Letter to the Editor:
Re: “Post-ruling options carry risks” (Daily Camera, Jan. 16). The biggest risk would be to give up on municipalization and to go with the Xcel status quo.
The city had laid out a course and developed a plan for municipalization that was most advantageous to the citizens of Boulder, and the district court has altered the course that we must take, giving the PUC some control over our future. (It seems ironic to me that the small-government, anti-muni folks are happy that the PUC is taking more control over their lives.)
We must, for the sake of our planet’s future, continue to push for a low-carbon future and here in Colorado the only way we can do that for the electric system is to municipalize. The tasks that the city must accomplish have not changed, just the order in which they must be done. This will delay one of the off-ramps, knowing what the final cost will be for condemnation of the distribution system, but please don’t let that deter the process.
A misconception that bothers me is that some people think that the $6 million budget for 2015 has already been spent. It has not even been committed to, let alone spent; $4 million has not been transferred from the general fund to anywhere. The whole point of the large budget is to give the city flexibility to deal with the events as they arise. Should the city decide to appeal the district court decision to the state Supreme Court, there will be sufficient funds to do that as well as file with the PUC and the FERC.
Paul Culnan
Boulder
This letter to the editor was originally published by Boulder Daily Camera