• WCE Bankruptcy Update and Reentry Fee

I'm sure that you've heard that WCE has filed for bankruptcy. There was a press release from WCE on May 24th.

LINK TO PRESS RELEASE

If you're saying, "Yeah, but what is WCE, I've never heard of it?" you might as well exit this blog now, or, if you do want to know more, click on the key words at the bottom of the blog. 

But, Since I'm a sooooper nice guy and all, I'll give you a basic primer: WCE is short for Western Community Energy. It was adopted by the Wildomar city council in 2018 and went into effect in Spring of 2020. The only way to keep your original power company (SCE) was to opt out of WCE. 

That wasn't some diabolical plot, it's mandatory for such schemes to be "opt out" instead of "opt in". 

If that rankles you, look no further than the misguided blue team in Sacramento that has been ruining this state with their one-sided stranglehold for more than a generation. If you voted for them, you voted to be "opted in".

In less than a year WCE went belly up.

Was it bad luck due to Covid, coupled with the State allowing unpaid bills to be treated like junk mail? 

Maybe.

Was it an unwise decision to have the city join WCE, where even the county flatly rejected the notion when it was presented to them, not to mention the other 12 member cities of WRCOG (the impetus behind WCE)? 

I'll hazard a "yes" response to the above question... obviously! 

There were six Riverside County cities that opted their residents into WCE.

During the June 9th city council meeting there was a WCE update. 

If you listened to that meeting, it was reasonable to conclude that all the WCE customers were going to be returned to SCE as if they never were part of WCE.

That's what appeared to be the verbatim quote by WRCOG's interim director, "for those of you that are WCE customers going back to SCE, we worked very hard so that you go back in at the standard rates, it's as if you were never part of WCE."

Under the circumstances, what more could one ask for, I was satisfied.

What could be clearer than that?

"As if you were never part of WCE"

But, as always, there are plenty of flies for what little ointment there may be in a given situation.

This topic was being discussed on Facebook and I gave out inaccurate information that I heard at the city council meeting (or thought I heard). 

Here is a screenshot of the exchange. Not sure if it's legible or not, or if it's interesting or not. You decide.

Here is a larger version of the slide from the meeting that was mentioned above... still not sure if it's legible on your device or not.

I hope the above graphic is legible. It was part of the presentation during the city council meeting. What was not gone over in detail was a "reentry" fee, which is clearly listed in among the bullet points.

The last bullet point says, Initial indications are that SCE rates with the reentry fee will still be below WCE's rates with recently adopted rate increases.

What is it that I'm reading? 

The whole point of WCE, as it was sold anyway, was LOWER RATES.

Imagine that, SCE rates, including a yet to be determined reentry fee, will be lower than WCE's rates... I guess that's a way of selling this as "good news"?

Below is the email that I wrote seeking clarification:

Residents are discussing the return to SCE and I happily let them know that we were told during the presentation that all customers will return to SCE as if they’d never left, as we were told in the meeting.

 

Then a resident suggested that I look at a slide that was part of the presentation that had six bullet points (attached). The speaker didn’t go over the last 4 bullet points which specifically said that returning WCE customers would be paying a reentry fee.

"There will be a reentry fee that SCE will charge to returning customers."

 

That was not made clear.

 

I want to gather all the facts before drawing conclusions, but a reentry fee is not compatible with "for those of you that are WCE customers going back to SCE we worked very hard so that you go back in at the standard rates it's as if you were never part of WCE."

 

Will there be another WCE update at the next city council meeting? 

This was the response I got from the presenter of the WCE update at the city council meeting. 

I'm not naming him because he's the interim director of WRCOG, and had NOTHING to do with this fiasco. He had it dropped in his lap when the former director suddenly developed retirement fever and stepped down. 

In terms of the transition, we were referring to the rates.  WCE customers are going back to Edison at Edison’s standard rates, which are they same they would be paying as if they never left.  That was an unknown for a while since SCE is allowed to charge them higher rates under the regulatory process and we worked with SCE, CPUC, and others to have customers go back at the standard rates.

 

SCE is allowed by law to recover their costs for bring WCE customers back to SCE.  We don’t know what those costs will be.

