Utilities CEO Jerry Forte

Colorado Springs Utilities has created a covert group to silence any questions about its management, including questions from Mayor Steve Bach, according to City Councilman Tim Leigh.

But the city-owned utility has a different explanation about the group and its mission.

“The effort being referred to is a team of existing employees who, as part of their normal responsibilities, are focused on ensuring the community and our customers are informed about current utilities discussions that affect them,” Utilities spokeswoman Nikki Richardson said in an email.

“We are ramping up our outreach efforts to meet an increased demand for information. This team works to provide proactive, reponsive (sic) communication, which is not outside what we normally do,” she said.

Leigh said the team is a special working group “to defeat questions and questioners who voice alternative views to CSU’s management.”

“I have been told that such a group exists and that their function is to defeat the mayor (and anyone else who speaks out) against CSU policy and that this working group is designed especially in context of the coming city council election,” Leigh wrote in his electronic newsletter.

“While I don’t mind political opposition, I do mind it, if it is being paid for with ratepayer dollars,” he wrote.

The allegation is likely to be flushed out today at the Utilities Board meeting, which starts at 1 p.m. The meeting is on the fifth floor in the south tower of the Plaza of the Rockies.

Here is the full, unedited text of Leigh’s newsletter:

I have been considering the CSU budget over the past few weeks and at this time, I don’t plan to support the budget because, as presented it’s a mere marketing piece designed for slick obfuscation.  Furthermore, as part of the conversational process, I plan to ask for separate votes (bifurcation) on the budget detail relating to public relations, advertising, charitable giving and the Neumann spend.

I believe the average ratepayer would like to know what purpose robust public relation, advertising and charitable giving programs serve with respect to their municipally-owned monopoly.  Therefore, I think it would be instructive for leadership to deliver a line-by-line itemization of the rationale for each program and its’ spend, delineating specifically the expected (and actual) rate-of-return for each.

Furthermore, I’d like to inspect the Neumann spend more thoroughly.  I’d like to see a line-by-line itemization of that spend, including following the distribution of money from CSU to the vendor, account-by-account, from the project’s inception, by date, amount and purpose and, I’d like to see the cost and who paid for the validation of the Neumann process.  (An arm’s length forensic audit would be acceptable.)

Does Neumann’s system work?  I’ve been told NO.  Others, including CSU management say yes.  Because of that uncertainty, I’d like to see the 3^rd party verification.

– Does 3^rd party verification exist?

– Who performed the research?

– Was the research done to validate a predetermined conclusion?

If management is so certain that the Neumann system works, are they willing to individually stand-by the process, including accepting responsibility if it fails to perform to expectation?  We’re already aware of one failure in the Neumann grand plan – there are no customers willing to buy the system providing the promised pie-in-the-sky income.  (There are no fish under the ice!)

My position on the Neumann spend has been unwavering.  We need to stop-the-spend [now] until a full inspection the CSU system is completed and until we’ve finally determined Drake’s fate.

We know we have existing environmental compliance issues costing millions beyond the Neumann scrubber.  We also know of threatened law suits from radical environmental groups and now with Obama’s reelection we can legitimately surmise both threats will amplify.  What we don’t know is our long-term ability to pay for these increasing external threats.  I have asked on several occasions about our aggregate borrowing power and the assumptions that were used in determining that borrowing power.  [Consider buying a house.  You like the house.  You think you can afford the house.

You apply for the loan and (in spite of your good intention) are turned down because your current payments exceed your ability (not your willingness) to borrow the money needed to buy the house.]  While I don’t know that that is the case in our case, I’d like to have a clear answer with data supporting the conclusion.   I would like to know what revenue streams were used to determine our long-term borrowing power.  [We’re not building-out Banning Lewis; our population growth is flat; we’re going to lose income when the military installations get to “net zero”.]  Show me the potatoes.

Lastly, and this is very troublesome, I’d like to know if there exists’ a special “working group” within the CSU system designed as to defeat questions and questioners who voice alternative views to CSU’s management?  I have been told that such a group exists and that their function is to defeat the Mayor (and anyone else {little Timmy Leigh from Grand Forks, North Dakota comes to mind}) who speak-out against CSU policy and that this working group is designed especially in context of the coming city council election.  While I don’t mind political opposition, I do mind it, if it is being paid for with ratepayer dollars.