Daniel Kanter

California Voters Embrace Public Power

Among the elections this Tuesday, Californian voters had a proposition on their ballot that is likely to change the way some residents get their power. If approved, Proposition 16 would have required cities to receive two-thirds voter approval to get into the public power business, in spite of ongoing plans for San Francisco to do just that. The Proposition was heavily funded: Pacific Gas and Electric Company spent $46 million on advertising campaigns for the proposition, however opponents raised less than $90,000 and spread their message mostly online and with homemade fliers and small protests. Still, Californian voters rejected the proposition by a 5 point margin. In PG&E’s large service territory, essentially the northern two-thirds of the state, the margin was even greater at almost 16 points.

In a year when political tensions are at an all-time high, can these results be extrapolated to anything more extraordinary than isolated public anger at PG&E? Certainly, PG&E has had their share of PR woes-- from the 2000 release of the Hollywood blockbuster Erin Brockovich, based on the contaminated groundwater in Hinkley that ultimately led PG&E to pay about $650 million in damages, to their 2001 declaration of bankruptcy, to the ongoing upset over the inaccuracy of their so-called “SmartMeters.” The public has reason to be distrustful and dismayed at the company’s behavior. But despite customer dissatisfaction, the arguments to be made for public power aren’t terribly strong by regular voter standards: namely, many have projected (including the San Francisco Chamber of Commerce) that public power would translate to an increase in power costs. Californians were also working against the state’s history of rejecting 12 public power ballot measures since the 1920s.

It’s possible that the lure of green energy helped public power’s case because the San Francisco plan calls for 51% of power coming from renewable sources by 2017, higher than PG&E’s goal. But perhaps the resounding rejection of Prop 16 has broader implications about voters’ negative feelings toward big business, even when public option solutions don’t necessarily translate to monthly savings for consumers.

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Posted at 4:57 PM, Jun 10, 2010 in
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