Letter from the Executive Director

The year was 2004. Joe Tondu, a power plant developer originally from Michigan and now based in Texas, had honed his sights on New Carlisle, Indiana, a small town outside of South Bend. Undeterred by his recent unsuccessful attempt to site a conventional coal plant in Manistee, Michigan, he began to spin the benefits of coal gasification to local officials, unions, and businesses in the South Bend area. Unbeknownst to Joe, he was about to run into a community-organized buzz saw. The citizens of New Carlisle rallied to protect their property values, their water supply, their air quality, and the concept of sustainable development. They rose to the occasion with fierce, but thoughtful, determination and stopped Mr. Tondu in his tracks, very thoughtful determination.

Driving into South Bend to attend one of a number of County Council hearings on the issue, I tuned into a local radio station. Within minutes, music to my ears – the citizens group, now known as Michiana Quality of Life, was running radio commercials against the plant. They had raised money to mount a paid media campaign. I felt a huge grin developing across my face. When I arrived at the meeting the room and most of the hallway were packed. Literally, hundreds of people carrying ping pong paddle-sized signs with question marks on them. Since they weren’t allowed to speak at this hearing, the members of Michana Quality of Life held these signs in view of their elected officials the entire time. And they definitely had questions – that they answered constructively and systematically.

MQL was always well organized. They sought and gained expertise from Notre Dame on the water volume impacts that plant would have. They researched Joe Tondu and communicated with the citizens of Manistee who also defeated his attempts. They were always well prepared and had all angles of the issue covered in testimony. And they had their paid media campaign. At the not so important meetings 200 people would show up. At the important ones 500 attended consistently.

CAC coordinated its strategy with MQL. The CAC canvass rolled into swing districts and generated hundreds of letters to the fence-sitters. Joe Tondu set himself up with erroneous statements about the plant’s rate impacts that CAC took advantage of in the press. It was a well-orchestrated, intelligent campaign. We created a truly symbiotic relationship with MQL. Among the positive results was that Michiana Quality of Life remained intact to work on sustainable economic development in the region.

Please join us on November 7, 2009 to celebrate, as we explore, effective citizen action at CAC’s annual meeting. If you’ve ever wanted to do more, this moment belongs to you. This is an opportunity for you to enjoy learning more about the work we at CAC do every day; and how all of us, working together with hope, determination and principled advocacy, can reclaim our rights and responsibilities as citizens!

Thank you again for your many years of support.

Grant Smith
CAC Executive Director

Click here to read the full 2009 Annual Report in PDF format.

Letter from the Executive Director

Leaving Energy Policy to those who think on a quarterly basis is threatening the economy and driving global warming to the point of no return.

We have sacrificed jobs, public health and household budgets on behalf of the fossil fuel and nuclear industries. The US was at the pinnacle of wind turbine technology. Now Denmark, Germany and Spain are dominating the market. The US was the top solar panel producer in the work. Now the Japan and Germany have thriving solar industries. Much of the US capacity is exported. Why is this? These countries seized on the economic and environmental opportunities inherent in these technologies by adopting public policies to drive renewable markets in their respective countries. The US? The US gravitated to business as usual, driven by the political and economic influence of the fossil fuel and nuclear industries.

Once considered the engine of our economic prosperity, fossil fuels have become the ball and chain dragging the economy into the doldrums and the bane of the planet. Nuclear and coal-fired power plants have become excessively expensive subprime, toxic assets, with the legacy cost of the former being high level nuclear waste and the legacy cost of the latter being global warming. Taken together, nuclear and coal-fired power represents an extremely ominous duo of doom. Unfortunately, they compromise roughly 70% of our electric generating capacity, while renewable energy and energy efficiency are relegated to the position of window dressing.

Fortunately, there is a way out of this mess. Another reason for optimism is that the public (in Indiana and nationally) support the alternative, the alternative being the systematic phase out of nuclear and fossil fuels and the phase in of efficiency and renewables, advanced storage technologies, distributed generation technologies and electric vehicles.

CAC began to explore this enormously beneficial approach to economic development and vastly improved environmental quality as part of The CLEAN.org (Citizens Lead for Energy Action Now) coalition. The hub of the effort is the Civil Society Institute based in the Boston area. Civil Society Institute convened a series of meetings with state and local groups fighting power plants and unimaginable mining methods (mountaintop removal for instance) to map out a platform for the phasing out of coal and nuclear plants and the phase in of clean energy and energy efficiency on a large scale.

