Community Renewable Energy Agency Board Mtg

2023-02-06

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[0:17] Good afternoon, everybody.
[0:18] We're going to give us everybody about another minute or two
[0:21] to join the meeting.
[2:39] I got 8 on my.
[2:58] Well, good afternoon and welcome to the 6th February 2023
[3:03] community.
[3:05] Renewable Energy Agency board meeting, and
[3:10] we'll go through introductions.
[3:12] We'll start with those in the room
[3:16] and then we'll go through the ones online
[3:18] and I'll just call out your name.
[3:20] So starting with Councilmember Quinn.
[3:23] Drew Quinn, city of Holiday.
[3:25] And I'm a voting member, Shari Jackson, millcreek,
[3:28] and I'm voting today.
[3:31] I'm Dan Duggan, Salt Lake City voting today.
[3:34] Emily Quinton, Summit County alternate board member.
[3:38] Our primary bot member, Roger Armstrong
[3:40] will not be able to make it today, so I will be voting.
[3:44] Christopher Thomas, Salt Lake City
[3:46] alternate board member will not be voting today.
[3:50] And Luke.
[3:55] Luke Carton Park City municipal voting today.
[3:58] Michele Barney.
[4:03] I'm Michelle.
[4:04] Barney I'm doing your minutes today with Salt
[4:06] Lake City recorder's office.
[4:08] Thank you, Bob Davis.
[4:12] Division of public utilities just listening to.
[4:15] Thank you, Joe.
[4:19] Bill Frazier, Oakley, Citi and I am voting, Randy.
[4:26] In the tiny town of Springdale.
[4:28] We'll be voting today.
[4:30] Chris?
[4:35] a Chris Conley 10 about the ultimate board member.
[4:38] It will be voting today.
[4:40] Suzanne Suzanne alger, town of Springdale.
[4:45] I will not be voting today.
[4:47] Given Galen Jones city of Moab voting
[4:53] Angela and Susie Angela to at Ogden city
[4:58] and I will be voting today.
[5:00] Pamela you don't hear you, Pamela,
[5:13] but I saw you clicked your mic.
[5:17] Can you hear me now?
[5:19] Faintly, Yes.
[5:23] Can you hear me now?
[5:24] Yes of that famous classical ballet.
[5:32] Thank you, Alexi.
[5:36] Like Salem city of moab, not voting Lorenzo.
[5:44] Lorenzo long Ogden city.
[5:46] Just observing.
[5:47] Monica Monica O'Malley, Salt Lake City staff.
[5:54] Not a board member, not voting Gordon.
[6:00] We're in a minute.
[6:01] Immigration mature Township council
[6:03] listening and not voting.
[6:05] Samantha hey, everybody.
[6:09] Samantha Steele, horse alternate board
[6:11] member with Cottonwood heights.
[6:12] I will be voting today.
[6:14] Zach Zach Garvey.
[6:18] Summit County not voting.
[6:21] Dina all right.
[6:28] Dina blase, was Salt Lake County not voting?
[6:32] And Sarah.
[6:36] Sarah Montoya from the Salt Lake City attorney's office here,
[6:39] listening and not voting.
[6:41] Mark Holt. Mark Logan just interested observer David.
[6:59] I see a kid you like, David, but I don't hear you.
[7:07] OK, Eliza.
[7:12] Elisa Martin, Grand County planning and zoning.
[7:16] I'm voting.
[7:17] Thank you, Elisa.
[7:18] Sam on.
[7:23] Salt Lake City council staff.
[7:26] Salmon listening.
[7:27] Not voting in, Jeremy.
[7:39] OK well, we have David and Jeremy are on the screen,
[7:43] but their mics are.
[7:46] Not working at this time.
[7:47] Hopefully they can hear us.
[7:48] So we'll move on to continue on to item number 1.2.
[7:54] Well, at 1.1, the purpose of the overview purpose
[7:56] is just to review everybody, a couple community.
[8:00] Groups and going through their issues.
[8:04] And then we're also going to hear from Phil Russell
[8:06] on some the utility agreement.
[8:10] 1.2 the current participation percentages
[8:12] are in your board packet.
[8:14] If you have any questions on those,
[8:15] you can ask Christopher myself to clarify anything.
[8:21] Business matters.
[8:22] Item 22.1 I would be looking for a motion
[8:25] to approve the minutes of January 9 2023.
[8:33] Mr chair, I move that we approve the January
[8:36] 9 2023 board meeting minutes.
[8:41] I'll second that.
[8:42] I have most of the Councilmember coin, the second
[8:44] from Councilmember Jackson.
[8:47] Any discussion of this item?
[8:49] I see no discussion of this item.
[8:50] I will look for approval.
[8:52] All in favor of say I, I, I, I opposed Hirono.
[9:00] No, oppose that motion passes unanimously.
[9:02] Moving on to item 2.2, the Treasury report.
[9:06] Mayor silver Zinni is not here today.
[9:10] And I think we're good.
[9:15] Mr chair, this is Emily Quintin with Summit County.
[9:19] And just as the secretary, since I handled the treasurer's
[9:22] report, I don't think there are any particularly
[9:25] noteworthy items.
[9:28] I do believe we're still waiting on just
[9:31] one final payment to come in.
[9:33] That is grand county's phase two anchor payment.
[9:38] Alisa, if there's any support that you need on that
[9:41] or if you need to get the invoice again, let me know.
[9:45] It's possible that it had gone to former commissioner stock
[9:49] and that it kind of got lost in the transition.
[9:51] So I'll just reach out to you, Alisa, directly about that.
[9:55] That would be great.
[9:56] I appreciate it.
[9:57] Thank you.
[9:59] Thank you, Emily.
[10:01] We're going on to 2.3 reports from the committee.
[10:04] We'll start with the Communications
[10:05] Committee and Chris Corley.
[10:16] And Chris Christopher is here if you need him to.
[10:20] Move to your sides.
[10:23] Great thanks, Christopher.
[10:25] And yeah, if you could advance the slides.
[10:27] And add any necessary additional commentary,
[10:30] that would be great.
[10:32] Yeah Thanks.
[10:32] So I'm Christopher.
[10:33] Chris Colley, rather alternate board
[10:36] member from the town of Alta.
[10:37] I do help facilitate the Communications Committee.
[10:39] Our committee membership has not changed.
[10:43] So Yeah.
[10:44] Onto our first slide.
[10:46] We met twice in January.
[10:49] Our first meeting was on January 3.
[10:51] That was our regular monthly meeting.
[10:53] Meeting was focused mostly on charting
[10:55] a course forward with our consultant procurement project.
[10:59] And then we made a plan to produce some monthly newsletter
[11:02] and more social media content.
[11:04] On January 19th, we had a great meeting with
[11:07] environmental nonprofits the Utah chapter
[11:10] this year club in 02 Utah.
[11:14] Talk more about that in a moment.
[11:16] The image on the right side of this slide
[11:18] is from the kit of communications
[11:20] content that went out to the board a week ago today.
[11:25] Next slide.
[11:29] So the latest on our communications
[11:32] consultant procurement project.
[11:35] As a refresher, we developed an RFP
[11:39] and published it through Mill Creek city in November.
[11:43] When the RFP closed in December, we
[11:45] had only received one proposal and the committee
[11:49] declined to accept that proposal.
[11:51] After the holiday break in January,
[11:54] we got direction from Mill Creek city that
[11:55] under Mill Creek procurement rules.
