What's in it for Entergy?

Quite a deal they all announced this morning.  

🚨BIG WIN FOR THE CITY OF NEW ORLEANS🚨

Promises kept: We are bringing reliable power to the Sewerage and Water Board without increasing rates to customers. https://t.co/TZLrnl71vf

— LaToya Cantrell (@LaToyaForNOLA) June 16, 2021

Made a big to-do about the roll out too. In fact it looked like they might have even put it out to the T-P under an embargo so the story (or the bones of it) could drop on the website  at the same time as the press conference. 

Currently, about half of the S&WB's pumps already are powered by Entergy.This plan would switch over the rest by building a new substation at the Carrollton Plant and installing frequency changers that would convert Entergy's power to the archaic standard used by about half of the S&WB's equipment.

The $75 million deal would be jointly paid for with state money set aside for the plan, city funds through the issuance of bonds and money from Entergy. The S&WB expects to generate savings of $5 to $6 million annually from what S&WB executive director Ghassan Korban said would be a cheaper source of power than the fuel currently used to power the turbines.

Of course it's not like they had to scramble to write up at least a sketch of the plan.  It's actually quite similar to a scheme that was floated back a few years ago.  

The calls to make the switch to Entergy became more urgent after the flooding in the summer of 2017, which was blamed in part on a lack of power. Former Mayor Mitch Landrieu specifically called for making the change as he prepared to leave office.

Despite those discussions, however, the process has moved slowly, beset by issues over funding the equipment needed to make the change. Entergy had originally sought to strike a deal where it would fund the entire project in exchange for permission to make a higher profit, a plan rejected by the City Council.

For more context on how that happened see my prior notes here.  At the time, the City Council, which regulates Entergy's monopoly to sell electricity in New Orleans, was in the middle of a negotiation over a new rate case agreement. This is where the council sets parameters that determine how much money Entergy can charge you for power. The mayor, who is not typically a party to these talks, intervened at the last minute on Entergy's behalf, arguing it should be allowed to charge higher rates to New Orleanians in return for a one time $75 million kickback in the form of a new substation serving S&WB. 

That would have been a bad deal for most New Orleanians. This one, at least so far, appears to be a bit better. Details here via The Lens.

The $74 million will come from three different sources. The initial $34 million investment to build the substation will come from Entergy. The Sewerage and Water Board will then pay Entergy back for that investment over time.

Officials said that the investment should have no impact on the bills of Energy and Sewerage and Water Board customers. Korban said that the new substation will save between $5 million and $6 million a year that would otherwise be spent on generator fuel and maintenance for the aging turbines. Those savings will be used to pay Entergy for the substation.

The second tranche of money will be $20 million in state capital outlay dollars to integrate the substation with the Carrollton plant. 

And last, the city will cough up $20 million from its own budget to install “frequency converters.” Some of the pumps in New Orleans require an antiquated type of electricity that is rarely used today, and is different from the form of electricity provided by Entergy. The “frequency changers” will allow the electricity from Entergy to power those older pumps.

That last $20 million comes from bond sales already approved in a citywide infrastructure ballot measure in 2019.  

So, if they aren't getting higher rates out of the deal, what's in it for Entergy this time?  Well for one thing it looks like they don't really spend any of their own money on the capital.  And, in the long run, they get to sell more power to SWB in perpetuity.  Also, as the sole supplier of power to the public utility, they gain a degree of leverage over the city they didn't have before. One would think that should be enough but, well, we have come to expect differently so keep an eye out.  More details are supposed to be available next week.

Holy hell it is already June

It's been quiet on the Yellow Blog for a few weeks and, I guess, for much of the year. I've been kind of slacking, I realize that. That's not to say I've been off in space or anything. The main point of this blog is basically note taking for stuff that goes on in the news or just things I read and hear in general. Trust me there are plenty of notes. The "drafts" folder here is quite prolific. I just haven't taken the time to sit down and organize them in a while.   That's not a great thing because if I don't process at least a little bit, it starts to feel like I might forget it all. Which.. again.. the main point of this blog is so I don't forget about things that happen. 

And there's a ton of stuff going on right now that I don't want to lose track of.  The legislature is wrapping up today.  I managed to get some of that down a few weeks ago, but things have not improved since.  Most notably, despite being in possession of an historic budget surplus flush with federal money to throw at whatever they like, lawmakers decided to fund a roads and infrastructure program by forcing more cuts to higher ed and health care. 

Today, we learned that they have decided to scrap two years of work toward a plan for automating expungements of criminal records because the State Police said it might cost too much. 

Davis said State Police still weren’t able to afford the proposal. He told legislators last month that  if James’ bill passed his agency might be forced to reduce the size of its next police academy class — a priority for several lawmakers — or cancel the purchase of new police vehicles. 

But lawmakers could have absorbed the entire cost in next year’s budget. The Legislature’s budget plan includes $17 million in unallocated funding that can still be spent. The Supreme Court is also sitting on millions of dollars of reserves that could be used for this purpose if it wanted to do so.

Anyway, there's more, of course. But that's not the only thing.  A bunch of stuff has been going on. Another building is collapsing downtown while we are still figuring out what to do about the last one.   A big municipal election is coming and some of your all time favs are back in the mix. It's hurricane season again and the turbines are.. not ready.  It's June now but the first of July is coming and that is going to be the worst first of the month yet for people facing eviction. 

Also other things! I have to make time to get this stuff in context before it all becomes a big blur and our consciousnesses disintegrate into the wind.  I'm trying.  

Meanwhile, holy hell it is already June. The myrtles are already in bloom and it hardly even feels like we're in 2021 yet.

The pump uprising

The pumps have had enough of our abuse and are starting to turn against us. 

Part of the West End area of Lakeview flooded Wednesday when a Sewerage & Water Board pump worked in reverse, sucking water from Lake Pontchartrain and pumping it into the streets of the residential area, according to our news partners at WWL-TV.

The pump was working in reverse for nearly an hour before it was fixed, WWL-TV reported, citing information from S&WB officials.

We always suspected this day would come.

Is it possible to do less with more?

Now that the "Rescue Plan" bill has passed, it's time to pick around in it and see what we've won.  Of particular interest now will be keeping an eye on state and local politicians to see if they continue pushing for austerity budget cuts even though the stimulus specifically provides funds intended to prevent that from happening. This morning the LA Budget Project calls attention to one provision of the bill meant to head some of this off. 

The law also contains an important provision for states receiving the aid: for every dollar that a state government spends on net tax cuts, it will lose a dollar of federal support. As lawmakers gavel into session next month, they will have an opportunity to make long overdue investments in Louisiana’s people, families and communities instead of providing tax cuts to businesses and the wealthy. This provision provides an incentive to do just that.  Nicholas Johnson of the Center on Budget and Policy Priorities has the details: 

Cutting state taxes now would repeat a mistake many states made in the wake of the Great Recession: they cut taxes, which harmed families, undermined economic growth, and exacerbated economic inequality and racial injustice. Instead, states should address critical health and economic needs by making investments that can help build antiracist, equitable states. To help them do so, the American Rescue Plan Act includes $195 billion in fiscal aid for state governments (and more for schools and for local, tribal, and territorial governments).

