BY MARK SCHUMANN

While serving as editor of the Vero Beach Newsweekly, a Scripps publication, I reported on the proposed sale of Vero Electric to Florida Power & Light, including informing readers of the work City Councilmen Jay Kramer, Richard Winger and others have done to explore options that might be better for all 34,000 customers of Vero Electric.

In mid December, after writing a series of stories exploring the proposed sale, including analysis of a partial sale, I was instructed by Bob Brunjes, the publisher of Scripps Treasure Coast Newspapers, and the husband of a key FPL executive, to stop reporting on the proposed sale of Vero Electric to FPL.   Uncomfortable with Brunjes’ directive, I resigned from my position with the Scripps Newsweekly, and am now publishing InsideVero.com.

Any news organization would do well to seek to live up to the Scripps motto, “Give people light and they will find their own way.”  However, when information is withheld, slanted, or served up to please advertisers, a public trust is breached.

Call me skeptical, but I don’t believe for a minute the timing of FPL’s “work day” at a local nonprofit yesterday was anything more than an attempt to gain favorable publicity less than a week ahead of next Tuesday’s referendum.

In FPL’s search for favorable free publicity, the Press Journal was more than willing to oblige.  On the front page of the local section today the newspaper ran a story and a large photo helping FPL cast itself as a responsible corporate citizen.  There was, however, no mention of the fact that FPL’s parent company, NextEra Energy, managed to avoid paying any federal corporate income taxes last year.

After enumerating no less than four “critical factors” obscuring the search for clarity in the question of whether to sell Vero Electric to Florida Power & Light under the terms currently proposed, the Press Journal editorial board, in a puzzling twist of logic, concluded, “Despite these concerns, voters should approve the referendum.”

Given that those “critical factors” include a near-certain delay of the closing until late 2016, if ever, a vote to approve the proposed sales contract will, quite simply, lead to higher electric rates for at least four more years.

Advising voters to approve the flawed sales contract, with all its many contingencies, is much like telling a headache sufferer to shoot himself.

Not since my then teenage daughter offered what seemed to her like a plausible explanation for entering our home through her bedroom window have I heard such tortured logic.

Though proponents of the deal would have voters believe otherwise, next Tuesday’s referendum is not a choice between selling the city’s electric system under the terms currently proposed, or of suffering ahead with high electric rates.

There is at least one alternative to accepting a flawed deal that will for all intents and purposes leave the city empty handed, namely a sale of the city’s 22,000 county customers.  Such a “partial sale” could be concluded much sooner than late 2016, and would lead to lower rates for everyone.

Press Journal columnist Russ Lemmon, utility activist Glenn Heran and the City Council troika of Tracy Carroll, Craig Fletcher and Pilar Turner seek to characterize opponents of the proposed sales agreement as “old guard” reactionaries who want to hold on to the power plant.  Nothing could be farther from the truth.

After speaking at length with Councilmen Jay Kramer, Richard Winger, supporters of the political action committee Voices for Vero, and others, it is clear to me their greatest concern is that voters are being asked to approve a deal that will not lead to lower rates any time soon, if ever.

Following FPL’s lead, Heran’s group, Citizens for a Brighter Future, the Council troika of Carroll, Fletcher and Turner, the County Commission, the Chamber of Commerce, the Taxpayers Association and the Press Journal editorial board, are all leading the voting public to believe there are no alternatives to accepting a deal which will lead to higher rates for at least four more years.

In fact, the deal as it is currently proposed may never close.  The city has long-term contractual obligations with the Florida Municipal Power Agency, obligations the transactional attorneys, after billing the city some $1 million in legal fees, have yet to resolve.

Rather than chasing the FPL rabbit down a dead end street, the city could sell its 22,000 county customers.  Because FPL is salivating at the prospect of acquiring 34,000 customers at what amounts to a fire-sale price, the utility giant is willing to wait four years, and certainly doesn’t mind gambling at the city’s expense.  Consequently, none of those who seem to be taking their lead from FPL have been willing to give serious consideration to, or reporting on a partial sale.

For all their criticism of the performance of previous Council’s in managing Vero Electric, Carroll, Fletcher and Turner are asking voters to approve a purchase and sale agreement that will stand as a monument to the fact that governments are even less competent at selling businesses than they are at running them.

Voters should avoid getting caught up in the group think of those who are doing FPL’s bidding, and should instead reject the sale of Vero Electric under the terms currently proposed.  There is a better way forward.  Voting “NO” next Tuesday is only way to force the Council troika to explore other, better options.