Socorro Electric Coop board finally holds a (mostly) open meeting

After hemming and hawing, claiming it was "impossible" and "unworkable", and that it was simply "ludicrous" that the public (i.e. member-owners) could actually attend a board meeting, the Socorro Electric Coop met on Wednesday, July 28th, and - in essence - proved themselves wrong. They finally acquiesced to follow the Open Meetings Act (at least in part) for one meeting, knowing full well that their attorney's ploy to intimidate the member-owners by suing all 10,000 of them was apt to fail both from a legal perspective and, perhaps more importantly, from a public relations perspective. Note to self: if you want to win friends and influence people, start by not suing the entire town and surrounding county. Second note to self: don't claim it's impossible to hold open meetings when cities, towns, and counties across the US and, indeed, across the world, do it all the time.

Closed "executive session" for discussion of law suit

Editor's note: this section has been corrected from a previous version which stated that the board voted to try to rescind the law suit. We made that claim on the basis of SEC board president Paul Bustamante's statement that the board "wanted to seek mediation." It appears that Bustamante's comment was merely an expression of what he wished could happen but not a statement that the board intended to pursue this route. This is probably a recognition, on the part of the board and its attorney, that the responses to the suit, which have already been registered with the court, prevent the suit from being dropped.

According to Paul Bustamante, SEC board president, the board would have liked to seek "mediation" instead of pursuing the suit. Unfortunately, it's difficult - perhaps impossible - for the genie to be put back into the bottle; in order to withdraw the suit, apparently, all of the people or organizations that have formally responded to the suit must withdraw their responses and any counter-claims. This, presumably, includes not only the current responses, but any future responses that may be forthcoming and entered prior to the deadline. It is not clear, at all, that the responders would have been willing to withdraw their responses, which would have made it impossible to drop the suit. It appears that this fact has been recognized by the board, and they are resigned to going forward with their ill-advised plan to sue all of the members of the coop.

What's wrong with mediation?

Although it appears that the board will not be able to wiggle out of the suit by trying to get the member-owners to agree to mediation, it still merits a brief discussion. Mediation is a nice idea, in principle. In many disputes, if you can find a legitimately neutral party to serve as an honest broker, disputes may be resolved before going to court and incurring legal expenses. Unfortunately, in this particular situation, mediation does not really make sense for several reasons.

First, mediation is a technique for resolving things that are in dispute. While the board may wish that the new bylaws passed at the SEC annual meeting are "in dispute", and in fact they may dispute them in their own hearts and minds, the fact of the matter is that the bylaws were passed by a quorum of voting members at the annual meeting, and they are in effect. That's the law. One cannot mediate things that are "law" - for example, one could not go into mediation for a speeding ticket. If you were speeding, you broke the law; no mediation is appropriate. The judge may give you a warning, probation, a fine, or any number of consequences as punishment, but you are not free to ignore speed limits because you personally don't like them. No mediation can occur for factual matters such as the bylaws. Mediation is for things that are unclear or matters of opinion.

The second problem with mediation is that one of the main purposes and goals of mediation is to avoid legal fees and keep things out of the courts, if at all possible, This can often be a good goal, because it avoids legal fees. Unfortunately, the SEC board has already incurred large attorney's fees to Mr. Dennis Francish for his poor legal advice. The board, under the direction of Mr. Francish, has already put things into the legal arena and filed suit. So, one of the main points of mediation, to avoid legal fees, has already been rejected by the board. Mr. Francish may well be planning his next vacation, with SEC members - you and me - picking up the tab by way of the fees he will receive for suing us. So, to now try to use mediation, does not necessarily make sense. Mediation might have been appropriate before the suit, although even then the bylaws cannot be mediated; they must be obeyed.

Clarification, not mediation?