They can't use the one time stimulus payments to create new "fiscal cliffs" made out of tax cuts for rich people.  Republicans in some states are already complaining, of course.  But the truth is there will plenty opportunities in the new law for them to steal whatever they want.  This line, in particular, seems like a just such an opportunity. 

(3) TRANSFER AUTHORITY.—A metropolitan city, nonentitlement unit of local government, or county receiving a payment from funds made available under this section may transfer funds to a private nonprofit organization (as that term is defined in paragraph (17) of section 401 of the McKinney-Vento Homeless Assistance Act (42 U.S.C. 11360(17)), a public benefit corporation involved in the transportation of passengers or cargo, or a special-purpose unit of State or local government.

Which suggests that the city of New Orleans, still beset with serious infrastructure challenges, and which has spent the past year threatening layoffs, furloughing workers, and dropping cryptic hints about "shared sacrifice," could still move ahead with its plans to do all of those things while shoveling the federal stimulus funds out the back door to non-profits controlled by the NOLA Business Alliance or Leslie Jacobs, or even Stephen Perry with very little accountability for any of it. Especially interesting thing to watch for just ahead of an election season when people will need paying off.

Whoops!

Looks like they weren't intentional enough about how to do the intentional power shut-offs Tuesday night.  

NEW ORLEANS — When Entergy cut power to customers in the Carrollton and Riverbend areas during Tuesday night's freeze, the Sewerage and Water Board was one of those customers, and a key piece of critical public infrastructure lost power for almost an hour.

New Orleans City Councilwoman Helana Morena said it wasn't supposed to happen. An Entergy spokesman said it was an error on their part.

"It was our water system, our groundwater intake," the councilwoman said. "It was resolved quickly, caught quickly, but in my opinion, it should have never happened to begin with."

The Sewerage and Water Board said it lost power at its Hamilton Station, where motors pump water from the Mississippi River into the Carrollton Water Plant. That water is then treated and sent out to homes and businesses across the city.

A S&WB spokeswoman said the executive director of the water utility, Ghassan Korban, had to call Entergy's CEO David Ellis to complain. Entergy spokesman John Hawkins said it was their mistake.

"Those (electricity) feeders shouldn't have been on that (blackout) list, and they have been removed," Hawkins said. "That was addressed last night, so it won't happen again.

So far it hasn't happened again.  Although, they did threaten to run us through the drill again last night to find out.

NEW ORLEANS — Entergy is asking customers to use less power with another night of freezing temperatures ahead for the New Orleans area.

Freezing weather is causing a critical shortage of electricity in our area. It got so bad Tuesday night that Entergy and Cleco implemented rotating black outs in New Orleans and on the Northshore to preserve the integrity of the power grid.

Notice Entergy has gone out of its way to warn customers expecting to be able to heat their homes in dangerous freezing conditions that this is probably their fault for being so greedy. 

Entergy asked customers to be especially conservative between the normally heavy use times of 5 pm to 10 pm.

"This unusual request is due to the demand for electricity potentially exceeding the available generation due to the extreme cold and weather conditions currently impacting our service territory," said Lee Sabatini, the Entergy New Orleans Communications Director. "Current load forecasts are approaching an all-time peak, even greater than those experienced during the polar vortex of January 2019."

But it isn't your fault. It is theirs. Specifically it is the deregulated US energy market that allows this sort of catastrophic failure to happen in the first place. 

Instead of state agencies regulating the business of monopoly utilities in a centralized manner, deregulated grids create a series of perpetual auctions running across the country. Electricity arrives in your home as the result of nonstop bidding and profit-maximization. Put very simply, does Alice’s natural gas plant generate the next unit of electricity that feeds into the grid, or does it come from Bob’s wind farm? Place your bets, Alice and Bob, and let’s see who wins!

Now imagine that happening every five minutes every single day, twenty-four hours a day. There’s also a separate auction for day-ahead dispatch (who plans to generate it twenty-four hours from now?) and, in most RTOs except for Texas, an auction for reserving some amount of power capacity over a year in advance (who plans to have power available in a year?), a market-based perversion of centralized planning.

If the fundamental objective of a grid is to produce enough electricity to meet demand at all times — in other words, reliability — then how does the deregulated market accomplish it? Not through direct coordination of productive assets but through an endlessly complicated system of auctions, requests, incentives, and price signals. Regardless, the blackouts in Texas prove that it doesn’t always accomplish reliability, just like it didn’t in 2011, the last time extreme weather led to major blackouts in Texas, or last summer in California, to pick only a few examples.

What’s worse, there’s nobody to blame because, hey, the grid operator is just the auctioneer who set up the technocratic process to incentivize private development of those productive assets. With wholesale electricity prices hovering at the $9000/MWh maximum price, about three hundred times the normal price, scarcity of life’s necessities means scarcity price signals to encourage future investment. But with average prices far lower due to increasing gas and wind, it’s not economical for private plant owners to weatherize their plants better. Truly, it’s the invisible hand that keeps your lights on — too bad that hand is just as ephemeral as the electricity that powers them.

Nobody to blame, maybe, but also plenty of customers to blame for.. not knowing how to use an oven?

Staying in from the cold weather may make you want to cook a nice, hot meal. To help conserve energy be sure to cook food at the lowest possible setting and refrain from opening the oven door while baking. More tips at https://t.co/DVdrzhqUOV pic.twitter.com/oY7McSlwyD

— Entergy New Orleans (@EntergyNOLA) February 18, 2021

Anyway, it's this thing where individuals are forced to bear the cost of price spikes in the natural gas and wholesale electricity market and pay for the mistakes and negligence committed by utility companies that is the problem. Not regular people trying to stay warm. 

If your power has been deliberately shut off because we live under a failed neoliberal regime that can't supply life sustaining necessities to people unless corporate entities realize massive profits, don't worry too much. Remember your bill doubled last month because of a "planned outage" that somehow overlapped another unplanned outage or something.  This time all the outages are definitely planned so that shouldn't be a... oh. 

Consumer advocates also voiced concerns that ratepayers will now be looking at another big jump in their energy bills, which spiked in December because of high use and higher rates for importing out-of-state power supply.

"There is no doubt that customers can expect to have really high electricity bills when they get them next month," said Logan Atkinson Burke, executive director of the Alliance for Affordable Energy, a New Orleans-based consumer advocacy group.

She said New Orleans customers are particularly vulnerable to big spikes because the city's antiquated housing stock is among the least energy efficient in the country. New Orleans homes use, on average, 30% more energy than those in other cities.

"Our houses are old and beautiful and historic, but they're leaky," Burke said.