[11:58] Rather than issue another RFP, we
[12:01] could hire a communications firm with an active state
[12:04] of Utah cooperative contract.
[12:06] And just for those of you who aren't aware,
[12:10] the so-called state contract is a contract.
[12:13] The state of Utah Division of purchasing
[12:15] negotiates with vendors to obtain services based on a set
[12:19] pricing schedule so eligible users can purchase goods
[12:23] and services through these contracts
[12:25] in order to streamline the solicitation
[12:27] and procurement process.
[12:29] We have begun to engage communications firms that have
[12:32] active state contracts, and we aspire to bring a proposed
[12:37] scope of work and fee to the board of directors for approval
[12:41] at the March 6 board meeting.
[12:45] We're pursuing basically our original scope of work
[12:47] with an updated timeline.
[12:50] If you go to the next slide, Christopher,
[12:51] I can run through that scope work a little bit.
[12:55] So this is basically a slide I've used in the past
[12:58] to depict the scope of work that we
[13:00] developed for our original RFP.
[13:03] The tasks outlined in the scope are
[13:06] associated basically with our four major program
[13:08] development milestones.
[13:11] Those are program application, the Public Service Commission
[13:14] decision to approve our application,
[13:17] then the ordnance adoption milestone
[13:18] and finally program launch.
[13:21] What's different about this illustration
[13:22] of a communication scope of work is that it
[13:25] reflects our adjusted timeline.
[13:27] Basically, we shifted everything forward one quarter.
[13:30] And then one thing we might do this time around
[13:32] is shift some of the tasks we originally associated
[13:35] with the program application milestone
[13:37] and a further down the timeline to the Public Service
[13:40] Commission decision milestone.
[13:42] So things like social media newsletter content, calendar
[13:47] brochures and posters and other physical collateral and then
[13:50] a branding and website refresh.
[13:52] Those tasks are not required for us to submit a program
[13:55] application, so we may move those tasks down the timeline
[13:59] in order to allow a firm that we select
[14:02] more time to get up to speed.
[14:05] Next slide, Christopher.
[14:09] So you with a great meeting on January 19 with 0 2 Utah
[14:13] and the Utah chapter of the Sierra Club.
[14:15] As we approach those key program milestones,
[14:18] these organizations are ramping up efforts
[14:21] to engage community members and elected officials
[14:24] in participating communities.
[14:27] Basically, these words are requesting guidance
[14:29] on messaging they can share to ensure our constituents have
[14:32] the best and most accurate information about the program
[14:36] and some of the steps and program development
[14:38] we're approaching.
[14:39] One topic these organizations shared
[14:41] they'd like to be able to provide really good information
[14:44] about is the utility agreement.
[14:47] And basically, when that utility agreement
[14:50] is closer to its final form, we'll
[14:52] work with the organizations to develop an info sheet
[14:56] they can use to begin educating, educating constituents
[14:59] and elected officials about what that utility agreement does
[15:02] and what it doesn't do.
[15:03] And I think we'll hear some more about the utility
[15:05] agreement later in the meeting.
[15:07] We do have another meeting scheduled with 0 2
[15:09] and the Sierra Club on February 16th,
[15:12] and I think we expect to have regular meetings
[15:13] with these organizations going forward
[15:16] as we move through the steps in our program development.
[15:23] Next slide.
[15:24] So just a reminder, we did produce
[15:28] one of our monthly email newsletters
[15:29] that went out on January 24.
[15:32] And then the next day I sent out an e!
[15:34] Kit of communications materials that all of you
[15:37] should have in your inbox.
[15:40] Topics we covered in these materials
[15:42] include our municipal ordinance finalization
[15:45] and update on all the great work we
[15:47] did to adopt low income assistance strategies
[15:49] and then plans for the agency to present
[15:51] at the upcoming Intermountain Sustainability Summit.
[15:55] If you didn't receive the newsletter
[15:56] or you haven't seen it yet, you can find it on our website
[16:00] under subscribe or you can click on one
[16:02] of the links in this slide.
[16:07] So yet going forward, we plan to continue focusing on hiring
[16:13] a communications firm.
[16:14] And once again, we do hope to be able to bring up
[16:17] proposed scope of work and the proposal
[16:19] to the board for approval at our regular March 6 board meeting.
[16:25] We'll work with Utah and the Sierra Club
[16:27] again on February 16.
[16:31] We'll work on some content specifically regarding
[16:33] the utility agreement.
[16:35] We'll keep the monthly newsletter and kit projects
[16:40] going until we have a communications firm on board
[16:43] at least to help us prepare that material
[16:45] or maybe recommend a change in course with those channels.
[16:48] And then finally, we did change our monthly meeting schedule.
[16:52] We'll be meeting on the second Friday
[16:53] of each month at 10 a.m., including this upcoming
[16:56] Friday, the tenth of February.
[16:59] That's going to have for you today.
[17:04] Thank you very much for the update, Chris.
[17:05] Any questions for chris?
[17:08] Mr chair, I have a couple of comments
[17:11] for Chris and the Communications Committee.
[17:14] I wanted to let you all know that I received a comment
[17:17] from a resident who had signed up for the newsletter,
[17:20] complimenting the January newsletter,
[17:22] and just wanted to express that it was very well written
[17:26] and clearly communicated.
[17:27] So I wanted to pass along that compliment.
[17:30] And then I also just wanted to let everyone know.
[17:34] Chris mentioned that the January newsletter
[17:37] had promoted the potential inter mountain
[17:39] Sustainability Summit panel.
[17:42] We did get accepted to present at the Intermountain
[17:46] Sustainability Summit on Thursday, March 23rd.
[17:49] The final agenda has not come out yet,
[17:52] but once that's available, I will share that
[17:54] with you, Chris, so that the Communications Committee can
[17:57] promote the session more specifically
[18:00] in terms of when it will actually
[18:04] occur on the conference agenda.
[18:06] Thanks again, Mike.
[18:10] Thank you for that comment.
[18:11] Any other comments or questions for chris?
[18:17] CNN all right.
[18:18] Thank you, Chris.
[18:19] Well, we will.
[18:19] On to the low income plan committee and Samantha
[18:23] the seahorse.
[18:25] Yeah, I was going to see Christopher
[18:27] if you'd be willing to advance my slides
[18:28] or if you want to turn over screen sharing to me,
[18:31] I can do it.
[18:32] He's got it right now.
[18:33] He's got the clicker.
[18:34] Awesome So this is our committee membership.
[18:37] We haven't had any changes to that membership recently.
[18:41] We were planning to meet or we are scheduled to meet
[18:45] in our next committee meeting.
[18:46] One week from today, I will be sending
[18:48] out an email to the committee with a possible adjustment
[18:52] to that.
[18:52] I will be traveling and had hoped to convene that meeting
[18:56] while working remotely.
[18:57] But some logistics have changed and won't allow me to do that.
[19:01] So if you're on that committee, keep an eye
[19:03] out for an email from me.
[19:05] I'll be reaching out to data for any kind of an alternative,
[19:09] we can forward one slide.
[19:13] Great so I wanted to start off with a huge Thank
[19:16] you to all the board members and support staff who collaborated
[19:20] on the low income plans for the communities
[19:23] participating in this program.
[19:25] I know it was a lot of work to read through those
[19:28] and to coordinate with your teams
[19:30] to make sure they reflect the approach
[19:32] that each community is taking.
[19:34] And we're just about there.
