COMMENTARY

“To borrow two phrases from a recent dissenting opinion by Supreme Court Justice Antinon Scalia, their (Reisman’s and Zahner’s) reasoning is ‘profoundly incoherent,’ and their conclusions little more than ‘jiggery-pokery.'”

MARK SCHUMANN

Reading Press Journal community editor Larry Reisman’s Sunday column, I wondered if he is now being coached by a corporate public relations specialist, perhaps one who works for a major investor-owned utility.

Reisman persists in erroneously claiming the voters of Vero Beach have twice approved referendums on selling their electric system to Florida Power & Light, (Amy Brunjes, wife of Press Journal publisher Bob Brunjes, is a vice president of external affairs with FPL).

It is as if Reisman has embraced a fundamental tenant of effective propagandists. If a falsehood is repeated often enough, they say, the public will eventually believe it to be true.

In 2013, voters were asked to approve a purchase and sale agreement between Vero Beach and FPL. With editorial support from the Press Journal and heavy political spending by FPL, proponents of the sale succeeded in persuading voters to go along with a deal that left several key issues unresolved. That deal is now dead, though FPL refuses to release Vero Beach from a contract which will not expire until Dec. 31, 2016.

The only other referendum to which Reisman could possibly be referring is the fall 2011 vote on leasing the power plant site.  In that referendum voters were asked to approve leasing the power plant to FPL, if a deal could be negotiated that was sufficiently favorable to the city.

With Reisman at the time responsible for the Press Journal’s opinion page, the newspaper editorialized in favor of passage of the referendum. Voters were assured they were not being asked to approve a sale to FPL, but only to give their blessing to “continuing the conversation.”

Concurrently, the same talking point was repeated in a flood of FPL political mailers and advertisements placed in the Press Journal. Today, though, Reisman continues to insist the 2011 vote was a clear mandate to sell the electric system.

Reisman’s latest column includes another puzzling assertion. He seems to join island weekly reporter, Lisa Zahner, in believing that if Vero Beach had negotiated a wholesale power agreement with FPL back in 2008, rather than with the Orlando Utilities Commission, the customers of Vero Electric would now enjoy rates comparable to those charged by FPL.

To borrow two phrases from a recent dissenting opinion by Supreme Court Justice Antinon Scalia, their reasoning is “profoundly incoherent,” and their conclusion is little more than “jiggery-pokery.”

In response to Vero Beach’s 2008 request for bids to supply the city with two-thirds of its wholesale power needs, FPL was the second lowest bidder behind the OUC.

Since 2008, the cost of natural gas has plummeted.  This development has been a huge advantage to FPL, which is more reliant on natural gas power generation than is the OUC.

Do Reisman and Zahner really believe, though, that if FPL had a contract to sell power to Vero Beach at rates agreed to in 2008, management at the investor-owned utility would unilaterally offer to sell the city power at today’s prevailing, lower rates?  Again, such a notion is nothing more than, to borrow Justice Scalia’s precise legal term, “jiggery-pokery.”

Finally, Reisman, who previously called for the dismantling of the Florida Municipal Power Agency, persists in believing State Rep. Debbie Mayfield will eventually persuade her colleagues in the Legislature to break up the FMPA through legislative decree. Such a notion is, again to quote Justice Scalia, “profoundly incoherent.”

In three years of trying to push through FPL-sponsored legislation to move forward the sale of Vero Electric, Mayfield has yet to steer so much as a single bill out of committee.

This so-called legislative solution seems to be what Brunjes was referring to in a quote Reisman attributed to her. “We clearly have concerns with the way the (request-for-proposal) process is structured and really see little in that process that will help Vero Beach achieve that goal (lower electric bills). We believe there are other options to lower bills for the city and we want to work with the city to move in that direction.”

Really? According to the city’s special utility counsel, Schef Wright, in a series of meetings held over many months FPL has failed to put forward any specific proposals for concluding the sale.

Reisman’s pronouncements, which are likely little more than a recitation of FPL’s position, reveal that the utility giant’s strategy is to hope against hope the Legislature will be both bold and crazy enough to dismantle the FMPA, and all for the benefit of Vero Beach.  It is not going to happen.

To the great displeasure of FPL and their cheerleaders, including Reisman and Zahner, what seems likely is that city leaders are going to do what can be done to lower electric rates. Their efforts could well lead to a reduction in rates of as much as 10 percent.

Rather than continue to snipe, belittle and back stab, it’s time for the electric sale’s proponents to support the city council’s efforts to do what can be done to lower rates.