By Greg Lavelle
(Editor’s note: Lavelle is Senate Minority Whip. Click here to read the viewpoint piece from Tony DePrima that prompted this rebuttal)
Having been exposed to the sunlight, the Sustainable Energy Utility, in the person of Tony DePrima, has broken out the propaganda to try and convince Delawareans of that there is some ‘utility’ in what the SEU does.
My plan doesn’t involve a choice between clean air and clean water. Delawareans deserve both. My idea presents a choice between using existing funds piling up inside the SEU instead of a regressive income tax that makes our government even costlier, and that would create a separate fund for DNREC to disburse at its pleasure.
Mr. DePrima offers a laundry list of projects undertaken and planned by the SEU, but fails to acknowledge the State Auditor’s report of January 12, 2016, which reads, in part:
“…concerns with the energy conservation measures performed, including changing light fixtures and bulbs, installing new heating and cooling units that proved to be unreliable and improperly installed, and reducing water flow on sinks through the installation of faucet aerators that were eventually removed because they proved to soak employees as they washed their hands. Ongoing monitoring of cost savings for the Legislative Mall Complex project is solely based on calculations using manufacturers’ estimates of energy usage and spot measures of installed equipment. Further, the State’s accounting for the energy funding and contractual payments is so complex, the State will never know whether true cost savings is occurring.”
The report further states that “…the Legislative Mall Complex project alone utilized more than $4.8 million in SEU bond proceeds for construction and will require more than $8 million in repayments over a 20-year period,” and leads the Auditor to ask “…how and why was the State’s best interest subordinated to the interest of the SEU and its partners?”
In addition, Mr. DePrima claims that the Memorandum of Understanding creating the Regional Greenhouse Gas Initiative bans funding of water projects. However, multiple states have diverted RGGI funds for other uses, including New York, who used the money for property tax refunds and college programs, and Connecticut, who has proposed shifting $20 million into the state’s General Fund. Apparently, they didn’t get Mr. DePrima’s memo.
Senator Townsend’s $100 million annual tax increase, which will essentially create a new SEU-type entity for water projects, is wrong as proposed and structured. It is little wonder that Mr. DePrima is apparently eager to raise taxes so as to keep attention and accountability away from his little corner of the world. The SEU board, which is supposed to be oversee the operations of the SEU, has too many members that have political or policy conflicts.
This isn’t a choice between clean air and clean water. Delawareans deserve both. Carbon emissions have dropped drastically in recent years due to the switch to cleaner-burning natural gas. The air is getting better, SEU or no SEU. We can have clean air without a secretive, maverick, quasi-governmental agency trying to own the air.
This is a choice between a $100 million tax increase forced upon people who didn’t create the problem, or using currently available money designated to improve the environment to clean our waterways.