[19:36] So as the plans have been completed,
[19:38] I've just moved them from the general Google Drive folder
[19:42] that you were all accessing them from to kind
[19:45] of a completed folder so I can see
[19:48] which ones still are remaining.
[19:50] So on that note, if you need to get back
[19:52] into your plan for any reason, if you need to see it
[19:56] or what have it changes or anything
[19:58] trying to limit any additional changes made.
[20:00] But I'd be happy to send you access to that separate folder.
[20:04] If you need to get back into your plan, just let me know.
[20:08] And then just wanted to remind everybody
[20:10] the next step on these plans, they're going to be included
[20:14] in our program application.
[20:16] So as this little graphic I put together tries to convey,
[20:20] we're going to have 18 or we do have 18 low income plans,
[20:24] and those are going to go into our overall program application
[20:28] along with a variety of other documents.
[20:31] Move forward.
[20:32] One slide, please.
[20:33] So now that we've finished the plans
[20:35] and are kind of just tying up the final loose ends there,
[20:38] I wanted to start talking about some of the next steps
[20:41] for actually doing the outreach.
[20:43] So as you all recall, within the outreach strategies section
[20:48] of your plan, you identified organizations or groups that
[20:52] serve your community, maybe specifically
[20:55] serve low income constituents in your community.
[20:58] And those community organizations on your list
[21:02] were the ones that you've planned to do outreach
[21:05] about the program with this outreach doesn't need
[21:09] to actually take place until after the program application
[21:13] has been approved because we don't want to be doing outreach
[21:17] with information that hasn't necessarily
[21:19] been finalized or approved.
[21:21] We want to make sure it's moving forward in the way
[21:23] that we expect it to before we start
[21:25] doing too much content on it.
[21:29] However, I just wanted to start these conversations now,
[21:31] so we kind of have a good background
[21:34] when the time does come.
[21:35] So as a reminder for the organizations
[21:37] you've identified, that outreach you're
[21:39] going to need to conduct with them
[21:41] will entail these five things.
[21:43] So the first is an offer to meet with the organization
[21:46] to just make them aware of the program,
[21:48] answer questions they have.
[21:50] This could be a virtual meeting or even a phone call.
[21:53] The second will be to invite the organization
[21:55] to a quarterly meeting hosted by the low income plan committee,
[21:59] just to talk through how things are working with the program
[22:03] and low income customer membership in it
[22:05] and kind of run through any concerns they might have.
[22:09] The third will be just to add a contact
[22:11] email address for that organization
[22:13] to our agency listserv.
[22:16] The fourth will be to provide a printed
[22:18] poster in English and Spanish to the organization.
[22:21] So that they can post it in high visibility
[22:24] areas of their offices where they might
[22:26] be working with clientele.
[22:28] These poster files will be provided by the low income plan
[22:31] committee, hopefully in coordination with
[22:33] our Communications Committee.
[22:34] So communities aren't having to make these posters unless they
[22:39] want to make their own.
[22:41] And then the fifth thing will just
[22:42] be to provide the organization with kind
[22:45] of a template informational email
[22:48] that gives pretty standard aq information for their clients.
[22:53] So if this organization has a client who reaches out to them
[22:56] with questions, this informational email
[22:58] can be a good resource.
[23:00] And that email content will also be provided with.
[23:04] The low income band committee and hopefully
[23:06] the Communications Committee collaborating.
[23:08] So hopefully with the support from our various committees
[23:11] and the kind of longer timeline we have to do this outreach,
[23:15] I hope that this isn't too heavy of a lift,
[23:18] but I wanted to talk a little bit
[23:20] about some additional support from the low income
[23:23] plan committee.
[23:24] So let's move forward.
[23:26] One more slide, please.
[23:27] Samantha, can I ask a question?
[23:29] This is Sherri Jackson with Monique.
[23:31] So, yeah, so looking at the list,
[23:33] I am assuming that there's some overlap
[23:36] on some of those organizations between multiple cities.
[23:39] Is there going to be some coordination
[23:41] to say like Mill Creek will talk with this organization and salt
[23:44] lake, we'll talk to this one so that we're
[23:46] not all bombarding them with.
[23:48] With yeah, I actually have a slide coming up on that.
[23:52] You're way ahead of me.
[23:53] Thank you.
[23:54] No worries, because that's a great point to bring up.
[23:56] OK let's move forward one slide.
[23:59] So first of all, we're going to be putting together a contact
[24:01] information appendix so that at the end of these low income
[24:05] plans, there will be one master appendix that has contact
[24:08] info for every organization that's been identified,
[24:12] and that appendix will be given to every community.
[24:14] So that you have contact info for your organizations
[24:19] as well as for any others that maybe you need down the road.
[24:23] So that'll be a single resource where you don't have
[24:25] to be hopefully chasing down contact
[24:27] information for organizations.
[24:30] OK, next slide.
[24:33] OK so now getting into the outreach
[24:35] overlap, so where you are also and have already started
[24:38] identifying overlap in various outreach organizations,
[24:42] just like Councilmember Jackson was mentioning,
[24:45] there's some natural overlap where
[24:47] multiple communities may have identified outreach
[24:50] to the same organization.
[24:52] So to help coordinate with that, the low income plan committee
[24:56] will notify communities of overlap
[25:00] with other communities in the organizations they've selected
[25:03] so that those communities can coordinate
[25:07] on a single outreach effort.
[25:08] So the example I gave is it's Salt Lake city,
[25:10] Creek and Kern's all identified the same organization
[25:15] on their outreach lists.
[25:16] The committee will notify Salt Lake city, Creek and Kerns,
[25:19] so that they can coordinate on that single outreach
[25:22] push instead of three separate outreach pushes.
[25:25] And I think that will help not only community bandwidth
[25:28] with doing that outreach, but also will
[25:31] prevent these organizations from being bombarded
[25:33] with the same information.
[25:36] And then if we move forward, one more slide
[25:38] just to kind of further this idea for overlaps that
[25:42] constitute a majority of communities,
[25:44] the low income plan committee will just
[25:47] facilitate the outreach itself.
[25:49] So for the overlaps that maybe only involve two
[25:54] to three communities, we will just give that information
[25:57] to those communities and they can
[25:58] facilitate outreach together.
[26:00] But for the overlap where the majority of our communities
[26:03] want to do outreach with a single group,
[26:06] we felt like it was most appropriate for the low income
[26:08] plan committee to just do that outreach
[26:10] as a single point of contact.
[26:12] So one example of this was most of our communities
[26:17] listed the Salvation Army as a group
[26:20] we want to do outreach with.
[26:22] And so to just streamline that, we
[26:24] figured the committee can just can just take that outreach
[26:26] and handle that.
[26:27] And this will all be communicated
[26:28] to all of the communities so that you're knowing which ones
[26:34] on our list are going to be covered by the committee
[26:39] itself, and then which ones on our list or
[26:41] may be going to be covered by an adjacent community who's
[26:43] planning to do the outreach.
[26:45] Does that answer your question, Councilmember Jackson.
[26:48] Yes, that does.
[26:49] Thank you.
[26:50] OK, perfect.
[26:53] Next slide.
[26:55] So then just to circle back to the actual outreach,
[26:59] this doesn't need to take place until after the program
[27:01] application is approved.
[27:03] I even kind of recommend waiting to communicate
[27:09] details about the program just until it's approved.
[27:12] We want to make sure we're giving the accurate approved
[27:14] information.