CAC sought to add meat to the CSI platform by suggesting to the group to embrace the Institute of Energy and Environmental Research’s report called “Carbon Free Nuclear Free: A Roadmap for US Energy Policy.” In it, Arjun Makhijani, director of IEER, describes a systematic approach to a brighter energy future.

The Civil Society Institute has provided excellent leadership and generous resources to the effort in the form of support for organizers, media hits and policy development.

The next stage is developing a presentation that the regional organizers can give and train others to present. In essence, we would be picking up where Al Gore left off. That is, he educated the public as to the problem of global warming and its implications while CLEAN will educate the public as to the solution and its implications.

The biggest barriers will be the usual suspects and the mentality that the construction of new coal-fired power and nuclear power plants are absolutely necessary, which is, in large part, due to industry spin.

If we are to make utility bills affordable, economically and effectively address global warming and create the green jobs we need to, the electric grid of the future will have to consist of renewables and advanced storage technology coupled with extensive and comprehensive deployment of energy efficiency technologies.

This year the annual meeting will explore this option and jumpstart the discussion of moving US and Indiana energy policy in a direction we can all embrace and be proud of.

Grant Smith
CAC Executive Director

Click here to read the full 2008 Annual Report in PDF format.

Letter from the Executive Director

The latest round of local elections may have provided us with an important lesson in the public’s state of mind and politics in general.

Voter ire over property taxes sent many incumbents packing. Although the General Assembly caused the spike in residential property taxes by eliminating the inventory tax on business, the local elections came prior to the state elections and voters felt compelled to act. The message obviously hasn’t fallen on deaf ears among the leadership of the General Assembly. Hearings are underway now designed to arrive at approaches to alleviate the property tax squeeze on homeowner finances.

The lessons learned from the latest election results are very intriguing.

First and foremost, citizens are the real power behind the throne when they want to be, regardless of the financial resources of candidates. For instance, Bart Peterson, the outgoing mayor of Indianapolis, possessed campaign resources roughly ten times as much as his rival and incoming mayor, Greg Ballard. The local power base (including the individuals and institutions it represents) was unable to sway the outcome. No amount of special interest campaign contributions could have stemmed the tide of anti-incumbent feeling of the electorate, whether from developers, utilities, pharmaceutical companies, unions or mega-law firms. The Indianapolis Star’s endorsement of Peterson went for naught, as well. Mayor-elect Ballard did not even enjoy the support of his own party. Clearly, the public decided this election in a decisive manner.

Secondly, the results of the recent election seems to reinforce the perception, often unstated but nonetheless present in the public psyche, that there is really no political leadership at the local, state or federal levels in this country. There is no apparent vision with respect to improving the lives of people in general. There are no proposals that address the issues of the day in any concrete, decisive manner. There is only business as usual, which is at the heart of the recent voter response, and business as usual, in this case, is inimical to democratic values.

The Democrats put out the message “We feel your pain.” The Republicans’ message was: “We can’t imagine how this happened”. Both messages were disingenuous at best because they knew the root cause, i.e. shifting a significant portion of property taxes from businesses to homeowners. And both responses reflect an endemic problem in our public policy processes.

Most elected officials act in a manner suggesting that they are completely disconnected from their constituents and, therefore, the needs of their constituents. The status quo is important to them because it is important to the most financially and politically powerful elements of society. They work to appease those interests out of the public eye as much as possible. Take the example of the property tax issue. Officials worked under the guise of “economic development” or “job growth” but were merely satisfying the economic interests of the most powerful and entrenched interests. However, in this instance, their actions struck decisively the wrong cord with their constituents.

Third, with few exceptions, elected officials are in power for the sake of being in power, not to exercise that power to the benefit of their constituents or society in terms of furthering the values of justice, equality, and the pursuit of happiness. They all receive their contributions from the same sources and, as a result, are unwilling or unable to break the cycle of policy making based on shortsighted crony capitalism. That is why the differences between the major political parties are unremarkable and why there is a leadership vacuum that extends from Main Street to the halls of Congress.