Okay well we get what she is saying here. Obviously there needs to be a massive public investment in weatherizing homes and infrastructure.  That's one important lesson in all of this.  If only there were a policy outline just sitting on the shelf the congress could turn into law tomorrow if it wanted.  Doesn't look like that's happening, though.  In the meantime we'll just sit around in our "leaky" houses tonight trying to resist the urge to bake too much bread.  If the lights go out anyway, surely nobody will blame us.

Domino-like effects

Seeds of Decline "Fights The Futilities" Krewe Du Vieux 2006

So it's come to this

NEW ORLEANS — New Orleans is warning residents that a citywide boil water advisory could occur in the next 24 hours because of water pressure drops caused by freezing water mains under the streets. 

The city is expecting temperatures to be below freezing for about 12 hours, starting at about 3 pm Monday.

Ghassan Korban, the head of the Sewerage & Water Board, said that the utility does not have much of a margin for error with little backup power. 

"Our power and pumping system is vulnerable and (will likely) have challenges," Korban said.

Sounds about right.  Happy Mardi Gras, everybody. Famously, a day of challenges. Like we said the other day, Carnival is a lot of things but most of all it is the time for us to be the most, um, intensely whatever we have been over the past year. And this certainly seems like a way to do that. 

After an explosion last year at one of their main power-generating turbines, S&WB has been operating on a shoestring power budget, with generators picking up the slack. 

This means that if any part of their system gets overloaded and goes down, there could be domino-like effects throughout the city. 

Sure, we remember the turbine explosion almost a year and two months ago.  It kind of put the capper on 2019 which had already featured multiple major street flooding incidents, a city cybersecurity disaster, and a certain hotel collapse downtown* you may have heard about. At the time, we thought that was what a year full of disaster would feel like.  Turned out we didn't know yet. But then a few days later the sewer exploded under the French Quarter and we had a little bit better idea.  

Ha ha I am just kidding.  We actually got a better idea of what a year of disasters was like when the "extreme emergency" of a backed up sewer main under Gentilly was declared immediately after that. Remember that one? No, of course you do not. Because after that came 2020 and... whoo boy. 

Anyway, back to those "domino-like effects" they're worried about now. What do those look like?

One of the most pressing of those is a citywide boil water advisory, which Korban said was more than possible. 

"We are likely to see water mains ... rupture throughout the city," Korban said.

This will likely cause localized boil water advisories and low pressure in various areas throughout the city. 

But if enough pipes freeze, or if a crucial main fails, S&WB could take more drastic preventative measures, such as a citywide advisory. 

Ha ha, of course. 

There still has not been one citywide boil order since the pandemic began

— skooks (@skooks) February 2, 2021

Because if you demand the cosmos answer a riddle, that is what you get. The boil order is now "more than possible" on Mardi Gras day. Also it will be freezing outside and maybe the power will be out.  

And so with little recourse now but to sit and contemplate these mysteries, we have to wonder a little bit if this is happening now because we haven't managed to put our spiritual energies back in balance after the cascading disasters of 2019.  The time for that would have been Carnival 2020. But recall that last year's cleansing rituals were themselves interrupted by bad weather, bad.. vibes.. and the horrifying deaths of two parade goers who were crushed by floats. In fact, if we weren't now trying to figure out how to have Carnival in the "not cancelled but different" circumstances of the pandemic, we would certainly have been arguing over whatever new rules might be in place after 2020.  Would barricading the route be an overreaction?  What about a permanent ban on tandem floats? Come to think of it maybe taking a year off to just eat king cake and decorate houses was the best choice for everyone COVID or no COVID.

In any case, there are multiple years of angst piling up here and no obvious means of venting any of it.  Certainly not before Wednesday comes. But something needs to happen before a domino-like karmic effect happens.  Probably nothing for it now besides focusing on getting people vaccinated.  Assuming that goes off well enough (a lot to assume, I know) then probably Krewe Du Vieux will happen on February 12, 2022.  Circle that on your calendar and keep your fingers crossed.

*Still dealing with the ramifications of that, btw

The wind wooshed around a lot

Yesterday I got out on the bike for a little while to see how bad it was around us.  It wasn't all that bad, really. A lot of tree debris everywhere. Most not quite as extreme as the photo above but I didn't go very far.  The roads were okay by the time I was out. But the night of the storm, one person was electrocuted by downed power lines which is horrifying.  A lot of people still don't have power.  325,000 Entergy customers are still down as of this morning.  But, generally speaking, for a high category 2 hurricane passing directly over the city, things could have been a lot worse.

It's not over yet, though. Sewerage and Water Board certainly had themselves a night on Wednesday. 

Yet another New Orleans Sewerage & Water Board turbine failed Wednesday during Hurricane Zeta, although a spokesperson for the public utility said loss of that power source did not impair drainage.

Turbine 3 was brought online at the height of the storm but went down after “it reached its capacity,” S&WB spokesperson Courtney Barnes said. The turbine has typically been reserved for emergency use in recent years but was pressed into normal service for Zeta because Turbine 4, the largest of the S&WB’s operational turbines, broke Sunday.

Turbine 3 appears to have been activated as a back up for pumps that would have taken Entergy power under normal circumstances. But they made the switch when either that power or some other equipment failed.  Anyway, it sounds like they were able to juggle and jerry rig their way through it. Happily, the storm moved quickly enough that the rainfall didn't put the pumping capacity to a serious test. 

Yesterday, the city and SWB were asking people to use less water until they could be assured of full sewerage pumping capacity.  But the details of that and several other issues were still incredibly vague as of this morning. McBride enumerates a few in this FB post.  In the meantime, while it is still highly doubtful that there will be any Mardi Gras parades in 2021, I think several krewes have asked Turbine 6 to ride  as a Grand Marshall

We are hearing some concerns about water being safe to drink due to power loss across the city. Power at our Carrollton Water Plant, where water is purified, maintained power throughout impacts from Zeta thanks to Turbine 6.

— SWB New Orleans (@SWBNewOrleans) October 29, 2020

This afternoon the Entergy map is still looking pretty Christamassy.  Eyballing it, I think that looks like we might be close to 50% restored in Orleans Parish. 

The Lens reports that the clerk of court needs 48 hours advance notice if we have to move any polling locations for Tuesday. 54 of them were without power as of today. Also in that article we read that the city is starting to get estimates as to the general cost of repairs. (It also happens to be city budget season and the outlook is not good.)  As is the usual case with a major disaster, we would expect the federal government to reimburse these expenses.  How much they pay out, though, might depend on certain data. 

FEMA hasn’t approved a major disaster declaration for Hurricane Zeta yet, according to The Times Picayune/New Orleans Advocate, and is awaiting more complete damage assessments.

Cantrell said that the National Hurricane Center would also be reviewing data as to whether the storm was indeed at Category 2 or if it had slipped over the Category 3 threshold. That would have reimbursement implications, she said. Green said the city was also looking into federal assistance for individual residents over lost food.

