Those power poles are scheduled to disappear as three blocks of Water Avenue are rebuilt as a “plaza street.” (Vehicles were parked there last Thursday night because of River Rhythms.)
Placing power lines under ground on three blocks of Water Avenue may cost Albany customers of Pacific Power between $3.50 and $4 a month for two years. Or maybe a little more.
The city council Monday wasted no time sticking electric ratepayers with the expense of undergrounding the power lines. It voted 5-1 to approve an agreement with PacifiCorp, the utility’s parent company, covering the payment plan.
Councilwoman Matilda Novak voted “no.” She did not want to saddle ratepayers with higher bills when Pacific Power is already raising its rates.
No one on the council asked the main question: Why didn’t the city staff or the council foresee the cost of the undergrounding of power lines and budget for it in the overall expenses of the Central Albany Revitalization Area’s Waterfront Project?
When I reported on this last week, I didn’t have an estimate of the monthly cost per customer. Now I do thanks to Adam Kohler, PacifiCorp’s regional business manager in Albany.
The CARA’s Waterfront Project calls for Water Avenue from Washington Street to the Ellsworth Street Bridge to be rebuilt as a “plaza street” suitable for holding events. The project requires utility lines to be moved under ground.
Pacific Power estimates this “conversion” will cost nearly $2.4 million, but the city did not include the cost in the project’s budget.
In an email, Kohler explained that a “forced overhead-to-underground conversion” like this is governed by an Oregon administrative rule as well as a tariff rule and Pacific Power’s Albany franchise.
Kohler continued:
“The city has the option of covering the costs of the overhead-to-underground conversion with a single payment to PacifiCorp at the onset of the project, or by recovering those costs through a line-item charge on PacifiCorp customer’s bill. The city chose the second option as a method of cost recovery.
“The city also has the option of defining which customers would fall into the cost recovery ‘zone.’ The decision was made to apply the repayment across all the ratepayers within the city limits — just over 24,500 customers.
“PacifiCorp and the city negotiated the repayment timeframe to be over two years (PacifiCorp initially had hoped to have the repayment be completed over one year but acquiesced to the city’s request to extend the recovery over 24 months) to minimize the size of the line item each month…
“A rough calculation (our accounting department will be involved in the actual numbers) shows that customers can expect a monthly charge of around $3.50-$4.00, give or take.”
Kohler pointed out that all this has to be approved by the Oregon Public Utility Commission before it takes effect.
The Albany council was scheduled to discuss the agreement with PacifiCorp in a work session Monday (Aug. 5) and act on it Wednesday. But it took action Monday instead. (hh)
This story was updated after the city council work session on Monday afternoon.
Take it out of CARA funding! Don’t stick the taxpayers with the bill! We didn’t ask for this project!
Don’t fool yourself. CARA funding IS taxpayers.
Was the need for this switch to underground known when this project was started? If so did CARA know the costs at that time? Why didn’t CARA include it in the already overpriced halucination?
CARA funding is paid by our property taxes. So. take your pick…the people will have to pay for moving the power one way or the other. CARA has already spent 21.5 million dollars plus for the Kiddie Park and a few improvements to Water Street and the Dave Clark path and docks. They are out of money and can’t get more, because the people finally a few years ago passed a law that Albany cannot form more urban renewal districts (money scamming districts, that is) without a vote of the people. So, therefore, the City/CARA is getting the power moved to underground paid by the people through a deal with PP&L.
I have been harping about CARA for years. Now, the chickens are coming home to roost.
“The Central Albany Revitalization Area’s Waterfront Project calls for those three blocks of Water Avenue to be rebuilt as a “plaza street” suitable for holding events. The project requires utility lines to be moved under ground.”
So CARA/city council called for it, but then decided not to fund it using urban renewal bonds and TIF to pay them off.
Instead, CARA/city council “chose” to reach into the wallet of EVERY customer of Pacific Power and force the customers to pay the bill.
A bill which will probably benefit one specific developer in a BIG way.
Hasso, you did a great job of identifying the CARA/city decisions; however, there is zero on “why” CARA/city council “chose” this method of financing.
Do I smell the putrid smell of corruption, fascist corporativism, here?
Hilarious! Why not add collectivism, socialism, anarchism, and all other dystopian “isms” you can think of… :-)
I smell shadleism…the irrational rejection of everything a community attempts to improve itself.
Does anyone think the “elite” expected to stay in Lehman’s future hotel on the site of his then-torn-down ragtag warehouse will want to look out the window of their expensive room and see the old Senior Center building? Or, would they rather the building not be there and be able to view the river?
I have one question which I think is significant…where is the cost benefit analysis that should have been accomplished before this massive project was started. Does the city of Albany really not accomplish a comprehensive cost benefit analysis before major projects? A cost benefit analysis can and does encompass even to the value of lesiure so there is no reason that a surprise expense of this magnitude should not have been adequately calculated way before this juncture in time.
Common sense doesn’t apply to our city council. It’s not THEIR money, it’s OUR money. It’s REALLY easy to make decisions with someone else’s money.
There is NO cost benefit (or any other benefit) in the entire waterfront project. If they really wanted to “revitalize” the city, they would have started repairing our streets. Then EVERYONE could benefit.
They’ll hem and haw about budgeting, but the bottom line is they wasted $20,000,000 plus on something the majority of the taxpayers didn’t want, didn’t need and won’t benefit from.
I’d be willing to bet that this “dig” money grab won’t be the last.
The people who run this city ‘put the horse before the cart” in every decision. They make life miserable for the working people forcing us to choke down their swill (our drinking water they say is good but is not) and acting like they are helping us. Money wasted on everything that will make someone else money while we drive everyday to work dodging potholes and homeless people running in the road. The city throws their hands up like they just don’t care and then spend their time and energy on useless projects. The city needs to “get their house in order” before they invest our hard earned money making our lives harder. Respect goes both ways and the city needs to understand that they have lost the respect of the very people who pay their wages.