 

The procedure for recovering those costs is that SCE must first bill WCE for those costs.  We believe we can address them through the bankruptcy process but that is to be determined.  Our other option is to seek State funding, which we are currently working on.  If neither of those two are successful, there is a possibility that SCE could seek to recover those costs from the customers. 

 

We anticipate that process could take 3 months, 6 months or even longer.  For right now, saying it is as if they had not left SCE is a correct statement.

My apologies for not being clearer in my presentation to the City Council.

So why am I writing this?

First and foremost is to get the word out. 

Again, if you're among the number that has never heard of WCE, take another blue pill and go back to sleep.

For the rest of you, I'm very displeased that the WCE update was done in such a way as to allow for confusion on the matter of how much this is going to cost people that had NO INTEREST in this in the first place.

There is no word about how much this bankruptcy will cost or who will ultimately pay for it. It will be many months before it gets through the courts. 

One thing you can count on is that creditors will not just roll over on this saying, "Aw shucks, bummer that WCE fell like a house of cards on a windy day... just forget about the money we put into it."

We can always hope for the best, that the courts will produce a ruling that will safeguard the innocent folks that had nothing to do with any part of this short lived nightmare.

But "hope" is never a good strategy to live by, so I don't personally factor such things into my planning... we shall see.

Last, if this blog raises some eyebrows among my colleagues, my responsibility is to the residents, and I'm not going to blink even if that means I put myself in some rather uncomfortable cross hairs. 

Below is the video to the city council meeting. This item begins at 36:30 of the video.

•                •                •

What is this "complete truth" that is spoken about? What is a "complete truth" to begin with? 'Truth' is not divisible. A half truth must eventually become a whole falsehood.

– EG Marshall (CBSRMT)

Wildomar Rap isn't divisible and rejects all attempts therein.  

This blog was produced for viewing on a desktop or a laptop. Though it's been optimized for smartphones, the formatting can look odd on a smartphone or if you get this delivered through email (such as missing video links). Link to proper format.

Press Release: WCE Bankruptcy

Below you will find the press release from Western Community Energy, and then if image isn't easy to read, below will be the text of the release.

POWERED BY THE COMMUNITY

3390 UNIVERSITY AVENUE, SUITE 200 | RIVERSIDE, CA 92501

FOR IMMEDIATE RELEASE: May 24, 2021

Media Contact:

Elisa Laurel

951-206-4498

elaurel@wrcog.us

www.westerncommunityenergy.com

WESTERN COMMUNITY ENERGY FILES FOR CHAPTER 9 BANKRUPTCY PROTECTION TO RESTRUCTURE ORGANIZATION’S FINANCIAL OBLIGATIONS

State mandates related to COVID-19 and increasing power costs due to state renewable energy requirements cause WCE to seek Chapter 9 Bankruptcy protection and reorganize finances.

RIVERSIDE, CA – On Monday, the Western Community Energy (WCE) Board of Directors approved a resolution declaring a fiscal emergency and authorized its legal counsel to move forward with the filing of a Chapter 9 Bankruptcy petition to allow for the restructuring of WCE’s financial obligations.

Several external contributing factors have impacted WCE’s financial situation since the program was implemented at the beginning of the COVID-19 Pandemic in April 2020.

In August 2020, California experienced an unprecedented heat event, which resulted in substantially higher power needs and a spike in the cost of energy. 

Although WCE had secured 90% of its electricity needs for the summer of 2020, the heat storm exhausted the projected supplies prematurely. 

An additional $12 million in energy costs were incurred throughout the 2020 summer season due to the unanticipated warm weather. Additionally, a tightening of the requirements of the State of California for Resource Adequacy (RA) created a shortage in the market, significantly increasing the cost of regulatory compliance.

Additionally, the Governor of California issued an order during the COVID-19 pandemic, implemented by the California Public Utilities Commission, mandating that no customers could be disconnected due to non-payment of their utility bills. Over the last year, delinquencies averaged ten times higher than pre-Pandemic industry standards and have cost WCE millions of dollars in added cost burden.

“The ongoing impacts of COVID-19 severely limited the organization’s options moving forward and

forced today’s action,” said Todd Rigby, Chairperson of WCE.