[27:15] However, if some of the groups or organizations you're
[27:19] planning to do outreach with are ones you've never worked
[27:22] with before, I do recommend initiating contact early on,
[27:26] and I think that's something we could kind of all start on now
[27:29] if it applies to us, where maybe we just reach out and kind
[27:34] of let them know that this is coming, that we'll be following
[27:36] back up with program details once they're approved
[27:39] and give that contact early on to help
[27:42] prime the pump for the outreach to take place later on.
[27:45] So once communities have the appendix we're working on,
[27:48] that should help where you can decide if you want to start
[27:51] reaching out now and just kind of having
[27:53] those initial conversations.
[27:55] And I think it's always appropriate to give
[27:58] the high level detail of our program
[28:00] that we share in these public meetings.
[28:02] I just would be remiss if we provided specific program
[28:05] details to somebody.
[28:07] And then through the regulatory process,
[28:08] those changed and there was confusion.
[28:12] Next slide.
[28:15] OK yeah, there's the end, so feel free to reach
[28:18] out if you have any questions.
[28:20] I'm always happy to set up a meeting with myself
[28:22] or other willing members from the committee
[28:25] and just want to say Thanks again to everyone who worked
[28:27] on those low income plans.
[28:29] I know it's an imperfect process using virtual platforms
[28:34] to collaborate, and I just appreciate everyone's grace
[28:37] and patience and getting onto the Google Drive
[28:40] and being flexible with how that process worked.
[28:43] You guys are all great, so does anyone
[28:45] have any questions for me?
[28:51] Thank you very much, Samantha.
[28:52] Appreciate the work of your committee and yourself on this.
[28:56] We'll move on to the program design committee
[28:59] and Christopher Thomas.
[29:05] Oh, everyone.
[29:06] Christopher Thomas with Salt Lake City and I
[29:08] convened the program design committee and
[29:11] happy to give you some updates.
[29:15] Let's see if I'm plugged in here.
[29:22] Thank you, Kurt.
[29:23] Our program design committee membership has
[29:25] stayed the same as it has been.
[29:29] But you're welcome to look at this slide
[29:30] if you've got questions.
[29:33] Key activities.
[29:34] The committee met three times in January.
[29:36] We did have a small group who met with the Department
[29:39] of Energy loan Programs Office.
[29:41] That's a part of the federal government, department
[29:44] of energy loan Programs Office.
[29:47] We did host a meeting where we invited municipal attorneys
[29:52] for the communities who are part of the program design committee
[29:56] to meet with our outside counsel, Phil Russell,
[29:59] to discuss a draft of the utility agreement.
[30:02] So we had provided an initial draft.
[30:04] We received back red line edits from Rocky Mountain power,
[30:09] and then we brought in the municipal attorneys
[30:11] to look at it together and raise additional questions
[30:13] and comments.
[30:15] And then finally, we received a data request
[30:17] from Rocky Mountain Power to prepare budgeting guidance
[30:20] for noticing costs, which I'll talk
[30:23] about later in the slide deck.
[30:27] Here is the program application dashboard.
[30:31] I like to call it which kind of shows where
[30:33] we are with each of these.
[30:35] So on along the left hand side are
[30:37] all of the specific items that need to be included
[30:41] in the Program application that goes to the Utah
[30:43] public Service Commission.
[30:45] And then to the right, you can see kind of our status
[30:49] with green, meaning we're good, you know,
[30:53] we've completed it fully or mostly blue,
[30:57] meaning we're working toward completing it orange meaning
[31:01] it's more conceptual and red meaning
[31:02] it hasn't been started yet.
[31:04] So slowly but surely we're turning more of these rows,
[31:08] green and blue.
[31:12] but.
[31:13] Certainly not.
[31:16] We're not there yet.
[31:17] We do have a meeting scheduled with Rocky Mountain
[31:20] Power this month to basically do around up of all
[31:24] of the required items where we are with them
[31:26] and what we need to do to complete them
[31:29] with our hopeful application submission
[31:33] deadline of the end of March.
[31:40] OK here are some requests for board
[31:44] members regarding the utility agreement.
[31:47] So our current hope is that the program design committee can
[31:51] distribute a near-final version of the utility agreement
[31:55] to board members around February.
[32:00] As soon as we do that, we would ask for your help
[32:04] from the board members to please solicit
[32:06] feedback from your municipal attorney on that draft.
[32:10] We hope to.
[32:11] Then the committee then hopes to bring in near-final version
[32:15] of that utility agreement to the special board meeting that
[32:19] is scheduled for February 27.
[32:21] So we would not look to vote on the agreement at the February
[32:25] 27 meeting, more just to look at it together, have
[32:30] our outside counsel explain it, entertain questions and so
[32:33] on and so forth, so that then hopefully by our regular board
[32:37] meeting on March 6th, the board would
[32:38] be in a position to vote on whether
[32:41] or not to adopt that utility agreement.
[32:45] In the meantime, though, and I know this
[32:46] is a bit awkward for some of our communities
[32:50] because of how they schedule their council
[32:52] or commission meetings.
[32:53] But we ask that if you can please
[32:55] do try to schedule time on your council or commission's
[32:58] agenda to present the utility agreement for signature
[33:03] during the month of March after March 6th,
[33:06] and that so that we can stay on timeline with hopefully being
[33:09] in a position to submit the program application
[33:12] by the end of March.
[33:15] We do hope to bring additional program design issues
[33:19] to the board for consideration at either our regular meeting
[33:23] on March 6th or the special meeting on March 27.
[33:31] OK I was going to present this slide to you with a map.
[33:37] But I'm not going to present this slide to you with the map.
[33:42] So the maps have been very complicated.
[33:45] It's one of those things that you
[33:46] think is going to be simple.
[33:48] And then the more you peel back the layers,
[33:51] the more complicated you realize it is.
[33:53] And so we I'm going to go through a little bit of why
[33:57] we're suggesting going back to just a really simple map now,
[34:02] just showing boundaries.
[34:04] And here, here's the thinking on it.
[34:06] So I've been doing some research on this issue of community
[34:10] jurisdiction and getting good input
[34:14] from our various communities, which is actually
[34:18] kind of a nice well, it's a very nice thing about our agency,
[34:20] right?
[34:21] We all can get into our little bubbles
[34:22] with how our community does things.
[34:25] And then being in this larger agency with many communities,
[34:28] you realize there's a bigger picture.
[34:31] Right so anyway, through discovering that bigger picture
[34:36] and then talking to our outside counsel for Russell,
[34:39] we're now recommending that our maps only show the boundaries,
[34:44] not jurisdictional areas, not state
[34:47] and federal own federal land ownership.
[34:51] And here's the thinking behind it.
[34:54] So one is that it turns out that municipal jurisdiction
[34:58] over state and federal lands is pretty complex.
[35:01] So in talking through it with our.
[35:04] With it's an understatement.
[35:07] So in talking it through with Sara from Salt Lake City
[35:11] attorney's office, it sounds like it can really vary
[35:15] on an issue by issue basis.
[35:17] So one example that we discussed was
[35:19] that when it came to an issue of requiring sprinkler heads
[35:23] for fire suppression in buildings,
[35:25] a municipal entity had jurisdiction.
[35:28] Salt Lake City could require those things in a federal
[35:31] or a State Building.
[35:33] However, not so much when it comes to levying taxes.
[35:37] So you can see jurisdiction kind of changes
[35:40] depending upon the issue area.
[35:43] In the case of our program.
[35:46] The question is not settled.