In the last local election in Indianapolis, the public filled the leadership vacuum. Citizens took matters into their own hands and, without a person or vision to rally around, they sent a strong message to incumbents for whom no real loyalty exists at this time. The same can be said for the major political parties.

Fourth, it can be argued that the property tax issue has become an important issue for the middle class because the financial status of the middle class is under siege by powerful corporate interests. Risk shifting, profit taking and concentration of wealth are the order of the day. Exceedingly high health care costs, rising utility and energy costs, rising property bills, the trend toward regressive taxation, the assault on wages and benefits are all the result of private business plans masquerading as public policy. These financial pressures are destabilizing the middle class and making “affordability” a key issue for households across the nation.

In conclusion, the basic needs of our population, including the opportunity for a meaningful, productive life, cannot be met under the current circumstances. It is now our challenge to create a strong consumer message and engage citizens in their roles as taxpayer, ratepayer, parent, wage earner, and/or homeowner for support of policies that fulfill these basic needs which compromise the foundation of the true public interest. For, in the final analysis, citizens will have to fill the leadership vacuum to redirect our communities, our state, and our country to a more sustainable and prosperous future.

Grant Smith
CAC Executive Director

Click here to read the full 2007 Annual Report in PDF format.

Letter from the Executive Director

Significant change is on the horizon for the nation and Indiana with respect to energy and utility issues. As is usually the case, we have options that can either improve our lives or make our lives more difficult. The status quo is not an option for the immediate future or long term. However, it is adherence to business-as-usual that is the biggest threat to our economic well-being and quality of life. The challenge looming before us is to convince policy makers to deal with reality. What is going for CAC and Indiana is that people appear to be ready for change and looking for a positive vision that can address the financial quandary in which a growing number of middle class households are now finding themselves.

The economic realities of high foreclosure and bankruptcy rates, heating bills and dwindling incomes and benefits are now hitting home to many Americans. Upset with the direction of the country, the nation responded by replacing Republicans with Democrats as the party in power in Congress. In Indiana, the House Representatives changed hands. Similarly, the CAC membership survey conducted from January through May of this year revealed a high degree of concern for heating bills and health care costs. It also revealed support for alternatives such as putting greater emphasis on energy efficiency in our energy policy. The financial squeeze, previously associated primarily with households of more modest means, is now beginning to pervade the middle class.

Throwback policies are not going to work to improve the financial position of our citizens in any context but particularly not on the energy and utility front. They cannot, economically or practically, effectively address the very real issues of affordability, public health, and global warming.

As an example, it is clear that Indiana-based, electric utility companies and the Daniels Administration are not coping with reality. Duke Energy has proposed a new coal-fired power plant whose cost estimates have risen 100% over the last year, from an original estimate of one billion dollars to, recently, two billion dollars. The plant will also add substantially to Indiana’s overall carbon dioxide emissions which analysts believe will be regulated within a few years. Moreover, particulate (soot) emissions will increase, which are costing Hoosiers billions of dollars per year in health care costs. This represents a potentially enormous rate increase to Duke (PSI) residential and business customers. Indeed, the specter of carbon regulations in a state that relies almost exclusively on coal-fired power equates to a substantial financial risk to ratepayers. However, the build-and-burn mentality of the 1950s through 1970s is cemented in institutionally biased utility companies and in an Administration that seems to view coal as the principal means of addressing electric energy demand.

Utilities and a good number of Indiana policy makers have already wasted enough time pretending that coal-fired power is a cheap way to generate electricity and that global warming and regulating carbon emissions is somehow in the realm of science fiction. If we are going to deal up front with the issues of affordability, global warming, and public health, we need a new direction that can effectively address these issues. In other words, we have to deal with economic and environmental realities.

The positive aspect of all this is that we are facing a “grim” reality only to the extent we continue down the same energy path of build-and-burn. We have the technological know-how to address the challenges of global warming, affordability and public health in a cost-effective manner.

As has been in the past, it is CAC’s challenge to bring a clear vision of how we can address those issues in the absence of a clear vision in the public interest emanating from policy makers or self-serving utility companies. It is also our challenge to take the angry public mood that swept the Democrats into power and channel that attitude to positive ends. The public’s apparent support of the Democrats appeared mainly to be due to being upset with the Republicans. However, an angry public with vision is how real social change can occur.