 

“Chapter 9 protection gives us the opportunity to restructure the organization and reorganize our finances. We look forward to working with our legislators, the Governor, and other parties to identify a pathway forward for WCE.”

Customers of WCE will not experience any service disruptions as a result of today’s actions and WCE will continue to keep customers updated as more information becomes available.

POWERED BY THE COMMUNITY

3390 UNIVERSITY AVENUE, SUITE 200 | RIVERSIDE, CA 92501

WCE has engaged the law firm of Weiland Golden Goodrich, LLP, to help the organization through the Chapter 9 process. Goodrich specializes in bankruptcy proceedings and has a combined 135 years of experience in managing Chapter 9 petitions. 

The Chapter 9 petition has been filed with the Federal Bankruptcy Court for the Central District of California. Following the filing, WCE will proceed through the bankruptcy process to work with potential lenders, creditors and regulators to adjust WCE debt and operations and protect the interests of its customers. The process is estimated to take approximately six months.

###

About Western Community Energy

Western Community Energy (WCE) is a joint powers authority, consisting of the Cities of Eastvale, Hemet, Jurupa Valley, Norco, Perris, and Wildomar, and was formed for the purpose of developing a Community Choice Aggregation (CCA) Program that purchases energy on behalf of its residents and businesses to offer a cost competitive alternative to electricity rates. A CCA provides the community choices when it comes to energy mixes and programs, while providing local control over rate setting.

For more information, please visit westerncommunityenergy.com.

Work to form WCE began in 2016, with the development of a Feasibility Study that examined the viability of moving forward with a CCA by looking at the energy markets and the costs associated with purchasing power on behalf of its customers. As a result of the findings that a CCA would be feasible, WCE was formed as a new program.

WCE aims to provide its customers:

 Competitive, often lower, electricity rates

 A cleaner, more efficient energy supply

 Consumer choice, consumer protection, and local control over rate setting and programs

 Local jobs creation and local power resiliency

 Opportunities to develop future complementary energy programs such as net energy metering, energy efficiency retrofits, distributed rooftop and community solar, electric vehicle incentives and demand response technologies

 New renewable power development

About Community Choice Aggregation (CCA) Programs A CCA is a model that allows communities to aggregate its power and then purchase to meet the needs of its community, offering an alternative choice in the market—often the only alternative to sourcing power from the investor owned utility (IOU). CCAs can provide the communities they serve with competitively priced, clean energy choices while reinvesting revenues into projects and programs that support the local economy.

--------------------------

OPINION

Note: When I went to the WCE website at 6pm Monday, May 24th, I saw no mention of the press release.

This was first on my radar in February of 2018. Here were my take away quotes about it. 

"Since there seems to be savings to the rate payers, and an easy way to opt out if things change, I can't image the point of not exploring this further."

"The thing I want to know is, if this is better than peaches and cream like it's described, then why aren't all the local cities beating a path to their door? Why the deliberation? Why does it sound like WRCOG would be sanguine if they could "amass five to six cities" when their organization has eighteen?"

-Joseph Morabito, Wildomar Rap Feb 2018

It was next mentioned in February 2020. by this time, 15 months later, it's of little consequence to point out that I was less than sanguine about WCE, but there is a link to the video of the 50 minute item, plus opinions of the time at this link.  

Blog Link

I don't have anymore info than you read above.

I'm not sure what to make of it at this point, but I'm a firm believer in transparency and I wanted to get this press release to the people, in an easy to read form, at the earliest point possible.

If you have questions, please use one of these options.

E: info@WesternCommunityEnergy.com
P: (866) 356-4175

•                •                •

An ounce of prevention is worth more than a pound of cure.
– Benjamin Franklin

Wildomar Rap hears that menudo is a great cure if you forgot to take your ounce of prevention the night before.

This blog was produced for viewing on a desktop or a laptop. Though it's been optimized for smartphones, the formatting can look odd on a smartphone or if you get this delivered through email (such as missing video links). Link to proper format.

• City Council Meeting February 2020: WCE

This was a three hour city council meeting. Nearly one hour of it was for item 3.1 Western Community Energy Joint Powers Update.

This blog will give you the basics on item 3.1, the slides from the presentation and a link to a video of just the item and not the rest of the meeting; that will be in a separate blog shortly.