[35:48] Right and it could be a complex legal.
[35:54] A process to actually settle that question by law.
[35:58] The other thing that was brought to me by Moab
[36:04] was that sometimes the jurisdictional issue
[36:07] can change based upon contractual arrangements.
[36:10] So it could be that there's a piece of state owned land,
[36:14] but there can be a contractual agreement that could expand
[36:18] or restricted jurisdiction, a community's
[36:20] jurisdiction over that land.
[36:22] So for all these reasons, it's just a complicated issue.
[36:25] And so we thought better not to say anything about jurisdiction
[36:29] specifically and just really stick to the state
[36:32] administrative code, which only says that we must include,
[36:36] quote, maps depicting the geographic boundaries of
[36:39] each such eligible community.
[36:41] So I think we just keep it simple
[36:43] and and as much as we can just show the boundaries.
[36:47] And then when it comes to how electric accounts on state
[36:51] and federal lands inside of our participating communities
[36:55] will be handled.
[36:57] The answer is we don't exactly know right now.
[37:00] But what we've done to try to answer this question
[37:03] is we've worked with two large electric customers who
[37:07] are partially on federal and state or state land
[37:10] and partially not.
[37:12] And so they have gone to the trouble of getting a whole list
[37:16] of their electric accounts.
[37:17] They've provided them to pacificorp and basically said,
[37:20] here's all of our accounts.
[37:22] How what are our options from participating in this program?
[37:26] And so we're still awaiting an answer on that.
[37:30] But nevertheless, I don't think it's that question is one
[37:33] we can answer with our maps.
[37:35] So now I know that some communities have certain maps
[37:39] that they want to include.
[37:41] I think if they're open to having us generate
[37:44] just a uniform map for everyone, same style,
[37:48] just showing the border, that would be great.
[37:50] If a community feels really strongly
[37:51] they want to have their own map, I think that's fine also.
[37:58] OK so that's maps.
[38:00] Now let's move to opt out noticing costs.
[38:03] So this is the one cost that was on our radar screen
[38:07] that we did not budget for as part of the agency.
[38:10] So this is what we hope will be the largest
[38:12] cost that our individual communities would need
[38:15] to appropriate toward this whole effort of the community
[38:18] renewable energy program.
[38:20] So state law requires that communities cover
[38:23] the cost to mail two opt out notices to customers
[38:26] within their boundaries.
[38:28] Again, these are the last costs we
[38:30] envision participating communities
[38:31] will need to appropriate.
[38:33] All future costs should be paid through program rates.
[38:37] Chair Dugan, Thank you.
[38:39] Sent a spreadsheet with updated noticing
[38:41] costs plus a 5% margin.
[38:44] And the reason we added a 5% margin
[38:46] is because we don't want to budget too little
[38:49] and then have a situation where there needs to be
[38:52] a new appropriation process.
[38:56] Now you'll notice probably that your opt out,
[39:00] your communities opt out, noticing estimated cost
[39:04] went up.
[39:05] Salt Lake City is definitely did and it seemed to be mainly
[39:08] for Salt Lake city's case.
[39:10] We had more customers in 2022 than we did back in 2019,
[39:14] so that's one reason our cost went up.
[39:16] But the main reason was because the per
[39:18] mailer cost increased by about 77% from the 2020 quote.
[39:23] And I, I have asked Rocky Mountain Power
[39:26] to why that has that been a across the board
[39:30] uniform increase for them?
[39:32] Or is there something specific about our mailer
[39:35] that made it more susceptible to a cost increase?
[39:38] And so they're looking into it and they
[39:41] haven't gotten back to me yet.
[39:45] So in any case, the yeah, it's a lot in terms of budgeting
[39:54] purposes for cities and towns, please do
[39:57] use this opt out notice spreadsheet
[40:01] as a guide for budgeting for fiscal year
[40:03] 2024 for cities and towns that begins July 1st, 2023,
[40:07] like Salt Lake City.
[40:09] For counties some of you may have already
[40:12] budgeted for fiscal year 2023.
[40:14] That's the current calendar year.
[40:16] But if you haven't or you can't for this fiscal year,
[40:19] please definitely budget for fiscal year 2024,
[40:23] which begins on January 1 for counties.
[40:28] And please note that a community only needs to actually pay
[40:31] for this noticing cost if it passes the final ordinance
[40:36] to finalize its participation.
[40:38] So if for whatever reason, our application doesn't get
[40:43] approved by the Public Service Commission
[40:45] or it gets approved with changes and nobody likes it
[40:49] and the community doesn't pass the final ordinance,
[40:51] those costs are never incurred.
[40:53] It's just that we need to budget for them
[40:56] now in case we get to that step.
[41:03] Oh, Kirk, could I get a click, please?
[41:09] Well oh, that's my last slide.
[41:15] Thank you.
[41:17] That's my last slide.
[41:18] Happy to take any questions.
[41:20] Thank you, Chris.
[41:21] Any questions for christopher?
[41:26] Christopher, I have a question.
[41:27] This is Emily Quinton with Summit County.
[41:31] I think well, I would just want to Thank you
[41:34] for waiting through this maps issue,
[41:38] because it sounds like it's gone on a lot longer
[41:40] than you were anticipating.
[41:41] I'm curious if we have a sense of.
[41:46] When we will know exactly what the boundaries of the program
[41:52] are, if that will come as a result of what you kind
[41:57] of described as having a couple of large electric customers
[42:02] ask Pacific core about their potential eligibility
[42:05] or if this is something that would
[42:06] be decided through the program application.
[42:08] And just it now occurs to me that the answer on jurisdiction
[42:13] is obviously then going to define how many of these opt
[42:16] out notices are going out.
[42:18] Right so yeah, just kind of curious
[42:21] what you're anticipating.
[42:24] It's a great question.
[42:25] I don't know for sure.
[42:27] I mean.
[42:30] I would hope we would have this question answered by the time
[42:33] that our program application were submitted.
[42:36] I guess it's possible that it could linger on beyond that.
[42:42] But yeah, I think we want we're going
[42:43] to do everything we can to try to answer it
[42:45] before the program application.
[42:50] Thank you for the comment.
[42:51] And questions.
[42:52] Appreciate that.
[42:53] See, no further questions for Christopher.
[42:57] I want to just Thank the committee's
[43:00] leads on their work and and passion for this program.
[43:05] So I appreciate that very much.
[43:07] I'm going to move on since we have Phil Russell,
[43:09] our outside counsel here.
[43:10] I'm going to move on to item 2.5 and then come back to item
[43:14] 2.4 for the public comments.
[43:16] So we have our outside counsel here
[43:20] to give us an update on the Public
[43:22] Service Commission filing and the utility agreement.
[43:25] And I'm going to turn the time over to Phil Russell
[43:28] because I saw him join the meeting.
[43:30] So, Phil, I'm a.
[43:34] Giving you the time.
[43:35] I'm here.
[43:36] Thank you, Phil.
[43:37] Yeah can you hear me OK?
[43:40] Yes OK, great.
[43:42] I actually if the board doesn't mind,
[43:46] I actually would like to respond to Emily Clinton's question
[43:49] about when we will know about the borders of the program.
[43:55] And on some level, the borders of the program
[43:59] will not be set definitively.
[44:02] And finally, at the time of the commission ruling,
[44:06] because the act the act contemplates
[44:11] that municipalities might annex new areas
[44:13] into it, which would, of course, change the program boundaries.
