me that is unacceptable,” said Rezentes.
Hedges echoed that sentiment, “What could the city have done with this six million dollars that would have been better spent, would have been a better investment? We certainly told the city all along that we thought this was a poor economic decision. I think this just proves what happens when government officials feel like no one is watching and they have unfettered discretion to do what they want with tax payer funds.”
So while most city officials believe their investment is safe and critics believe the money’s gone it all hinges on if the plant will actually be completed and if ECP can somehow overcome their deficit.
But City Commissioner Mary Jolley says changing from coal to gas won’t change existing problems. “It already has the same problems. How can you have a productive, cost effective gas plant if you’re already according to various pronouncements of the backers of the past plant 20-30-40 million dollars has already been spent on a coal plant? The main question is where is our 2.3 million dollars…is it down a rathole? I suggest it is,” said Mary Jolley.
According to some critics much more than that will be lost because they believe the plant will never actually be built. “The concern about the impacts from this facility on air and water led us to go digging through the city’s files and try to determine what was going on and how the city was involved in this plant,” said Anne Hedges with the Montana Environmental Information Council. “Our estimates are that they’re about six million dollars into this project and that doesn’t take into account the staff time and their travels going back and forth to billings on a regular basis,” said Hedges.
“Between 6 and 6 and a half million dollars is the amount is that the city has invested in this potentially lost as a result of the operations of Electric City Power and the investment in Highwood Generating Station,” said local CPA Larry Rezentes. City Manager Greg Doyon acknowledges millions could be lost if the project folds. “There’s no doubt that the city took a risk up front when then embarked on this and um I’m not sure if they knew at the time the extent of that risk,” he said.
Critics say the potential loss of public funds through Electric City Power and investment in Highwood is unacceptable. “The city does not have a problem with their continuing to operate Electric City Power in violation of the law. As a result the taxpayers have continued to loose money and to me that is unacceptable,” said Rezentes.
Hedges echoed that sentiment, “What could the city have done with this six million dollars that would have been better spent, would have been a better investment? We certainly told the city all along that we thought this was a poor economic decision. I think this just proves what happens when government officials feel like no one is watching and they have unfettered discretion to do what they want with tax payer funds.”
So while most city officials believe their investment is safe and critics believe the money’s gone it all hinges on if the plant will actually be completed and if ECP can somehow overcome their deficit.
4 comments:
The city is not invested in a gas plant. Mr. Bronson can point to no commission action that has allowed the city's investment in a COAL PLANT to be schuffled over to a gas plant. The city spent a lot of money on studies to see if investing in a coal plant was a good idea. TURNS OUT IT WAS NOT.
Mr Gregorie seems to be in charge of the city's cash.
We need to get out of this
entire enterprise, focus on city core functions.
What's Greg Doyon's job? He seems to be nothing more than a bench warmer.
Get in the fight and fix this mess now!
What's Mr Doyons job? I believe it's carrying Dona and Colleen's purses. He is quite powerless and quite a follower of that pair. As long as the eleven or so homes receive cut rate utility bills, we as underlings can only hope the next election come soon.
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