It has been widely reported that Zeta's maximum winds may have been just 1 mph below the threshold for what we would consider a Category 3.  If we had known at the time that this would make a difference, maybe we could have all gone out and waved some fans.

S&WB; math

Here is a word problem for you to work out.  According to the plan discussed at this week's meeting, how many turbines does the New Orleans Sewerage and Water Board plan to have online after all of the projects are implemented?  

Be careful. This is tricky, but we can think it through.  First we have to know how may turbines are operating now.  The most recently installed piece of equipment is called Turbine 6. So you might be tempted to just say six immediately and put your pencils down. But wait... 

The S&WB has five turbines, though their designations confusingly run up to six because Turbine 2 was decommissioned years ago. Each has faced significant limitations in the past and caused problems for the agency.

That's quirky.  But, in a way, it's very New Orleans. It's kind of like trying to explain to a visitor why a bunch of streets that cross Canal are called "North" or "South" but nobody ever says they are actually traveling in those directions. You just have to know the lingo.  Anyway, so it's five, right?  

Well, not exactly.  To solve for the number of available turbines, we still have additional values we need to factor in.  For example, the temperature outside on any given day is one. 

Under the timeline discussed Tuesday, the first project to be completed would also be the cheapest: a $700,000 fix to Turbine 6, its newest piece of power generating equipment, to allow it to operate in cold weather. The turbine, originally provided to the S&WB by the U.S. Army Corps of Engineers in 2013, was not designed to run when air temperatures are below 45 degrees, a limitation that prompted a boil water advisory in 2018 when temperatures dropped while it was powering the S&WB’s water system.

Now, some would say designing equipment that can only function above 45 degrees is actually very forward-looking policy in the context of climate change.  Maybe this is an example of that "resiliency" everyone is always talking about.  Also it may be a little confusing to some that a drop in temperature is what causes water to boil. But, again, that's just another one of those quirks. In any case we are currently living in a world where sometimes Turbine 6 exists and sometimes it does not. To solve this part of the equation, add $700,000*

*This value will undoubtedly increase over time. To determine the appropriate function to input here, please see Appendix B

Thankfully, the status of Turbine 5 is more of a fixed variable. It is blowed up.  Although, we have now learned, it is not quite as blowed up as originally thought. 

Next would be repairs to Turbine 5. That generator exploded in December, causing enough damage that officials initially said it would likely never be worthwhile to repair it. But an inspection showed damage was not as severe as feared and that insurance on the equipment would largely cover the $5 million to $6 million to bring back online, minus a $1 million deductible.

We can rebuild it. And we will. So, let's see where we are now. That's 6 turbines minus one for nomenclature, minus one for explosions, minus one IF < 45 degrees F so, for now we're at three or maybe three and a half operational turbines.  Got it? Okay now add one.

Then there’s the plan to buy a new turbine, which would be designated Turbine 7, for $18 million to $20 million. About $13 million of that would come from the federal government, the rest from the infrastructure deal.

The proposal calls for Turbine 7 to be operational in 12 to 14 months.

At which point there should be (assuming the business with the weather is sorted out) six turbines in operation including the one called number 7.  Got it?  Good, now subtract two. 

With all those pieces in place, the S&WB would be able to take Turbines 1 and 3 offline completely, Korban said. Those turbines, powered by steam, are considered to be particularly problematic.

The thinking there being that, there should be sufficient steam just coming out of everyone's ears by this point in the problem that these machines will have become redundant.  And we didn't even get into the conversion of 25 cycle to 60 cycle electric power which, yes, is also a factor in this. 

It's no wonder, then, that with all this high level math going on, that the billing system is every bit as mysterious.

The S&WB currently estimates about 45% of customer bills, instead of billing for actual use, and Korban said efforts to improve that figure are underway. Those include staffing up internally and bringing in outside contractors, efforts he said have already improved the situation from a low point when only about 30% of customers’ bills were being read each month.

Sometimes you have to pay or what you use. Other times they just make something up.  This situation fluctuates over time according to several variables as well which causes many people to wonder if their water bill is determined by a random number generator.  They say that's happening 15 percent less of the time now than it was before, though. So make sure your instruments are calibrated before you begin your next calculation. 

When I am elected mayor, we will make S&WB; build one more pump

 We gotta round it off. This always bugs me. 

The New Orleans Sewerage and Water Board said Saturday afternoon that 98 of its 99 drainage pumps, four turbines and five elctro-motive diesel generators are working ahead of Tropical Storm Marco, whose forecast track shifted east earlier in the day and put the city square in its path.

"What is my biggest worry?"

You know what, maybe this is not the year to be asking ourselves that question.

"Somebody asked me ... over the weekend, what is my biggest worry. And I said 'T4 tripping or being damaged where it can't operate because that is our go-to power generation equipment,' " Korban said. "So, we have redundancy in the system. It's not the redundancy that we need; it's not the redundancy we had a year ago. We are going into this season with a more fragile system and a less redundant system than ever before."

On Monday, City Hall was closed and a lot of people (who aren't already staying home to prevent spreading COVID) stayed home from work because a tropical storm was not really making it rain all that hard.  Today, a random thunderstorm flooded multiple neighborhoods. 

In 2020, if you name your "biggest worry" it comes true.  If you plan to cope with emergencies, they run a fake-out on you.  So, really, why bother worrying at all. 

The boil order decade is over

This is April. I'm not sure but I think the last boil order was January 6.  Seems like the longest we've gone in a while.  Maybe this year's cursed Carnival really did usher in a new phase of history.  Or maybe it's just not fashionable anymore.

Throw a tarp on it

RIP Turbine 5.

Regardless of the cause, it's unlikely that the more than half-century-old Turbine 5 will ever be brought back into service, Executive Director Ghassan Korban told the S&WB's board of directors Wednesday.

The announcement marks one of the first concrete steps in what could be a radical shift for the utility, a move away from spending millions to keep its own archaic power system limping along — including extensive repairs to Turbine 5 just two years ago — and toward a greater reliance on power from Entergy New Orleans.

The story also points out that a third party investigation into the cause of the explosion hasn't happened yet and SWB itself has not complied with requests for information about its internal findings.  We are meant to infer here that moving away from in-house power production is a cost saving measure. But given so little information it is difficult for the public to make an informed determination about that.

Meanwhile McBride points out today that SWB approved a pay raise for Director Korban bringing his salary up to $288,000. He also points out that the agency has reinstated its annual awards banquet whicb a previous legislative auditor's report has raised legal questions about. All of this raises doubts about the board's fiscal concerns over the turbine. 

We should point out also that mayor Cantrell has repeatedly advocated for higher Entergy rates in exchange for one or another deal she seems to be negotiating on behalf of SWB. Could that also be related to the decision described to us today? It's a pretty good bet.

The New Boil Order Decade

The answer is five. If you were keeping score at home, write down five was the number of consecutive days we were able to go before the first boil order of 2020.

The Sewerage & Water Board issued a boil water advisory for the West Bank Monday afternoon, the second time such a notice has been issued for the area in less than a month.