[44:17] But for purposes of what are the program
[44:21] boundaries at the time that the program is implemented?
[44:25] And that is something that I think as we've all kind of
[44:30] found out, those of us who've been kind
[44:31] of track mapping and nobody's done more
[44:33] work on that than Christopher.
[44:36] It's a bit of a difficult question to answer.
[44:40] What I anticipate is that we will submit
[44:44] the maps in connection in response to the requirement
[44:48] of the act and the commission rules,
[44:50] and that we will go forward as though those
[44:53] are the program boundaries until we are told otherwise.
[44:57] And when I say until we were, we are told otherwise.
[45:01] What I mean is either a customer who
[45:06] is within those the boundaries of the maps
[45:09] that we submit doesn't opt out and then challenges
[45:14] the termination fee that is imposed on them
[45:18] and then challenges on the ground
[45:20] that they should never have been included in the program
[45:22] in the first place.
[45:23] Maybe that's when we get some sort
[45:24] of resolution on this issue.
[45:25] Or the inverse is that somebody who
[45:28] is in one of those federal lands and thinks
[45:30] that they should have been able to participate in a program.
[45:33] But Rocky Mountain Power said no, then
[45:34] we could have a conflict there.
[45:36] Otherwise, I just frankly don't know that the commission
[45:39] is going to address this.
[45:40] We can raise the issue with the commission,
[45:43] but it's going to say it's probably not the entity that
[45:46] is the correct entity to be determining the relative power
[45:53] of a municipality versus the state versus federal government
[45:58] on those issues on this subject matter.
[46:01] So so my guess is that this may actually
[46:04] remain in flux for some period of time,
[46:06] but I don't think it's going to affect
[46:08] a great number of parties.
[46:11] What I would suggest is that each individual community,
[46:15] to the extent that there are large industrial or commercial
[46:17] customers that are in question, we
[46:19] should get those questions answered sooner rather
[46:21] than later, because that's where it's going to affect
[46:24] the program the most is if a commercial customer that wants
[46:28] to participate but isn't noticed because Rocky Mountain Power
[46:33] thinks they're not in or the inverse where they're
[46:37] in the program, but then later determined
[46:39] that they shouldn't have been.
[46:40] That's when it's going to have the biggest
[46:41] effect on the program.
[46:43] So all of that is to say, I don't know that we're
[46:47] going to get an answer on this soon or even
[46:50] by the time the application felt as much as we might like
[46:53] that answer to come then, but it may come over time,
[46:58] and there are things we can do to address those questions
[47:01] before they become a big problem for the program
[47:07] and any questions about any of that.
[47:14] Healing? none.
[47:15] I will go to the issues that I've
[47:17] been asked to address today, one of which
[47:21] is the utility agreement.
[47:24] Just as a reminder to all the community.
[47:27] Renewable Energy Act requires the utility agreement
[47:30] to address several things, one of which
[47:34] is an agreement by the agency that it will
[47:39] or by the communities excuse me, that they will make payment
[47:42] to Rocky Mountain Power for third party expertise that will
[47:46] be engaged by the Office of consumer services
[47:53] and the division of public utilities.
[47:55] We entered into an agreement to that effect back in July
[47:59] in order to allow the division in the office
[48:02] to go out and initiate their solicitation processes
[48:07] for third party consultants during the run up to the filing
[48:11] of the application.
[48:13] Another requirement is that the utility
[48:15] agreement address and payment for the notices
[48:19] that Christopher was just talking about,
[48:22] the utility agreement also has to address
[48:25] if there are going to be any initially
[48:26] identified replace assets.
[48:29] Those are existing assets that we're
[48:31] going to say we don't want to have providing service
[48:36] to program participants.
[48:39] And then finally, it has to the agreement
[48:41] has to identify what we're going to do with termination
[48:46] fees that are imposed on customers that don't initially
[48:50] opt out, but opt out later, but that are not ultimately rolled
[48:53] back into to program rates.
[48:56] The idea is that the vast majority of those
[48:59] will be rolled back in to program rates,
[49:01] but there are certain circumstances in which
[49:03] that might not be possible.
[49:05] And so we need to address that in the utility agreement.
[49:08] We sent a draft of the utility agreement
[49:12] to Rocky Mountain Power back in October,
[49:15] and then for various reasons, it took them a little while
[49:17] to get it back to us.
[49:18] We didn't get it back until mid-january.
[49:21] As Christopher mentioned, we had a meeting
[49:23] with the municipal attorneys last week.
[49:27] Part of the reason for that meeting
[49:29] was that many of the edits that we got back from Rocky Mountain
[49:33] Power addressed an issue that I needed some input
[49:36] from the municipal attorneys on, and that
[49:38] is that those edits really kind of addressed
[49:41] the nature of the agency itself and its relationship
[49:44] with the communities.
[49:45] What role does the agency play going forward?
[49:49] Where, when and how can the agency stand in on behalf
[49:53] of the communities?
[49:53] And so I really needed some of their expertise
[49:56] to address those issues.
[49:58] And I thought we had a really good conversation about it.
[50:00] And I'm awaiting some edits from the municipal attorneys
[50:05] on the red line that I sort of circulated internally.
[50:07] And so I anticipate having some comments back sometime
[50:11] next week where I can then turn a draft back over
[50:16] to Rocky Mountain Power and we can stay within that the sort
[50:19] of schedule that Christopher outlined in providing edits
[50:24] to the various communities.
[50:28] And do we have any questions on the utility agreement
[50:32] as it stands and what the process has been?
[50:38] This is Kayla.
[50:39] I was a little slow on the last topic.
[50:42] The boundaries.
[50:43] Could I just ask a question about that?
[50:46] Oh, sure.
[50:48] So if we have this federal properties within the boundary
[50:57] and they might be interested in participating,
[50:59] do you think it would be useful to initiate contact with them
[51:03] about the program now or wait?
[51:06] I would do that now to the extent that, you know,
[51:09] you have somebody who wants to participate.
[51:11] I would do that as soon as you can.
[51:14] And the reason I say that is the sooner we can have folks who
[51:19] were there some question raising the issue, I think the quicker
[51:22] we can get an answer about whether they
[51:25] are able to participate or not.
[51:27] And as I understand it, this is well outside
[51:29] of my area of expertise.
[51:30] As I understand it, whether that customer is going
[51:33] to be able to participate will turn
[51:35] on a question of what effect the ordinance has on that property.
[51:41] And that is an area that is well,
[51:44] I say, well outside of my area of expertise,
[51:46] but I think it can get on the right desk sooner if we raise
[51:50] the issue now, rather than waiting until either they don't
[51:54] get a notice or they do get a notice and want to participate
[51:56] but are told they can't or something.
[51:58] So so my recommendation to you and to anybody else that
[52:02] knows of those types of customers
[52:04] is let's address it with them now.
[52:06] And then we can try to get that answer as to that customer
[52:09] sooner rather than later.
[52:11] Great Thank you.
[52:12] Yeah, sure.
[52:13] And just to this issue could come up
[52:16] in front of the commission during the course
[52:19] of the commission's docket on the application.
[52:23] My strong suspicion is that the commission is not
[52:25] going to want to weigh in on those issues with respect
[52:28] to each and every instance of a community that
[52:31] has federal property or state property.
[52:32] Because, as Christopher was mentioning,
[52:34] the rules are different within each community
[52:37] and on each subject matter is just not
[52:38] going to be something, in my view,
[52:40] that the commission is going to want to address.