The presentation was given by Tyler Masters of WRCOG. Essentially he showed slides and described them as they appeared. I'll post the slides now, then add a few details afterward. 

There is a link to the video at the bottom of the blog. For those that are interested, the video itself is where you should head.

3.1 BACKGROUND: 
On February 14, 2018, Western Riverside Council of Governments (WRCOG) staff presented information about Community Choice Aggregation (CCA) and next steps to join Western Energy Joint Powers through Resolution and Agreement and adopt an Ordinance authorizing implementation of a Community Choice Aggregation Program. 

During City Council discussion, staff was directed to invite Southern California Edison (SCE) to present information about CCA’s at a future City Council meeting. 

On April 11, 2018 SCE staff presented i) key facts about CCA’s; ii) current status on power charge indifference adjustment (aka exit fees); and, other incentive programs for customers. 

Below is a video of the 12 minute SCE presentation from April 2018.
A code of conduct limited SCE to provide certain types of information pertaining to CCA’s. SCE and other investor owned utilities have filed request with PUC to modify code of conduct on outreach to allow additional outreach activities with stakeholders. 

On July 11, 2018, the City Council adopted Resolution No. 2018-39 approving membership in the Western Community Energy Joint Powers Authority. The city council appointed a Director and one alternate Director to act on behalf of the City of Wildomar within the powers of the WCE. 

On October 24, 2018, the City Council introduced the First Reading of Ordinance 160 authorizing the implementation of a community choice aggregation program and signed the 1st Amendment to the Western Community Energy Joint Powers Agreement.

I asked several questions that were put to me by the community either through email or on social media. 

The key complaint from the residents dealt with the Opt Out v. Opt In aspect of this. This is a law (AB 117) that makes it this way. Sacramento really has no concern as to what the people would actually desire or not, and they're the ones that came up with that one. 

WCE will not charge you for opting out, but there may be a charge from SCE to return to them. I emailed SCE for the particulars.

From the Email

---

• If customers want to return to SCE bundled service after the grace period they have two options.

1) Provide 6 months advanced notice before returning to SCE bundled service and there is no difference in cost. The customer will remain a CCA customer for 6 months then transition back to SCE on the standard rate.

2) Return to SCE bundled service immediately and go on “Transitional Bundled Service” rate for 6 months. This is a special rate that is typically higher than the standard rate. It fluctuates over time based on market prices. The higher rate allows us to recover the extra costs for procuring power in the short-term market that we hadn’t anticipated. This is typically more expensive than our normal procurement process.

Here is the Q&A on our website: LINK

This issue is addressed in the “How Do I Opt Out of CCA Service?” question. You can find the PC-TBS information here: LINK

Customers who opt out within the 60 day grace period can return to SCE immediately at no cost.

---

The other thing that got the hackles of the community up was that the first they heard of it was in a mailer that looked like junk mail.

The shot heard round the W'mar.
I was told by many people that they tossed it out thinking it was campaign literature.

This was also my key complaint. To the point that many of my colleagues on the dais were less than pleased with my posts on social media in the lead up to this meeting (sorry about that).

To my colleagues that said something to the effect of, "But we have had it on the agenda, it's been on the agenda several times that we've talked about it." That's great for the handful of residents that are up on such things, but that's not how most people think. 

They don't think that they should need to consult a city council agenda to learn big news that's coming their way. I also don't think the idea of thorough community outreach should be met with resistance, or countered with saying there had been presentations at city events. 

One resident that spoke during public comments said, "Why didn't you send the notice out two years ago?" Which after he was met with, "If you signed up for emails, you get the agendas emailed to you and you can see what's on there and you can come to the meetings to get the information. Plus we had information at our city events."

I couldn't believe my ears when I heard that. Most people have never looked at a city council agenda, much less an agenda packet that can run well over 500 pages... they have more important things going on and they rely on us to spread the word when big things are on the horizon. 

If we can send out reminders about Coffee with the City (both email and on social media), isn't it likewise reasonable to expect reminders for something as big as being automatically opted into a new energy company? 

Eastvale is also part of WCE and they don't start for 30 days after Wildomar, but they've had an explainer video up since last August.
Why couldn't we have been sending out regular reminders since last Summer? Maybe sending out a different slide from the presentation every couple of weeks? 