In a press release, the S&WB said water pressure dropped on the West Bank while crews were making a repair to Mardi Gras Boulevard.

Reset your counters to zero. 

Extreme Emergency

After the December we've just had, it's hard to blame Sewerage and Water Board for busting out a whole  new level of emergency declaration.  Otherwise, we might be so numb as to ignore their missives altogether.

NEW ORLEANS — The General Superintendent of the Sewage & Water Board of New Orleans has signed an extreme emergency declaration amid concerns over a potential water main blowout in Gentilly.

The document said sewage from Lakeview, Gentilly and the 7th Ward flow into Sewer Pump Station D, which is located at Florida and Peoples avenues. The station is one of the two major sewer pumping stations on the East Bank.

Actually, "extreme emergency" is a real thing. It's a specific designation for expediting the procurement process during situations of imminent danger to the public. And, yeah, I also thought that's what regular emergency declarations are for but apparently this just goes one more.

McBride talks about it at the bottom of this post albeit skeptically.

WDSU did get comment from the Board when they covered this story Tuesday night. The statement is pure spin, given the plain verbiage of the emergency declaration is generous in its use of words and phrases like "catastrophic," "imperative," and "significant risk to public health:"

"We want to emphasize that the health and safety of our residents was never at risk. At no point did we release sewage into the Mississippi River, had circumstances forced us to do so, we would have alerted the public and all necessary agencies as mandated by the EPA and LDH. It is important to note that we are not in a state of emergency. The phrase 'extreme emergency declaration' is a legal condition that allows us to more swiftly order equipment, hire any necessary contractors and expedite our response and repairs to prevent a true emergency. The decision to enact an emergency declaration is indicative of our commitment to being proactive as we work to keep New Orleans safe and healthy."

I would just like to say that the fact the situation got to a point where they needed to bypass public bid laws shows the opposite of a commitment to the public, as it will now cost more and the work will have to be hurried, which practically guarantees sloppiness and mistakes. And they clearly don't know what "proactive" means.

Either "the health and safety of our residents was never at risk"or it was. SWB seems to be saying both.  Maybe it still is. You never know what is going to flood, back up, or explode at any given moment. This description doesn't inspire confidence.

The emergency declaration, passed unanimously by the board, will allow the job to be bid out and repairs made more quickly, as the broken valve at Pump Station D is currently being held open by a hydraulic jack and wooden wedges.

Crews discovered the problem Dec. 2 and spent about six hours trying to get the valve open as sewage backed up into the system.

It was during this period that the agency considered the possibility of diverting sewage away from the valve and dumping it into the river in order to keep it from backing up into the streets, or worse, causing a blowout that would be a "significant risk to public health," the emergency declaration reads.

Ultimately, the agency did not need to take that step, Executive Director Ghassan Korban said.

Yikes! They almost dumped raw sewerage into the river.  Can you imagine what would happen if somebody dumped raw sewerage into the Mississippi River? Who could even contemplate such a thing?  It would be a national scandal, right? Surely, the federal government would have to intervene.  Well, it turns out that's exactly what's already happened. There's already a federal consent decree in place because dumping raw sewerage into the Mississippi is something SWB used to do it all the time

The prospect of releasing sewage into the river would be an apparent violation of a federal consent decree under which the city's sewer system has operated for two decades.

The S&WB was put under a consent decree with the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency and U.S. Department of Justice in 1998 after it was accused of violating the Clean Water Act by dumping untreated sewage into Lake Pontchartrain, the Mississippi River and other water bodies.

Speaking of federal intervention, there's more where that came from.  A lot of people may have missed this bit because it was wedged in between the turbine explosion, the French Quarter sewer fire, and this latest nightmare scenario with the sewerage back up, but we also learned this month that the IRS has placed a lien on all Sewerage and Water Board assets for failing to pay $185,741 in payroll taxes withheld from employees between 2015 and 2018.

What were they spending the money on instead?  Certainly, the ballooning cost of turbine repairs must have had something to do with it.  According to the legislative auditors' office, emergency spending on one of those projects had blown up to eight times its initial cost in 2017. 

Following established approval policies that govern contract changes is important to evaluate whether work changes are necessary and fairly priced. For example, a 2017 emergency contract to repair a turbine was originally approved for $500,000, but the contract had $4 million in contract change orders. While change orders may be appropriate and necessary, the S&WB does not always conduct a review or obtain the documentation needed to monitor the reasonableness of costs and necessity of work performed. For example, in one contract, a change order was approved via email and did not go through proper approval procedures. 

One can understand, then, why the latest "extreme emergency" declaration might make us extremely nervous.  In order to deal with the sewer back-up, SWB is going to need to throw a lot of money at it very quickly and with little to no oversight. 

By approving the emergency measure, the S&WB is allowing all of this work to be done without formally advertising for bids, without a cost cap and without designating where the money will come from. There were no estimates provided on what the work could cost, though the declaration said the work would take "several weeks."

Already they can't pay their taxes. What happens if the feds decide to foreclose?  If we lived in a better world, under a different regime, this might be one vector by which the federal government could step in and help. Cities all over the country are in dire need of a massive infrastructure overhaul. Utilities in crisis, such as our beloved Sewerage and Water Board, would be prime subjects for such a renewal. Unfortunately the current administration in Washington tends to harbor somewhat less benevolent motives.

Trump’s plan turns infrastructure investment on its head in another way as well. Traditionally, the selection of projects to be funded by the federal government emphasized benefits to the public. The administration’s plan weighs the ability to attract sources of funding outside the federal government at 70 percent when considering whether to support it; economic and social returns from the project count for just 5 percent. Federal funding will go to projects that are most attractive to private investors, rather than to those, like clean water, that meet the needs of communities.

The CPA interviewed by Channel 8 for their story on SWB's tax lien says, “technically the IRS could foreclose and force the sale of assets." So, rather than an opportunity to help, the powers that be, as currently configured, are far more likely to push for privatization.  Which is a troubling prospect now given that the local political climate has never been more ripe for it.

To begin with, the state legislature coming into office for the 2020 term will have the most right wing make up we've seen in that body in our lifetimes. Things are going to get super free market solution-y real quick.  More so than they are now, I mean. It's "unprecedented."

“It’s unprecedented. The Legislature is more conservative, more pro-business than ever before,” said Stephen Waguespack, head of the Louisiana Association of Business and Industry, the powerful lobbyist representing the business community. “The final tally shows that you’re going to have Legislature with a lot of fresh faces and a lot of new ideas.”

Don't expect the newly reelected John Bel Edwards to be much of a backstop to any of that. Already one of the more infamously "pro-business" governors in the country, in his now weakened position, John Bel is likely to be more eager to please than ever.