The city’s favorite contractor is Lepman, not Lehman. My apologies for previously spelling the name incorrectly.
One more comment, please. I drove by Monteith Kiddie Park on one of our now customary hot days and saw only one person in the park. It was late afternoon. It is so hot now with the affects of climate change that this park with no big trees is not really habitable in the summer afternoons. So, as one of the blogs commenters implied recently, it is the city’s favorite contractor who wants to build a fancy hotel where his old warehouse now stands who benefits from the power poles being placed underground, not the general population.
And is there really a demand for a fancy hotel in Albany?
Mary, you must’ve not walked by today around noon as there seemed to be about 40-50 people of all ages in the park having lunch under the trees, sitting in the grass, walking down the stairs, and yes, *gasp* kids playing on the playground and in the splash pad.
It was only forecast to reach 85 degrees today; not the normal 90s that we now get.
And, the trees are the few left around the old covered picnic area that they didn’t tear down. Tell your frenemy, Mary, this, in case she doesn’t read the blog.
Shame on them! Sticking it to us for sure.
Disgusting that all have to pay for something very few will benefit from.
SMH….
Yes, how are we as seniors and elders going to benefit from the plaza. We can barely pay our power bill now. PP L is talking about a 10 per cent increase.
“…very few will benefit from.”
Tell that the literally thousands who have already done so since July 4th!.. (Show up at the Monday evening “Summer Sounds” concerts and the Thursday River Rhythms concerts to see people seriously enjoying their new Monteith Riverpark.)
And a barren wasteland for the majority of the year
They should charge a fee for people to attend the new park for the concerts to pay for the
work many of us did not want and will never go to any of the concerts.
I agree. They have fencing all around the venue and it would be easy to charge.
It also would be great to see who is going to pay for the plants that have died because of not water and a poor choice. Big waste.
So now the rate payers are paying for a job that pacific power should be paying for AND we are paying for the legal judgement that PacificCorp was fined for the past fires
Good Job city council. Time to get rid of all of you especially Ray who can never say anything nice.
My opinion; By requiring PP&L to do this; allowing them to recover costs WITH INTEREST from customers monthly billings for two years violates section 44 of the City Charter. I filed a dispute with PUC today asking them to research and vote against the request from PP&L They said they would get back to me.
when the albany river front project was approved, did they allow anyone with common logic, common sense in the room? the new albany amtrak platform… 10 gauge copper wire is used for energy saving lights. if someone with common sense and good logic was in the room during planning, smaller wire would be used for lower power consumption, energy saving lighting. and lower cost of the project. 10 gauge copper wire, for energy saving lights, im not kidding! will anyone from city of albany put there big boy, or big girl pants on and tell us this same type of spending DID NOT happen with that $25 mill spent on the water front project? i find it amazing we are nearing the end of the project, and just now learning our power bill will increase due to it. the city had to know about this during planning, we had no clue this was part of the deal. until hasso rides in to tell us about it? hummmm.
So how does the city continually get away with making these types of decisions and voting on them in a work session without any notice provisions or an opportunity for public comment? This is not the first time they have done this. Where is their supposed “public transparency”?
The city council did vote 5 to 1 (Novak dissenting) to approve the agreement in their work session on Monday. It was also on the Agenda for Wednesday but was pushed ahead, as I understood, as the City Staff had a number of things to get before the council before the council’s six week break starts after Weds. meeting. On councilor asked if they were allowed to vote on this agreement on Monday in a Work Session, rather than Wednesday, but the Mayor seemed to push the vote forward without consideration or answer to this question.
One councilor (Novak?) did ask whether there were remaining CARA funds to pay for the undergrounding of the utilities. The director was uncertain if there were spare funds available, as the project accounting was not complete to know how much the Waterfront project was costing and if there were spare funds. The thought from city staff is that if additional CARA funds are available, then “likely” Pacific Power would accept an advance paydown from the city which could shorten or reduce the utility bill surcharge. It was commented in the Work session that residential and commercial customers would pay the same monthly surcharge amount ($4.00 or $4.25 per month for 24 months by the Director) so the surcharge seems to be applied by account, rather than based on the size of service or usage. Also heard is that the city needs to let their (the city’s?) excavation contractor (K&E) in ASAP to start excavations for Pacific Power to place lines underground, thus it appears the city will incur costs in addition to the $2.4 Million to come from customers.
“Catenary Lights” ring a bell? Although I realize it is not a direct comparison; I cannot help but think of the catenary lights the city installed to great expense. In a February 2018 article Hasso explained that the downtown beatification required installing extra posts and cables so that catenary lights could be hung over the middle of a street or two. They were, at best, superfluous since I haven’t met anyone who has noticed them and I personally couldn’t say if they are working, or even still there. I wonder if after we saddle the citizens with undergrounding the poles and utility lines, will we pass a fee or bond in a couple decades to once again erect new power poles and lines to give our plaza street a feel of nostalgia? I think we all see the benefit of uncluttering the skys of the cable and poles, but in 5 years will anyone notice, or care? And let’s remember that there are all kinds of other ways we could beautify this city, but let’s focus on that once we have a sustainable budget for our streets, parks, public works, water and waste systems.
My question would be.. why was this not included in the CARA bill that the Federal Goverment was paying for part of this ?? it sounds like the City Councilors thought of this as an after thought and decided to have the citizens of Albany pay for this… All those councilers need to be Flushed (down the toilet if possible)… LOL
No federal funds in CARA projects.