The last part that I'll mention was where resident Donna Poland (sp?) was allowed to stay at the mic for about 8 minutes, instead of the usual 3 minutes, with a good back and forth discussion. I found that to be very helpful. 

Please look for that around the 27 minute mark of the video. 

Wildomar Rap opinion time

This first came about in 2018, and though lower utility rates are always more attractive than the higher variety, I didn't think it was worth the effort to save 4% (which is what it was back then). 

My thoughts from the Feb 2018 blog

The thing I want to know is, if this is better than peaches and cream like it's described, then why aren't all the local cities beating a path to their door? Why the deliberation? Why does it sound like WRCOG would be sanguine if they could "amass five to six cities" when their organization has eighteen?

Now it's a 2% savings

It was said that the 4% is in there, but since SCE needs their cut, it's only a 2% net savings... which is what will be showing up on your bill.

I asked, "What's in it for WRCOG/WCE or the city?" 

And after a bit of a hesitation the answer came back, "Lower rates".

Then I attempted to give my view of it, which all too often doesn't hit the listener's ear the way it came away from my gray matter.

Let's see if I can succeed in writing where I failed at the dais.

In my mind, the impetus for a collection of cities (WRCOG) to embark on such a major undertaking has to be more than saving 2% for the rate payers. This undertaking that has taken years to get to this point, and a new entity had to be created to administer it (WCE). 

I suggested that it would make more sense if any savings were going to be split between WRCOG and the various cities (not the ratepayers). Then, with that pool of money, the cities would be able to do something valuable for the entire community, such as repaving roads. At the same time, WRCOG could put it's share toward regional projects.

It was suggested that such a thing would be an illegal tax. I countered with, I'm not actually suggesting we do it, but would understand the point of bothering better if something more was at stake than finding a way for me to pocket $30 at the end of the year. 

A key factor that wasn't mentioned in the meeting was that SCE is tied into long term contracts that will be expiring over the next several years. Contracts that have locked them into very high rates, but back in the aughts (that's what we call the years between 2000 and 2009) it was a gamble they took (thanks a lot) that ended up being costly (I hope that guy got fired).

Now, CCAs like Western Community Energy are not locked into contracts from the George W days and can buy energy at current rates, which are much better today... but that advantage isn't going to be around for all that much longer.

Again, I'd understand this better if all this effort was amounting to more than me (or you) saving 2% individually. 

I'm not going to opt out, but like Mayor Dustin Nigg said at the meeting, I'll be watching the rates and when they don't pan out, I'll be ready with an itchy trigger finger on the eject button. (Dustin didn't use that phraseology, that's my colorful prose.) ☺

This was a Receive and File item, no vote was necessary here. It was just an update.

Below is the 50 minute video of the entire item 3.1.

•                •                •

An ounce of prevention is worth more than a pound of cure.
– Benjamin Franklin

Wildomar Rap hears that menudo is a great cure if you forgot to take your ounce of prevention the night before.

This blog was produced for viewing on a desktop or a laptop. Though it's been optimized for smartphones, the formatting can look odd on a smartphone or if you get this delivered through email (such as missing video links). Link to proper format.

• City Council Meeting February 2018

Between items 3.1 and 3.3 this meeting was full of detailed information. 

So much so that I'm just going to highlight the portions that caught my attention, but first let's start off with the recognition of two Eagle Scouts that came at the front of the meeting.

Noah Thompson's project dealt with the snack bar at Marna O'Brien park. He installed removable screens, that are now part of the health code, for the service windows. 

Back row: Tim Walker, Dustin Nigg and Marsha Swanson. Front Row: Bridgette Moore, Mayor Ben Benoit, Eagle Scout Noah Thompson, Katelyn Wilkinson a representative for Assemblywoman Melissa Melendez  and Glenn Miller a representative for State Senator Jeff Stone.

Nate Coddington's project was also at Marna O'Brien park. He replaced the wooden backstops on the baseball diamonds.

Back row: Tim Walker, Dustin Nigg and Marsha Swanson. Front Row: Bridgette Moore, Mayor Ben Benoit, Amber Diaz (Nate's mom), Eagle Scout Nate Coddington, Katelyn Wilkinson a representative for Assemblywoman Melissa Melendez  and Glenn Miller a representative for State Senator Jeff Stone.