One item that caught our eye during the lead up to this year's election season was Edwards's gift of a multi-million dollar state energy systems privatization contract to Bernhard Energy Partners.  The deal was announced one year after Jim Bernhard decided, entirely by coincidence we are sure, that he didn't want to run against John Bel for Governor after all.  Anyway, in light of Jim and John Bel's well consummated friendship, we thought it newsworthy this week that Jim's company was investing in privatized water systems. 

The equity firm, which is led by former Shaw Group CEO Jim Bernhard and has raised more than $3 billion in capital, is interested in regulated utilities and has viewed Ascension Wastewater as a good foundation to get into the regional utility business, already drawing interest from other communities.

The article doesn't say much about which other communities are showing interest. But, with every passing plant failure, tax lien, or extreme emergency declaration, it becomes more likely that New Orleans would be among them.

If it is going to happen, the key decision maker will be the mayor.  She is the nominal President of the board and the prerogative to set its policy direction rests with her. And if LaToya decides she wants a major overhaul for Sewerage and Water Board, this legislature is likely to give her one. Typically the city's legislative delegation takes marching orders from the mayor.  After the success of several of her endorsed candidates in this year's elections, Cantrell's hand has only been strengthened there.

SWB has been the number one issue on her plate since before she even came into office. The 2017 citywide flooding dominated the campaign that year. And ever since she took over, the agency has done nothing but produce headaches for her administration. In addition to the continuing recurrence of street flooding and boil order crises, the mayor has also had to contend with a billing SNAFU to which she inartfully responded to by threatening to shut off water to residents, frequent turnovers in leadership and the ongoing financial problems of an agency incapable of collecting bills owed to it or paying out bills owed to vendors.  Her most public battle of the past year has been over the so-called "fair share" deal with the hospitality industry. Regardless of whether one believes that deal actually accomplishes what it claims (and we definitely do not believe it does), the bargain was, at least ostensibly, driven by the need to better fund Sewerage and Water Board.  It seems safe to assume that the time is fast approaching when Cantrell is ready to be done with this problem one way or another. 

We won't be surprised, then, if LaToya decides that privatization is a perfectly acceptable way to accomplish that.  There are a couple of reasons to expect this.  The first is political expedience. A privatized Sewerage and Water Board might still be fraught with unaccountable runaway corruption and incompetence. But at least this will make that somebody else's responsibility. Moreover, with the problem passed off, Cantrell can claim to have "done something" about the agency regardless of that something's objective merits. Once embarked on, the results of such a change won't be obvious to the political press for some time.  In all likelihood, a true verdict on New Orleans's experiment with a private water utility wouldn't arrive for several years.  They still haven't come around to acknowledging the total disaster wrought by school charterization, for example. And we're already well past a decade into that adventure.

In addition to just being politically easy for her, placing public services into the hands of for-profit private interests is very much in line with Cantrell's ideological approach to governing. Here are a few recent examples of this approach in action.

In November, Cantrell also spoke up on behalf of higher profits for Entergy in direct contradiction to a lower rate schedule negotiated by the city council and its consultants. The mayor intervened on Entergy's behalf because it was offering her a one time $75 million kickback meant for Sewerage and Water Board upgrades. Councilmembers didn't go for it.  But, amazingly, Cantrell and Entergy came back again with a second push for rate hikes in December this time citing the emergency situation brought on by the turbine explosion.  Even in the face contrary public opinion and council opposition, Cantrell' preferred approach to city infrastructure always begins with making sure one or another "private partner" is profiting from it.

Another private partner in receipt of the mayor's enthusiasm has been the "Blue Bikes" rental scheme the city has entered into with Uber. The company announced in December it will be replacing all of the bicycles with hybrid electric scooter-bikes and jacking up prices for all riders in the process.  The city is disingenuously promoting this private for-profit business as a "public transit" solution. It's probably something they consider a revenue generator, although I'd like to see the costs in dedicated infrastructure, promotion, etc. compared to the 2 percent kickback Uber promises. In any case, it's definitely not a money maker for riders. Public transit, ideally, should be free to use. Or, failing that, it should be as close to free as feasible.  When the city and its private contractor are expecting to turn a profit from those users, though, they are no longer really providing a public service. It's not clear the mayor understands, or cares much about, this distinction.


There was a line from the mayor in this WWLTV recap of 2019's disasters that best sums up her philosophy of governing.  Essentially, it's all about her. Or, at least, it's about her vs. whoever was doing her job before she was.

Cantrell said the city will continue to invest in drainage improvements and maintenance next year.

"Unfortunately...previous administrations did not own up to existing conditions within our built environment, throughout the city of New Orleans, did not deal with the Sewerage and Water Board accurately or appropriately, did not deal with even maintenance," Cantrell said.

Now, technically, what she is saying there is true. There is a long history of negligence, graft, and decay that's brought us to where we are. And that pattern has persisted throughout the course of several "previous administrations." But in Cantrell's mind, this isn't a systemic question of power and class politics so much as it is about the specific individual who happens to be mayor at any given moment. The way she puts it, it sounds like she is saying "Nobody before me knew what they were doing" and that's the reason we are where we are. But that isn't the reason. In reality, there are lots of reasons, personal, political, and, I guess, natural/cosmic that have contributed.

In a broad political sense, we've been under the sway of a national conservative movement for decades that has abandoned urban infrastructure. Federal money has dried up. State houses have become more hostile and conservative. The general philosophy of government that obtains generally leaves cities to fend for themselves. It's no surprise that most cites haven't handled that challenge gracefully. Petty local politics and small time corruption only becomes more of a problem in the context of diminishing resources. New Orleans is certainly no exception to that.

That doesn't mean we let any of the players in that off the hook. Ideally we'd like to see our local politicians join in a democratizing movement to take public resources back from the oligarchs. But failing that, at least, we should expect them not to make choices that actively exacerbate matters. In any case, we're describing a much larger circumstance than just, "Those were bad mayors and now I am a good mayor so don't be mad at me" which seems to be LaToya's take on things. Maybe that's all that matters to her.

Or, worse, maybe she really is a true believer in Free Market Uber Alles neoliberalism.  According to this story, she's starting off the new year at an international conference that appears to center on that ideology in particular.

Mayor LaToya Cantrell and two staffers are headed to the African country of Ghana where they will attend the Essence Full Circle Festival and create an agreement to strengthen relations with a city there.

The trip will feature Cantrell as a speaker on the Essence Global Black Economic Forum, a news release said. The forum brings together government officials, entrepreneurs, executives and entertainers from around the world to discuss economic development opportunities and cultural exchange and ways for the private sector to lead this development. The festival marks 400 years since the first slave ships left Ghana.

Anyway, when the mayor does return to us from Woke Davos, it will be time to dive back in to a whole new year of extreme emergencies.  Whether or not this is the year those emergencies lead to serious talk about privatizing the city's sewer and water systems remains to be seen.  But the elements that could take us there do seem to be in place.

