{"id":444101,"date":"2010-03-18T07:02:41","date_gmt":"2010-03-18T11:02:41","guid":{"rendered":"tag:ronkayela.com,2010:\/\/1.995"},"modified":"2010-03-18T11:01:59","modified_gmt":"2010-03-18T15:01:59","slug":"stop-the-dwp-board-from-rubber-stamping-outrageous-rate-hikes-at-an-illegal-meeting","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/mereja.media\/index\/444101","title":{"rendered":"Stop the DWP Board from Rubber-stamping Outrageous Rate Hikes at an Illegal Meeting"},"content":{"rendered":"

The mayor is so desperate to steal your money through outrageous and unjustified DWP rate hikes he has illegally coerced DWP Commissioners and resorted to an illegal “Special Meeting” at 12:30 p.m. today at 111 N. Hope St. to avoid giving 72 hours notice.<\/p>\n

<\/font>There is absolutely no basis for the
\n DWP Board
\nto throw everything including recognition of employee service onto a
\nSpecial Meeting notice with only 24 hours notice.<\/p>\n

The Special Meeting notice is being
\nused for one purpose: to defeat the intent of the Legislature that
\nnormally a public agency must give 72 hours notice of items it will
\nconsider.  The use of the Special Meeting is intended by City Hall to
\nSUPPRESS public participation on one of the largest rate increases in
\nhistory of the City.<\/font><\/font><\/font><\/p>\n

Here’s how Jack Humphreville, head of the DWP Advocacy Committee, recommends how to protest if you can’t get to the DWP by sending this email:<\/p>\n

<\/font><\/p>\n

TO: Forescee Hogan-Rowles
\n<info@cfrc.net>,  <\/span>Jonathan Parfrey
\n<jonathanparfrey@gmail.com>, <\/span>lkalpert@alpertbarr.com, sayles@usc.edu<\/span><\/b><\/p>\n

Commissioners:<\/b><\/p>\n

Without any meaningful review, without adequate hearings, without abiding by the MOU, without any input from or outreach to the Neighborhood Councils, without reducing the amount of coal used, you have sold out the Rate Payers, all for your own self interest.  After all, you wouldn’t want to offend our ethically challenged Mayor.<\/p>\n

Don’t you have any principles?  I hope you can sleep at night.<\/p>\n

Your Name<\/b><\/p>\n

HERE IS A STRATEGY RECOMMENDED BY A LAWYER IF YOU ARE GOING TO THE “SPECIAL MEETING”:

\nEvery person should submit a speaker’s card to speak on every single
\nitem on the agenda including the recognition of service of long time
\nemployees. Why?  Under the Brown Act, in a special meeting — unlike a
\nregular meeting — the public body must allow members of the public to
\nspeak on all items listed on a special meeting agenda.  Here is the
\nlanguage from the Brown Act:<\/p>\n

54954.3(a) last sentence: “Every notice for a special meeting SHALL
\nprovide an opportunity for members of the public to directly address the
\n legislative body concerning any item that has been described in the
\nnotice for the meeting before or during the consideration of that
\nitem.”  This provision implicitly overrides a later provision that
\nallows a legislative body to normally limit the total time for testimony
\n on a particular item or the total amount of time per speaker. That
\nprovision clearly applies when the public got the normal 72 hours
\nnotice.  When the time to organize and get there is only 24 hours under a
\n special meeting notice, the Brown Act trades off the shortened notice
\nto the public with an absolute duty to allow public testimony on every
\nitem on the agenda.<\/p>\n

THEREFORE, all activists going to the DWP meeting tomorrow should submit
\n a public speaker’s card on every item because it is your right.  When
\nyou speak on each item, tell the DWP Board over and over that they have
\nno right under the Brown Act to schedule what is OBVIOUSLY the content
\nof a Regular meeting agenda on a 24 hour Special Meeting notice.  It
\ncommunicates to the public the disdain the Board has for public
\ntestimony — especially on all the items thrown on the Special meeting
\nagenda that will result in massive rate increases on the public.<\/p>\n

Why would the recognition of an employee be placed upon the agenda of a
\nSpecial meeting.  It is totally routine business as is almost everything
\n on the DWP’s Board agenda EXCEPT for the huge rate increases.<\/p>\n

Say it over and over on each item and if the City makes the mistake of
\ncutting off everyone’s time to speak by the time they get to the rate
\nincreases, you will have laid the groundwork for an interesting Brown
\nAct lawsuit you can use to OVERTURN the rate increases because the City
\nfailed to afford the right of public testimony on each item on a Special
\n Meeting agenda.<\/p>\n

Just keep hammering and hammering on the gross abuse of the Special
\nMeeting agenda to squelch public testimony and public participation.<\/font><\/p>\n

HERE IS THE LIST OF RATE HIKE ITEMS:
<\/b><\/font><\/font><\/p>\n

22.(Recommended by Chief Operating Officer and Chief Financial Officer)
(Approved by Interim General Manager)<\/p>\n

Resolution authorizing modification of the Energy Cost Adjustment
Factor Cap of the Electric Rate Ordinance, General Provision G.7,
from 0.1 cent per kilowatt hour to 0.8 cent per kilowatt hour,
effective April 1, 2010.<\/p>\n

23.(Recommended by Chief Operating Officer and Chief Financial Officer)
(Approved by Interim General Manager)<\/p>\n

Resolution recommending amendment of Electric Rate Ordinance
No. 180127, to restructure the residential tiered electric rate
to encourage energy conservation during peak power usage, effective
July 1, 2010 and July 1, 2011.<\/p>\n

Council approval by ordinance is required.<\/p>\n

24.(Recommended by Chief Operating Officer and Chief Financial Officer)
(Approved by Interim General Manager)<\/p>\n

Resolution approving the estimated expenditures for fuel, purchased
power, demand-side management, and renewable portfolio standard
expenditures to be included in the Energy Cost Adjustment Factor for
the 12-month period commencing April 1, 2010 ($0.0080\/kWh Cap)<\/p>\n

25. Motion regarding the creation of a Ratepayer Advocate Function and
Position within the Office of the City Controller.

Note: Te largest contributor to the Controller’s recent campaign was
the IBEW! $250,000.  The IBEW contributed almost $1,000,000 to Yes
on Measure B.
 <\/i><\/b>
26.(Recommended by Chief Operating Officer, Chief Financial Officer,
and Senior Assistant General Manager – Water System)
(Approved by Interim General Manager)<\/p>\n

Resolution recommending amendment of the Water Rates Ordinance to
modify General Provision R, Shortage Year Rates, and the Second Tier
water rates specified in the Ordinance to fully include water
procurement costs in the rates to encourage conservation on a
year-round basis, and to reflect the actual costs of water to LADWP.<\/p>\n

Council approval by ordinance is required.<\/p>\n

<\/p>\n

<\/div>\n

<\/p>\n

<\/div>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

The mayor is so desperate to steal your money through outrageous and unjustified DWP rate hikes he has illegally coerced DWP Commissioners and resorted to an illegal “Special Meeting” at 12:30 p.m. today at 111 N. Hope St. to avoid giving 72 hours notice. There is absolutely no basis for the DWP Board to throw […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":4290,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[7],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-444101","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-news"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/mereja.media\/index\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/444101","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/mereja.media\/index\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/mereja.media\/index\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/mereja.media\/index\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/4290"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/mereja.media\/index\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=444101"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/mereja.media\/index\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/444101\/revisions"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/mereja.media\/index\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=444101"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/mereja.media\/index\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=444101"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/mereja.media\/index\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=444101"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}