[52:41] But to the extent that we can address it on a addressed
[52:46] those specific instances when we know that they arise,
[52:49] the sooner we can get answers with respect
[52:50] to those customers.
[52:51] So that would be my preference.
[52:57] Any other questions about the boundaries,
[52:59] or the utility agreement?
[53:07] Looks like no.
[53:08] I was also asked to appear and kind of discuss
[53:13] what the commission proceedings will be like
[53:18] once the application is filed.
[53:21] It's something I'm happy to do.
[53:23] There's some bit of guesswork into what
[53:24] that schedule will be like.
[53:27] I noticed we have one member of the Division of
[53:29] public utilities on Bob Davis.
[53:31] Hi, Bob.
[53:32] As Bob will tell you, the schedules
[53:35] for commission dockets are kind of a negotiated issue
[53:40] at the outset of each docket, unless there is
[53:43] some commission rule or statute that
[53:47] requires a specific schedule.
[53:49] So here's generally speaking, what I expect the response
[53:54] to the application to look like in the commission proceedings
[53:56] to look like once the application is filed,
[53:59] I expect the commission to file a public notice,
[54:04] giving notice to the general public
[54:07] of the filing of the application and setting
[54:10] a scheduling conference.
[54:11] That's scheduling conference that notice
[54:13] will go out within a couple of days of the filing.
[54:17] The scheduling conference will probably
[54:18] be set for a week or two later.
[54:22] And the idea is that for all parties that
[54:25] want to be associated with the docket,
[54:28] for all parties that want to have input into the docket,
[54:30] they should come to the scheduling conference
[54:33] to address the schedule.
[54:35] Typically what happens is we all generally
[54:38] know who the parties are that will
[54:39] be interested for our purposes.
[54:42] We know it will be Rocky Mountain Power.
[54:43] We know it will be the division in the office,
[54:45] in each of the communities that intend to participate
[54:49] or that are currently eligible communities and the agency.
[54:53] There may be others that want to participate as well.
[54:55] I expect there will be in the lead
[54:58] up to that scheduling conference.
[54:59] That will probably be an email discussion
[55:03] about what the proper schedule will look like.
[55:05] I anticipate that what that will do
[55:08] is that the company probably will file testimony
[55:12] in connection with this application,
[55:14] testimony that supports commission
[55:16] approval of the application.
[55:18] Then what the schedule will do is identify deadlines
[55:22] for other parties to file testimony in response
[55:26] to the application and in response
[55:27] to the company's testimony and support.
[55:31] That deadline will be anywhere from a few weeks away
[55:37] to a couple of months away, kind of depending on how much time
[55:39] everybody feels like they need.
[55:42] And then there's going to be two other rounds of testimony.
[55:47] There will be rebuttal testimony and then rebuttal
[55:50] testimony in each round response to the testimony in the round
[55:54] before it.
[55:55] And then the commission will set as part of the scheduling
[55:58] conference, we'll set a hearing several months out, giving time
[56:02] for all of that testimony to occur
[56:05] and for parties to conduct discovery, et cetera.
[56:07] One other item that I expect in to address in that scheduling
[56:12] conference is sometimes in dockets before the commission,
[56:16] we will have what are called technical conferences where
[56:20] if there's an issue or a set of issues on which it would be
[56:25] useful for everybody to just get together
[56:27] in the same room, either virtually or in person
[56:29] or some mix of the both with the folks from the commission,
[56:33] with the commissioners themselves to address part
[56:36] of an application we hold what's we schedule what's
[56:38] called a technical conference.
[56:40] It really is one of the few times
[56:42] where you have the opportunity to address
[56:45] the commission directly.
[56:46] I anticipate that we will have one
[56:48] or more technical conferences in this case.
[56:50] Just that's just my view of how this thing is going to go
[56:54] just because it is so new.
[56:56] So I would anticipate that we have
[56:58] one or two technical conferences where we
[57:00] can go over to the commission.
[57:01] My guess is there will be a phone line for people to call
[57:03] in and the company or the communities
[57:06] or a combination of the two will be
[57:08] asked to give a presentation about some aspect
[57:10] of the application.
[57:13] There will be any of the stakeholders
[57:15] that, who want to participate in the docket
[57:18] and the commissioners, one or more of the commissioners
[57:21] might attend that as well.
[57:23] So there can be this sort of opportunity for everybody
[57:25] to get on the same page.
[57:27] I think it does facilitate better
[57:29] questions during the docket.
[57:32] And if people have questions, sometimes
[57:35] it's more general questions.
[57:36] You can get past that point in a technical conference
[57:39] where people can start asking more
[57:40] specific questions later on.
[57:42] I think it's a really good way for us
[57:47] to advance the ball on getting people to understand what
[57:52] the application is all about and kind
[57:54] of where disputes might arise.
[57:58] So I would anticipate that those would be included
[58:00] as part of the schedule.
[58:02] Each of the communities, just to make this clear,
[58:04] as is a part of the act and is a part of the.
[58:06] Mission rules.
[58:08] Each of the communities is automatically made a party
[58:11] to the docket, and each of the communities
[58:14] will be expected to respond to discovery requests
[58:19] as part of that docket, if there are any discovery.
[58:21] I imagine that most of those discovery requests are already
[58:24] will be directed at the agency, and the agency will then
[58:28] Dole them out to the parties.
[58:30] But I guess that's up to the party who is seeking discovery.
[58:34] In any event, I wanted to put that on everybody's radar
[58:36] so that they're not surprised if during the course
[58:38] of the commission proceedings there is some discovery
[58:42] aimed at the communities.
[58:43] My guess is that most of the discovery
[58:45] will be aimed at the utility because they are
[58:49] the party with most of the information and also the party
[58:54] that is filing the application.
[58:55] So that's my expectation.
[58:57] But there may be some question about participation
[59:02] in some community or something.
[59:04] Then that's sort of what I expect.
[59:06] I can't really give you a great kind
[59:08] of expectation about what the schedule is going to look like.
[59:10] Other than that, that's kind of how the process will go.
[59:14] Obviously, on behalf of the communities,
[59:16] we're going to be seeking a hearing
[59:18] date, an end date to that proceeding as early as we can.
[59:21] But we do want to make sure that we give all
[59:23] of the other parties, the division, the office,
[59:26] other stakeholders, enough time to adequately review the
[59:28] application and respond to it.
[59:31] So my guess is they're going to want a fair bit of time
[59:34] to do that.
[59:34] So so that's something that will work out
[59:37] once the application is filed.
[59:40] And with that, I'll open it up to any questions,
[59:41] if folks have any, about the commission process
[59:44] or if anybody has thought of questions about the utility
[59:46] agreement in the interim.
[59:49] Thank you very much, Phil, for that.
[59:53] Briefing on matter, Kaitlyn.
[59:56] Thank you.
[59:58] So there's a public hearing as well, right,
[1:00:02] when just anyone can comment.
[1:00:04] Is that correct?
[1:00:06] There often are public comment periods
[1:00:09] either identified in the schedule
[1:00:13] or there can be a public hearing.
[1:00:16] Typically, we only see public hearings
[1:00:18] where people can come in to the commission
[1:00:19] and make some statement.
[1:00:21] Those are something we often see in rape cases.
[1:00:25] We we could set one here.
[1:00:27] If there's an interest in having the public come in and address
[1:00:32] the commission directly, rather than through representatives
[1:00:36] of the communities or the agency or whomever,
[1:00:38] we could ask the commission to include a public hearing.