There's a car on fire*

In our excitement to identify and catalog this weekend's various unrelated disasters, we missed the flaming bus that rolled in the Jingle On The Boulevard parade.  We gather this was an unplanned bus fire despite the fact that it was there specifically to carry the "Royal Heat" dance team.  We regret having overlooked the bus fire but are happy to report it is only the second school bus immolated in New Orleans East this year that we are aware of.

Similarly this morning's flaming vehicles that caused a French Quarter block to be evacuated are not the first cars on fire to appear in 2019. Today's event is unlike the one over the summer, though, in that because it is not suspiciously coincident to any ongoing political campaigns, there is a much better chance we will actually be told how and why it happened.

Actually, we are being told that this afternoon as I am typing this.  According to WWL:

What caused a loud boom and flames to erupt from the street in the French Quarter around 5:00am?

"This morning we had a challenge in the French Quarter with the explosion and the fire," said Col. Terry Ebbert, New Orleans Director of Public Safety and Security.

He explained that officials are blaming human waste.

"It appears that we had... methane gas underground."

Where did it come from?

"That is probably is due to (the) sewage system."

One thing we have learned this year is that, whether they blast it with flames from below, disable it in a flash flood, or just suck it straight on down into the culvert, Sewerage and Water Board is coming after your vehicle one way or another.

Anyway, another day, another (literal) shitstorm.  I wonder what will explode tomorrow.

*

Day in the life

Oh boy

The Sewerage & Water Board said that an explosion occurred in one of its turbines at its Carrollton water plant Saturday afternoon, injuring two people as residents were told to stay clear of the area.

According to the tweets and such (it's BREAKING news so we can't be sure) this is Turbine 5. Last year this piece of equipment made news when it failed a test of its capacity to run on diesel fuel. At the time, SWB said that was perfectly okay, though. 

A newly repaired turbine at the New Orleans Sewerage & Water Board's Carrollton Plant failed a test run using diesel on Thursday, though it is still "fully functional" when using natural gas as its fuel, the utility announced Thursday.

The Thursday test was aimed at seeing whether the repairs would allow Turbine 5 to be switched to diesel in case its main natural gas fuel supply was interrupted during a storm. But officials concluded that "additional repairs are needed" before it'll be able to switch to that backup fuel supply, according to a news release.

After the diesel test, the turbine was tested with natural gas and "continued to show strong performance," according to the release.

Anyway, today it seems to have exploded.

Before we get too carried away, though, it's important to say up front that this probably doesn't have anything to do with yesterday's "cyberattack" on city computer systems.They still have no idea what that might be related to but, apparently, we don't need any of that fancy crap anyway.

Officials said that taking the computer systems offline could result in inconvenience but that city government would continue to operate.

"One positive about being a city that has been touched by disasters ... is our plans and our activities reflect the fact that we can operate without the internet and without a city network," said Collin Arnold, New Orleans' homeland security director.

We should also clarify that, much the same as the computers are not related to the explosion, this water main break in Algiers, which happened today is unrelated to either of those things.  Nor is any of the above mention situations related at all to the other water main break happening Uptown. This is why there is a boil order in effect in Algiers but none on the East Bank.

That's a lot to keep straight, I know. Just be thankful it's a nice day outside so the power is probably not gonna go out and.. goddammit. 

meanwhile at entergy pic.twitter.com/wCsXqU50r4

— skooks (@skooks) December 14, 2019

Well if it's any consolation, this event is unrelated to the computer hacking which, again, is itself unrelated to the explosion that is unrelated to either of the unrelated water mains.

Also it turns out there is something wrong with Drew Brees's elbow. 

NEW ORLEANS — Saints Quarterback Drew Brees is on the team's injured roster, but isn't expected to sit out the Monday game against the Indianapolis Colts.

Brees was listed at the bottom of the weekly injury roster released by the team Friday. According to the report, his right elbow was injured sometime after Thursday's practice.

But just being on the injury report isn't an indicator that the QB will sit on the sidelines. The report notes he attended the full practice Friday.

It's unclear how the injury happened but if Brees practices again Saturday, he will likely start against the Colts Monday.

So that's pretty mysterious. As far as we know this is not related to the already well known problem with his thumb from earlier in the season. And at this we are practically obligated to point out that neither injury is related to any of the above mentioned infrastructure crises which can be a little bit confusing given that elbow joints do occur in both Drew Brees and in water pipes.

Honestly the best advice at this point is not to think about it too much.  Or, as a wise man once said, "Worry about your frickin meat."

Dire consequences

A couple months ago, New Orleans Chief Administrative Officer Gilbert Montaño told a City Council budget committee there would be "dire consequences" if the council did not agree to "roll forward" its property tax millages this year.

Perhaps the biggest criticism was around what Montaño said the consequences would be if they failed to roll forward. One potential budget cut, according to the presentation, would be laying off 500-plus city employees. Another was a 10 percent budget cut for all city departments. The options also included pay cuts across the city and cutting personnel in the police department, fire department and EMS.

After it became clear that councilmembers were unconvinced by what Helena Moreno correctly identified as a "scare tactic,"  the mayor's office lowered its demand by 50 percent. "I don't make idle threats," Cantrell warned.

Her administration has warned of things such as slower response times from police and fire, cuts to recycling, closing down rec centers or libraries -- or even longer waits to fill potholes if they can't get the extra money.

“I don’t make idle threats,” Cantrell said. “I’m telling you if we don’t see a modest roll forward -- $6.9 million? Come on. Yes, we will have to look at how we can make cuts.”

The possibility of a half-roll was still on the table come November when the mayor took a new scare tactic to the public as she argued for a 3 mill tax increase which was on the local ballot during the state election runoffs this past Saturday.

Voters were unmoved by the idle threats, however, and the property tax ballot measure failed by almost 9,000 votes. It's particularly telling that it did, too. Because all of the rest of Cantrell's "Ballot of Yes" items she campaigned for passed and all of the legislative candidates she endorsed won their races as well, this result didn't mean voters were rejecting her, specifically. It just meant they didn't buy her pitch on this particular issue.

Maybe they read the DSA voter guide.  There they would have found one of the more cogent arguments against the new tax. Maybe it's authors won't mind if we share a couple paragraphs of that here.

The new taxes would have serious impacts on the city’s cost-burdened renters and homeowners. Typically landlords pass on all or most of the cost of such increases to tenants. According to HousingNOLA, 41 percent of New Orleans homeowners are cost burdened and one third of all owner-occupied homes earn below the median income. Meanwhile, our property tax system remains riddled with exemptions handed out to developers, manufacturers, and non-profits that need to be revisited or eliminated.

The mayor claims there is no other way to raise the $10.2 million the new tax is estimated to bring in but her 2020 budget proposal includes $4.7 million in highly questionable appropriations to police and surveillance and has left the door open to funding Sheriff Gusman’s proposed jail expansion. We recognize the city’s fiscal situation is tenuous. But we also question why proposed remedies favor the privileges of wealth and bolster the police-surveillance state while heaping even more excessive burdens on poor people. We can do better.