PUBLIC COMMENTS (on non agenda items)
• Dave Crook (sp?) discussed speeding issues in the Lemon/Almond/Waite area.
• Brad Darymple brought up illegal dumping and off roading in the part of the city that borders Menifee.
• Ken Mayes (with donated time) had a slide show (literally) of things in town that he doesn't like. His list included home school inspections, fire hydrants, CSA 103 (an "assessment on 1084 homes located in the oldest part of Windsong Valley") which has "disappeared from the tax bill", the city fence code, the City Manager's pay, staff reports (in the online agenda packets) needing to include all the visual displays that will be at the meeting.

Wildomar Rap opinion time:

I'll have to try the slide show routine sometime too —looked fun. But in all seriousness, it was very effective to get the point across, about several issues, to all five city council members, and key staff members, at once.

Still, I have a sneaking suspicion that Kenny Mayes will be giving 6 minute slide shows at all the meetings from this point on. Might as well just cut out the middle man and make room for it on the agenda as a recurring item.

His final issue (about expanding the agenda packet to include all video display items) was brought up by Mayor Ben Benoit at the end of the meeting under "Future Agenda Items" where he asked staff to start including such items in the (digital) packets.

• Monty Goddard thanked city staff for the maintenance done at Windsong Park.

CONSENT CALENDAR
Before this part came up there was a change in the agenda and City Manager Gary Nordquist discussed the reason(s) why the new city website didn't launch before the end of January. 

"We encountered some delays," was the gist of the explanation. Mark your calendars for March 1st, which is the new target date for the switch over.

1.6
Monty Goddard spoke to this. This added a 12th holiday/floating vacation day, in perpetuity, to city employees (made possibly by the city getting the VLF funds returned from the governor). 

He noted that agenda item 3.3 also aims to reward city staff with a one time bonus of one vacation day for every year they "endured those dark fiscal days" (a quote from the agenda packet).

Wildomar Rap opinion time:

The Wildomar city staff has done a great job, especially considering those "dark fiscal days" and all, and a reward is in order now that there is the money to do so. 

However, let's keep in mind that public employees (whose salaries are public knowledge) aren't underpaid, even in our quaint little city. 

The fact that they didn't find themselves in the unemployment line, like many non public employees during those times, could have been considered a bonus in its own right.

I can see them getting either A or B, but both A and B?

I'm thinking that the extra holiday/floating vacation day was a pretty good attaboy on its own... but there I go again, always having had to earn money in the private sector, so I probably don't get it.

1.9
Ken Mayes attacked the credibility of ALS1 (who will be putting on the 3rd annual ALS1 5k on May 19th at Marna O'Brien Park — see flyer below). 

Hey Erin and Ken (the key local figures behind the 5K fundraiser), if there is paperwork that needs to be finalized, I suggest that you put that on your "do it yesterday" list. Otherwise, some wiseguy is going to look to shut down your event. 

I hear that there could be a beer garden there too... 
few things are as satisfying as a couple of frosty 
Saturday morning pops to get the weekend rolling along! ☺

As much as we hate it, red tape is there to protect the public from conmen looking to take advantage of the good nature of the public. That means everyone has to jump through the same legal hoops, even the good guys, to put on a fundraising event; especially one that is backed by the city.

Tangent Time

No doubt that is why the Original Christmas Tree Lane event (that was an annual event at the Lake Elsinore Outlet Center) is gone now. It was hosted by two local retirees that had no idea about the complex web of requirements the state has for such charitable endeavors. 

Blog about the demise of OCTL

Some "concerned citizen" suggested that the State AG look into the event... and that was the end of that, along with about $10K per year that got distributed to local youth orgs with the proceeds... but I digress.

3.1 Western Community Energy Community Choice Aggregation Program
This dealt with an energy scheme (in the British sense of the word) that would have the city join a JPA (Joint Powers Authority) to get their power from a newly formed CCA (Community Choice Aggregation), called Western Community Energy (WCE).

There was a slide show presentation that lasted about 10 minutes touting the benefits of joining WRCOG's brainchild.

A slide that tried to explain the CCA, and how the energy gets from them to you.

