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David Nahai chosen to head up the DWP; proposes rate increases

Posted by: Aqua Blog Maven on October 30, 2007 at 2:12 pm

LADWP general manager Ron Deaton has announced that he will be retiring from his position in December. Here’s the news from a different angle.

From the Owens Valley Committee website:

Mayor Villaraigosa has chosen H. David Nahai, who served as a Board of Water and Power commissioner for two years, to become the new general manager. His appointment is subject to Los Angeles City Council approval.

Nahai has visited the Owens Valley several times to consider local water policy issues during his service as a DWP commissioner, and has garnered a reputation locally for detailed knowledge of the issues and for a patient–but wary–ear for residents’ comments and questions.

He has gained a reputation for pithy and humorous observations as well, such as his rewording of William Mulholland’s 1913 speech regarding the diversion of the Owens River.

“There it is,” Nahai said at the Owens River rewatering ceremony in 2006. “Take it back.”

To read the full article and visit the Owens Valley Committee website, click here.

The Los Angeles Times article adds this:

The City Council still must vote to confirm Nahai, who spent two years as a Villaraigosa appointee on the five-member, volunteer Board of Water and Power Commissioners, which oversees the DWP.

As he stood next to the mayor, Nahai vowed to put the utility at the forefront in the development of renewable energy sources, such as solar and wind. “I see the bright promise of greening this utility . . . and having Los Angeles become the center, and the leader, for renewable energy,” he said.

Nahai said he would assemble a DWP management team to specifically focus on renewable energy. And he promised to develop a “water contingency plan” within 30 days to help the utility respond to the statewide drought. That plan will offer ways to impose higher rates on the biggest water users to encourage conservation, he said.

“I believe we have to start to plan for a long dry spell,” he said.

To read the full text of the article from the LA Times, click here.

Those rate increases would be substantial, according to this editorial from the Los Angeles Times:

… the DWP is seeking significant — and perhaps continuing — rate hikes for both water and power. The department wants a 2.9% increase in electricity rates Jan. 1, followed a mere six months later with an increase of the same size, then an additional 2.7% on July 1, 2009. For water, it is asking for a 3.1% increase July 1, then another 3.1% on July 1, 2009.

The Los Angeles Times has an editorial generally supporting Nahai and the proposed rate increases, but feels more oversight is necessary:

Under the circumstances, the rate increases the department has proposed are measured, and they are warranted. The City Council should approve them.

But residents must remain vigilant. The Board of Water and Power Commissioners was once made up of civic leaders whose job was to keep a wary eye on City Hall. Today, they are insiders, close to the mayor who appointed them and who is now “asking” them to hire Nahai — their former board president and a man with very little management experience to be running a utility of the complexity of the DWP. We are relieved that Nahai must also face City Council confirmation.

Nahai, for his part, was on the right track when he called Monday for a committee of two Water and Power commissioners to oversee how the increased revenue is spent. But the suggestion doesn’t go far enough. It makes sense that residents even further outside the city structure take that role. Just as citizen oversight panels pick over every penny of bond funds the city spends, a similar panel should oversee DWP spending. The rate hikes would give the agency the money it needs; the panel would ensure it is spent as promised.

To read the full text of the editorial from the Los Angeles Times, click here.

However, Mayor Sam’s Sister City blog takes a different view:

Nahai will take the reins of a bloated, inefficient, and wasteful example of government, sinking fast. First on Nahai’s list of tasks, is selling a “Snake Oil” of a proposal to raise water and electric rates. This, as the Mayor and Nahai will want you believe, is to help the utility upgrade its aging infrastructure. Further, your increased rates would provide the “investment base” to pay for a “Greener and Kinder DWP”. Yet, cynics will opine on who will benefit from these investments.

On the theme of cynics, especially “Valley Cynics”, Los Angeles Times Davis Zahniser has a story on a DWP proposal to restructure rates based upon geographical location. This will surely spark dialog. Especially when people find that the valley will get a cut in their bills. Could this be a “Kilowatt of a Carrot” to help sell the rate hikes ?

Whatever way the DWP “glows and flows” so does the direction of the city. Yet hours to the north, winds spread the toxic dust of past deeds that still await their “day of reckoning”.

To read the full text of Mayor Sam’s Sister City blog, click here.

October 30, 2007 · Filed Under LA DWP, Water Agency News (all)

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