That part about landlords passing property tax hikes on to renters, by the way, is definitely not an idle threat. My rent just went up 50 bucks this month based on the recent reassessments alone. I expect it may have been more had the millage gone up too.

Anyway nobody has to worry about that now because the final budget approved by the City Council this week is based on a deal among the council and various taxing authorities that amounts to a net cut in the overall city controlled property tax rate.

Mayor LaToya Cantrell and the City Council, which has the final say on the lion’s share of taxes in the parish, are close to finalizing an agreement that would cut the city's overall tax rate by about 5%, juggling about a dozen individual millages to come up with a deal that would, in effect, give up any revenue the city stood to gain from this year’s reassessment.

This is actually even more complicated than it already looks. So, apologies to everyone whose eyes are already glazed over. To begin with,thanks to the assessments, a lot of people's taxes are going to go up regardless of what the rate is. 

Exactly what that means for a property’s tax bill depends on the details of the city’s deal and where the property is located, since some taxing bodies cover only portions of the city.

And how well a taxpayer makes out also depends on what happened during this year’s reassessment.

Owners whose property values stayed the same will pay less. Those who saw only a slight increase will pay around the same amount as they did in 2019. But the tens of thousands of homeowners who saw substantial jumps in their property values will face significantly higher tax bills.

There's also the matter of the school board which is one of the independent authorities who voted to roll its millage forward thus capturing the reassessment windfall. Not only will this contribute to an overall tax hike for many residents, it also constitutes a shift in costs formerly assumed by the state onto local taxpayers.

The School Board on Tuesday voted unanimously to roll its tax rate forward all the way to its current level, in part because the higher assessments will trigger a $9.1 million automatic cut in state funding for the city's schools.

The roll forward will fill the gap left by that cut and provide an additional $15.1 million for New Orleans schools on top of that.

But leaving that aside, the crux of the deal that's been struck, is the library and the Audubon Commission have agreed to reductions this year in order that S&WB, the Fire Department, and NOPD can "roll forward" to pull in new revenue. That's not an ideal solution. But it's also not a disaster.  The actual numbers aren't available but this article strongly suggests that departments taking cuts can cover their expenses with reserve funds or other revenues.

For now, this will have to do. Streets and drainage improvements need funding. We'd prefer the city find the money it needs by reducing the amount we spend on police, not boosting it. Ideally, cities like New Orleans with critical infrastructure needs would have access to billions of dollars in Federal aid as part of a Green New Deal program.  But that's all in the future. Or at least we hope it is. Otherwise, the consequences could be dire, indeed.

How fair is fair?

Yesterday we thought it was kind of funny that LaToya was still saying "fair share" about everything, including, now, the Entergy rate case negotiations, like it's some sort of tic she's developed.  Today, though, it's less funny since it appears she has signed onto a proposal from Entergy that looks a lot like her bargain with the tourism cabal that is the actual genesis of that catch phrase.   

The company is offering to send up to $75 million in a one-time payment to the embattled Sewerage & Water Board if the City Council allows it to earn 10% profit,  the company's vice president told council members in an email.

The utility suggested the money could go toward building a modern power substation for the S&WB, which operates more than half of the pumps in its drainage system on an older power standard that is used almost nowhere else.

Cantrell has spent much of this year trying to secure more money for local infrastructure improvements, especially those sought by the S&WB. 

So to recap, here is what has happened so far. Hopefully this won't be too technical.  City Council's regulatory consultants (themselves not exactly hostile to Entergy's interests) recommended we hold Entergy to an 8.93% ROE. (Return On Equity: the figure that determines a regulated monopoly's profits). Entergy balked at that.  LaToya intervened at that point on behalf of something called the Crescent City Power Users Coalition in order to help Entergy negotiate the rate up to 9.35%.

The "Power Users" are apparently comprised of several entities with large electricity bills including Touro Infirmary, University Medical Center, New Orleans Cold Storage, and Sewerage and Water Board. It is assumed that Cantrell's deal offered those entities a better rate and spread more of the burden onto regular ratepayers. But that is just an assumption at this point.

Whatever it was, Entergy's CEO later decided it wasn't good enough for them. So now they want to back out and the mayor has spurned even her friends in the "Power Users" coalition in order to back out along with them. We thought, yesterday, that the City Council had rendered the whole matter moot by moving the case to its consent agenda for Thursday, essentially declaring the argument over.

But now we find out today that Entergy is offering this $75 million kickback.  The mayor thinks that is too good to pass up. It's difficult to understand why she thinks that, exactly.  This story suggests it's because this arrangement makes it look like more of an accomplishment for her, specifically. Although it doesn't quote her directly, that's how we would interpret this, anyway. 

Cantrell's office said Entergy's latest offer indicates its willingness to do more for residents at her urging.

But if that really is the case, she's made a mistake. Leave alone for a moment the point that a one time $75 million donation to Sewerage and Water Board is, pardon this expression, a drop in the bucket.  It's also just a wholly inappropriate way to go about raising the money. As Helena Moreno correctly points out here, it's not a gift to the city from Entergy. It's just something else you will pay for via higher electricity bills. 

However, City Councilwoman Helena Moreno said Entergy ultimately would get the money for the S&WB contribution from its customers — the residents and businesses of New Orleans. She said Entergy should be more upfront about that fact.

“If ratepayers are asked to foot the bill, we need a transparent process to examine these projects, along with how much more the people of this city will have to pay,” Moreno said.

And, of course, in the long run, once they make their $75 million back, it's just a rate hike.  As was the case with the tourism bargain, this is a deal that sustains corporate profits while increasing the costs borne by poor and working class New Orleanians.  Every time this happens we get a clearer understanding of how the mayor defines, "fair share."

Anyway, it looks from here like City Council isn't going for any of this and is set to approve their original compromise rates tomorrow.  But who knows what sorts of negotiations are happening this afternoon.  Maybe Entergy has decided to play hardball.

NEW ORLEANS — City Hall and the Orleans Parish Civil Court were shut down Wednesday afternoon after losing power.

City officials posted about the power outage on social media around 1:30 p.m. An Entergy outage map did not show the outage, but the company did tweet that "crews are on site assessing the cause of the power outage."

That's a joke, of course.  But then again, this is the mayor who tried to cut off everybody's water last year so maybe let's not underestimate the potential for wacky behavior here. 

The Boil Order Decade

Guys, it has been a heckuva weekend. Multiple building collapses, exploding water mains, democracy under threat (again).  It really feels like anything could happen.  Please somebody check the jaguar cage just in case.

But I don't think I've ever seen a double boil order.  That's new.

After lifting a boil water advisory early Monday morning for Uptown New Orleans, the Sewerage & Water Board has now reinstated it, officials said at 10:30 a.m., following another drop in water pressure.

The updated advisory from the S&WB did not state the cause of the second drop in pressure. On Saturday, a water main burst near the corner of Lowerline and Panola streets, flooding the streets as well as nearby yards and causing a drop in water pressure across large swaths of Uptown.