This only got more mind-boggling as the 25 minute presentation went on. Below is part of a slide that showed the proposed savings.

A lot of effort to save 2% to 4% if you ask me.

I won't sneeze at saving a couple of percentage points, but the large sums of savings (seen above) really won't be amounting to anything. 

My wife and I don't use a lot of power, but we'll still be celebrating our windfall of (up to) $40 a year in style.

Those numbers (~4% Savings in 10 years = $49+ million) come from adding up all the small savings of the rate payers, then acting as if there will be a large pool of money at the end of the rainbow.

Here are some of the takeaway facts.
•  Both cities and individual rate payers can opt in or out of the CCA at anytime. 
(I didn't hear anyone mention penalties for doing so, but makes me wonder if there are any. Usually if there are no penalties, that is specifically gone over).
•  The power would still be delivered to homes and businesses with the existing power grid, which is controlled by SCE in our area. 
•  The existing tiered rates would still be applied by Edison for delivering the energy, even though the rate payer would be buying from someone else. 
•  Start up costs range between $4M and $7M depending on number of cities joining, which will be covered by WRCOG.
•  If adopted, and things go as planned, they would start "serving load" by October of 2018.

Councilmember Nigg asked some basic questions to get the answers on the record. 
• Customers can opt out whenever they want, is that correct?
• Cost savings [mentioned in the presentation] are typical?
• The start up costs are covered by WRCOG?

To which "correct" was given as a response each time. The short exchange is in the 1:45 minute video below.

Wildomar Rap opinion time:

The "tiered rate" issue really got Councilmember Tim Walker exercised. His home is all electric and his bills are far higher than the average (from what I gathered). 

His point was, which seemed reasonable, is that if he uses more energy, he's already paying the additional costs for the additional supply, including the additional taxes that would come with it. 

He wasn't too happy about, what amounts to a penalty, in the tiered rate system. Especially if he were to be buying his energy from a different company, but still getting stung by SCE on the delivery side.

The video below is a snippet of Councilmember Walker asking about tiered rates, and then talking about wind cars and oil being a "renewable" energy source.

Let's create a scenario here.... Ah, how's this one:
You've been buying your chocolate milk from a venerable local dairy, but they charge you extra if you want more than 10 gallons delivered to you - tiered pricing. (Yes, it's preposterous, but stick with me...)

A different dairy approaches you (WRCOG or WEC - whichever it is) and tells you they'll sell you chocolate milk for about 2% to 4% less than the first dairy... but the first dairy (SCE) is still going to deliver it to you.

In the end, you're still using the tiered-price delivery services of the first dairy (SCE), and you're paying them like before too.

So, in conclusion, if you have high personal demands for chocolate milk (power) then it looks like you might want to buy your own chocolate cow (solar power at your home) and be done with either of the above options.

Another fun part of this agenda item was when Ken Mayes did his public comment routine and equated this JPA with the Animal Shelter "fiasco" of the past and made it clear that he wanted no part of the 2%-4% savings that would come from it, "I for one, will opt out, TONIGHT, from purchasing electricity from this JPA."

Good on ya Kenny, SCE will be glad to take your extra dollar a month.

This was just a "discuss and provide direction" item, and no action was taken, though it sounded as if SCE would be putting together a presentation of their own on the matter.

Since there seems to be savings to the rate payers, and an easy way to opt out if things change, I can't image the point of not exploring this further.

The thing I want to know is, if this is better than peaches and cream like it's described, then why aren't all the local cities beating a path to their door? Why the deliberation? Why does it sound like WRCOG would be sanguine if they could "amass five to six cities" when their organization has eighteen?

If you'd like to take a look at the 20+ slides, use this LINK and look for item 3.1 and click on it.

3.3 FY 2017-18 Mid-Year Budget Report
This item took an hour, in addition to updating where the budget stands, there was also lengthy discussion about what to do with the newly returned VLF funds (about $2.4 Million annually).

It was asked of the various departments for a wish list of sorts. The price tag came back at $6.9M worth of items.

Don't feel bad, this was difficult to read (due to small font size) at the meeting too.

All things on the list are either obviously worthy, or an argument can be made for them. It's just a matter of money.