[1:00:41] I don't know that the commission would on its own
[1:00:44] set one in this proceeding.
[1:00:45] If there's an interest in having that, I'm sure we could ask.
[1:00:51] OK my concern that led to the question
[1:00:55] was that I was more interested in whether or not
[1:00:57] the agency and our representatives
[1:01:01] would be prepared to respond to public input
[1:01:05] if it was negative.
[1:01:06] So if there's not a public hearing component,
[1:01:10] I'd be inclined to think that was for the best.
[1:01:14] Well, as because the communities each individually in the agency
[1:01:19] will be parties, we would have an opportunity
[1:01:21] to respond to whatever is placed before the Commission.
[1:01:24] In those public hearings.
[1:01:26] For instance, each of those parties
[1:01:28] could attend the public hearing and respond if there's
[1:01:31] something that's kind of depending on the format,
[1:01:34] but we'll be there throughout to address whatever issues are
[1:01:38] raised, whether by a party to the proceeding
[1:01:41] or by the general public.
[1:01:43] As I said, kind of going back, unless there's
[1:01:46] some request for a public hearing
[1:01:49] or some desire by the commission to hear
[1:01:51] directly from the public on this,
[1:01:52] I don't expect there to be one.
[1:01:54] There always is in connection with rate cases.
[1:01:56] I don't know whether that's a statutory rule
[1:01:59] or whether it's just practice that the commission has
[1:02:01] adopted.
[1:02:01] But there's always some sort of public hearing for those,
[1:02:04] but very rarely for any other type of docket.
[1:02:08] OK Thank you.
[1:02:10] Yep I have a question.
[1:02:14] This is Emily Quinton.
[1:02:16] Phil, you just described, I think obviously
[1:02:20] a written components like the application and the testimony
[1:02:24] that gets filed and then a couple
[1:02:27] of conferences or meetings, the schedule conference
[1:02:31] and the technical conference are all
[1:02:33] of these both written and meetings in the public realm.
[1:02:40] Yes OK.
[1:02:42] Thank you.
[1:02:43] Yeah so so just to expound on that a little bit,
[1:02:46] all of those written filings so that I
[1:02:50] identified several deadlines for testimony
[1:02:53] in a commission proceeding.
[1:02:55] The witnesses who intend to testify at the hearing
[1:02:59] will pre file written testimony with the commission,
[1:03:03] and then at the hearing they adopt all of that testimony.
[1:03:07] It shortens the hearing pretty considerably versus everybody
[1:03:11] going and saying all that stuff on the record.
[1:03:13] But it also gives an opportunity for folks
[1:03:15] to kind of prepare cross-examination questions,
[1:03:18] which is usually what you get at a commission hearing.
[1:03:21] The witness who has written direct in rebuttal and rebuttal
[1:03:24] testimony will get up, adopt all that testimony,
[1:03:26] and then they'll be subject to cross-examination or questions
[1:03:28] by the commissioners.
[1:03:30] All of that is are open to the public.
[1:03:34] The commission docket here will be open to the public
[1:03:38] and viewable.
[1:03:38] They've got a the commission's website will attach all
[1:03:43] of the documents that are filed in the case other
[1:03:48] than those that are marked as confidential.
[1:03:50] So if there are documents or testimony that are identified
[1:03:54] as being confidential, those will not
[1:03:57] be available to the public if there
[1:03:59] is a portion of the hearing or a technical conference
[1:04:04] that relies on or discusses that confidential information that
[1:04:08] will be closed to the public.
[1:04:10] But otherwise, everything here will
[1:04:12] be open to the public, which you can go to the commission
[1:04:16] website to get or if it's at the hearing
[1:04:19] or a technical conference, you can dial in
[1:04:21] or I think even the technical conferences
[1:04:23] and definitely the hearing there's
[1:04:24] the commission has a YouTube channel
[1:04:28] where you can just stream it online as it's going on.
[1:04:35] One more question, family.
[1:04:37] I have another question that's also just kind of a request.
[1:04:43] I remember that when the program design committee formed almost
[1:04:48] a year and a half ago, there was definitely a period of time
[1:04:50] where we just needed to get familiar with the terminology
[1:04:54] in this space.
[1:04:55] And it feels to me like as we gear up for the program
[1:05:00] application to get submitted and then
[1:05:02] be in the Public Service Commission process,
[1:05:05] there's a new set of terminology.
[1:05:07] So I guess my question is, if folks know
[1:05:09] of any existing resources guides,
[1:05:12] I know, you know, even when you're
[1:05:14] on the Utah legislature site, you can find
[1:05:16] some definitions of key terms.
[1:05:18] If there's something like that exists
[1:05:20] for the Utah public service commission, that'd be great.
[1:05:22] I also will note that I know there's
[1:05:25] a national organization, the regulatory assistance project,
[1:05:29] who aims to sort of teach folks about these various processes
[1:05:34] that might have some resources.
[1:05:35] So I'll poke around that website, too,
[1:05:37] but I know a lot of this is new to me and I'm not the only one.
[1:05:42] So to the extent that we can share some resources,
[1:05:45] that'd be much appreciated.
[1:05:46] Thanks Thank you, Emily.
[1:05:52] Any other questions for phil?
[1:05:57] All right.
[1:05:58] Appreciate that very much, Phil.
[1:05:59] Thank you very much.
[1:06:01] Thank you all.
[1:06:02] K board will be moving on to item number
[1:06:05] 2.4, which is public comment period.
[1:06:08] And our procedure and our policy on this
[1:06:10] is that the purpose of the public comment
[1:06:12] is to allow citizens to address items on the agenda.
[1:06:16] Citizens can address the board with a written statement,
[1:06:21] or they can come into in person or online,
[1:06:23] and they're allowed 2 minutes to address the board.
[1:06:28] At the conclusion of that address, we can make a take,
[1:06:32] have an action, taken action to provide them an answer or that
[1:06:35] or direct them to the appropriate resources for that.
[1:06:39] And this applies to all public hearings.
[1:06:41] So if you do want to make a comment,
[1:06:43] you can give you two minutes to make a comment,
[1:06:48] but you can also write a comment to myself or the agency,
[1:06:52] and that will be more than happy to address those comments.
[1:06:57] So is there anybody in person or online
[1:07:00] that would like to make a public comment at this time?
[1:07:03] If you're online, just go ahead and just click your mic,
[1:07:06] state your name and make the comment.
[1:07:13] I see no public comments and no public comments in person here.
[1:07:18] So we'll be moving on to item number 2.6 in a board comments.
[1:07:27] I just have one comment.
[1:07:28] So Thank you very much, Phil, on your work there.
[1:07:30] I appreciate that very much.
[1:07:33] Committee Leeds, Thank you very much for that.
[1:07:37] Samantha has got an action for all of us
[1:07:38] to submit our low income plan or approve that.
[1:07:42] I appreciate that.
[1:07:43] Get on the calendar for your committees, your councils
[1:07:48] and in March so we can keep this ball rolling
[1:07:52] and get to the application by the end of March.
[1:07:56] We have no clothes, vitamins.
[1:07:58] So I will look for a motion to adjourn.
[1:08:00] So moved.
[1:08:03] I suck at the motion of motion from Councilmember Jackson
[1:08:06] and second from Councilmember Quinn.
[1:08:08] All in favor.
[1:08:08] Say, I, I, I, I. I'm almost done.
[1:08:15] We are adjourned.
[1:08:18] Thank you.