What may be necessary is a process by which the new bylaws are clarified. This does not mean that they will be voided or disputed - if an attempt is made to dispute them, then the board needs to be recalled - but it would be useful to go through, for example, the New Mexico Open Meetings Act and tweak the language slightly in a handful of places to make it more explicit for the Coop. This is mainly because some of the language in the NM Open Meetings Act is geared towards governmental bodies. It's not at all difficult or "unworkable" to tweak this language and remove references or language which is geared towards government organizations, replacing it with language geared towards the Coop. It's not rocket science. Presumably, this is the kind of thing that an attorney who was actually working for the members would do; unfortunately, Dennis Francish does not appear to be up to the job.

Other coop business

In other coop business, the board approved disbursement of capital credits to the heirs of several deceased member-owners. They approved the purchase of some cardiac response equipment to be carried in SEC trucks, at an expense of approximately $20,000. The board discussed progress on several existing projects, including new transmission lines west of Magdalena.

Of particular interest to member-owners, the board mentioned that a rate increase will be proposed in the coming months and that public hearings will be held to "explain the need" for such rate increases. The redistricting committee - which has drawn up some tentative districts to partition the SEC territory into 5 approximately equal districts of around 2,000 members each - discussed its findings, and board member Charlie Wagner objected that the committee was not formed properly, in that the committee members were not voted on by the full board. He also voiced concern that the redistricting should be performed by a "neutral" group rather than a committee of existing trustees, to avoid any appearance of impropriety or "gerrymandering" by incumbents.

Yet more restraining orders?!

The board also voted on a motion by SEC trustee Milton Ulibarri to request that the board's attorney pursue a restraining order against SEC member-owner James Padilla, for comments Mr. Padilla made at a SEC reform meeting at the Socorro Public Library, in June. Mr. Padilla was quoted as saying, "I'd like to take a 2x4 to their heads" in reference to the members of the SEC board of trustees. I personally attended the meeting in question, and can confirm that the statement was, indeed, made. There is also an audio tape that has surfaced, also corroborating this fact.

My personal opinion - and it is just that, opinion, as nobody but Mr. Padilla really knows what he meant - is that Mr. Padilla's comment was hyperbole or a figure of speech to emphasize frustration, but not intended literally (i.e. as a threat). I suspect most of the folks in attendance at the meeting, if polled, would have the same feeling. I don't believe anyone took Mr. Padilla's comments to be a threat to the SEC board; if we had thought his comments were meant literally, we'd probably have notified the authorities ourselves. Having said that, Mr. Padilla's comments were, at the very least, in poor taste and he should have chosen better words to express his frustration.

In further discussions of the motion, trustee Charlie Wagner objected and said that the restraining order, if any, should be pursued by individual board members such as Mr. Ulibarri, not by the board itself. Mr. Wagner was in the minority, as the board voted by a 3 to 2 margin, with several board members abstaining, to recommend pursuing a restraining order against Mr. Padilla. However, despite the 3 to 2 vote, the SEC attorney concluded that a majority of the board (which would mean 6 of the 11 board members) was necessary to pass the motion, so the vote ultimately failed. It remains to be seen if Mr. Ulibarri will pursue this matter privately with the Socorro Police Department.

Things that make you say, "hmm"

In the "things that make you say, 'hmm'" category, I noted that the board mentioned, in passing, that the electric rate charged to individual members is higher than the rate charged to small businesses, which is higher than the rate charged to large businesses and organizations. So, the small guys are subsidizing the big guys, in essence. You and I, the little guy, are paying higher rates so that local hotel owners (as one example) might pay lower rates and make higher profits. It's amazing in this country how the "free market" is stacked to favor the wealthy, while the wealthy always claim that they "pulled themselves up by their bootstraps" and got where they were from "hard work." If our country wants to maintain a middle class, we should reexamine institutional policies which transfer wealth from poor folks to rich folks. I can hear what some people are thinking: "this is just a volume discount like one might get at Costco or Sam's Club" - however, this logic doesn't (or at least shouldn't) apply to electricity, as the Coop should be encouraging conservation not increased usage.