Things ranging from additional police (a no brainer) to wobblers like a new kitchen for the fire house ($60,000), and head-scratchers like a $60,000 video package to be able to start live streaming the city meetings (all approved).

There was a lot of discussion, so I'm going to include the video of the entire item. It begins with City Manager Gary Nordquist discussing the various spending options proposed and other aspects of the item (about 28 minutes worth). 

From there went the public comments, council discussion, input from Fire Chief Todd Philips and Police Chief Daniel Anne, more discussion and then the vote.

At one point Councilmember Nigg balked at the idea of spending $60k on remodeling the firehouse kitchen.

"I just can't see the justification there. I've read through the staff report. I would [want to] line it out and apply it (the $60K) to [other things]. I just can't justify taking $60 grand for a kitchen when we have roads that don't work that well." 

Chief Todd Philips came to the podium to elaborate on the needs of Station 61. For those interested in more details there, check out the video and jump to the 33 minute mark where the councilmember starts the topic.

The list of recommendations was unanimously approved by the council. With the addition of $4000 per year for TIP (Trauma Intervention Program). The entire agenda item is covered in the video below.

My favorite quote came from Councilmember Marsha Swanson. It was in reference to the additional $2.4M to the budget:

I think that Gary [Nordquist] has lead us well.  He's kept us in line all this time, and just because we feel like we've got some money —that's just a feeling we have, we don't have any money. We're not even back to where we were, so I think we need to start off slow. We're going to look at this throughout the year. If there're some ways we can add some other things, I'm all for adding a motor officer... I just think we need to stay within his recommendations, that we need this reserve cushion. None of us knows what's going to happen tomorrow, or what we might need [...] and if we don't have reserves, and we aren't fiscally conservative we're not going to get anywhere. We've got time, let's just take baby steps to start with and go with the recommendations.  

I wanted to ask about the $60,000 for video stuff. 

I know this guy that does video, and thinks that number is about 10 to 20 times too high. 

I obviously went into the wrong business. I should have aimed to be a government contractor.

Thing is I didn't fill out a speaker card, and there wasn't a solicitation of the audience if anyone else would like to speak before that part of the meeting was closed, so I'll just opine here instead.

Wildomar Rap opinion time:

We've NEVER had live video of the meetings, and I don't get the point of going from Zero to Cadillac (maybe I should say 'Tesla' so the younger generation will get the reference) all at once. 

I've heard that it's got a lot of bells and whistles. That'll be good news to the 11 people that will be utilizing it on a regular basis.

At $18,000 a year to operate, it had better whistle!

Seriously, do the math ($18,000 ÷ 12 months is $1500 per month). 

After the overpriced equipment is purchased, the city is planning on paying $1500 a month to operate it (though the graphic above says $3,000 a month). 

Even if the city meetings take up 15 hours a month, which they probably only take up about 5 total, that is $100 an hour. 

Am I still in Wildomar? Are they trying to live stream city meetings or are they building a Hollywood set?

Without being too much of a joker, if you went down to Costco you could buy an eight camera HD security set up for under $400. 

Sure, it would cost money to have it installed and set up (apparently $20K is the going rate cities pay for such things), but with that kind of thing there's no reason why one of the city interns couldn't be taught how to turn it on, then switch from camera one (on the dais) to camera two (the podium) to camera three (the video display) and back. 

Such a set up might be underwhelming for bigger cities, but spending $60K for such a thing in Wildomar just reminds us, that no matter how noble the players, tax money is spent differently than how we spend our own money. Either that, or I'm just a cheap bastard that can get a lot of mileage out of lesser items.

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It was learned that two signature events in town will not be happening this year. First, the Rotary BBQ failed to get enough backing to make a go of it. It was scheduled to be at Marna O'Brien park on April 21st. In it's place will be a Astronomy Night event.

The other annual event that won't happen this year is the Bicycle Safety Event. Each year the attendance has gotten smaller and smaller. It's a shame. Those that did attend, really enjoyed it.

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"These days, government employees are better off in almost every area: pay, benefits, time off, and security, on top of working fewer hours. They can thrive even in a down economy."
– Mort Zuckerman 

Wildomar Rap wasn't shrewd enough to consider a gubment paycheck when younger, and now the gravy train is full up.