Our task of changing public awareness, which can seem, at times, insurmountable, is being aided by reality filtering through to the public in the mainstream media. The promise of renewable power, the science of global warming, the national urge to become energy independent in the wake of the debacle in Iraq; all these developments facilitate our quest to create a better life for Hoosiers with public policies that shift ratepayer and taxpayer investment to energy efficient and renewable energy technologies.

The tasks in the coming year, as generally the case, will be difficult but are all connected. We are facing four prominent issues with respect to our vision for Indiana.

The first is the coal gasification plant proposed by Duke Energy. The second is the Renewable Electricity Standard we are proposing in coalition with the Indiana Coalition for Renewable Energy and Economic Development. The third is the recent initiative launched by the Indiana Utility Regulatory Commission to investigate the merits of a third party administrator (i.e. our proposed Sustainable Energy Institute) with respect to delivering energy efficiency programs statewide. Lastly, Senator Richard Lugar has asked the members of our renewable energy coalition (ICREED) to provide him with input with respect to public policies that can promote energy efficiency, renewable energy and distributed power in Indiana.

The outcome of the first will determine how the Daniels Administration will treat energy policy going forward. The second will allow us to test the waters with respect to public openness for change. The third could put our vision of energy policy, at least in part, on the map in Indiana. The fourth is a great opportunity to attract public attention to our agenda and leverage legislative support for it, particularly among Republicans.

At the 2006 annual meeting, we will explore strategies that can help us realize our vision of economic and social justice for all Hoosiers in the form of energy policy in the public interest.

We know that there will be resistance to our logical and necessary approach from various quarters. However, the time for positive change is upon us. The public is ready. It is up to us to seize the moment.

Grant Smith
CAC Executive Director

Click here to read the full 2006 Annual Report in PDF format.

Letter from the Executive Director

The most critical issue for a growing number of Hoosier and American consumers today is being able to afford basic necessities. Exorbitant home heating bills and health care costs, coupled with depressed wages, are making it increasingly difficult for consumers to stay within household budgets. The erosion of our sense of community and commitment to economic justice has endangered what was taken for granted less than a generation ago.

Our international trade policy is designed to suppress wages. Our domestic economic policy is designed to eliminate worker rights and benefits tied to basic human services, such as health care. The lack of commitment to social security and pensions may force millions of baby-boomer retirees into poverty or back into the workforce. If these trends continue, it is inevitable that middle class wage earners will become subsistence wage earners. It is foreseeable that health care will be affordable only to upper income households and that utility customers will have to present a pre-paid credit card in order to receive and maintain utility service.

How could this happen? How can the richest nation in the world abandon its commitment to providing its citizenry with basic needs? What happened to the chicken-in-every pot attitude that lifted millions of Americans into middle class status and cleared the way for a comfortable retirement?

I have reached the same conclusion as many others: The fundamental problem is that public policy has become private policy. Our economy and public policy are driven by short term profit motives of Wall Street. Instead of a socially responsible society looking to secure a better future for the generation to come, we have become a bottom-line society interested only in preserving the stock price of politically powerful corporations. As demonstrated so blatantly by the Bush Administration, Congress, state legislatures and regulatory bodies across the country, this is the era of crony capitalism. The “Gilded Age” has re-emerged. Short term thinking, so inimical to our economic and environmental survival, pervades the entire realm of public policy.

Now is the time to refocus our attention to making economic and social justice the foundation of our public policies. “Wedge issues”, such as intelligent design and gay marriage, must take a back seat to affordable utility bills, affordable health care, secure retirement, and living wages. We must unite in our common interest to live comfortably yet responsibly. There is enough to go around if we make the right choices. But, the necessary changes will not occur until the public reasserts itself in the public policy process.

This reality is why we have dedicated our 2005 annual meeting to a discussion of building citizen leaders in Indiana. The idea is to turn the daily struggle to make ends meet, with seemingly no light at the end of the tunnel, into the successful fight for common sense and justice in the public policy process. The wisdom behind “Let the people lead and the leaders will follow” has never been more relevant than at this point in our history.

Grant Smith
CAC Executive Director

Click here to read the full 2005 Annual Report in PDF format.