The PG&E Money Train Hit A Speed Bump

The PG&E Money Train Hit A Speed Bump Last Night.   
Help De-rail PG&E All Together!
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I'm urging everyone to at least send a quick letter to one or all of the following folks. You can cut and paste the one below and change a few words, or just write your own quickie. This weekend some people risked jail to put up stickers exposing PG&E on about 500 "No on I" signs all over the city, let's all do whatever we can to help.


The PG&E money train caught the wrath of San Francisco ratepayers this weekend.  Their \"Too Risky/Too Costly\" street signs were plastered with stickers saying \"Paid For By PG&E.\"  
I was told that the city was blanketed by a huge guerrilla team of angry ratepayers from all walks of life.
 
They created the momentum.  Let\'s not squander it!
 
De-rail the PG&E money train.  Two weeks left to win Public Power for San Francisco!
 
What can you do? 
 
1.)  Letters To The Editor - the Chronicle will print letters if they get enough of them on a given subject.
2.)  Talk Radio - KGO, KSFO, etc.
3.)  Contact your favorite print or electronic journalists
 

(I've listed some Talking Points near the bottom of this email.)
 
Letters to the Chronicle can be emailed to letters [at] sfchronicle.com.  (If you like, simply copy and paste from the data below, edit it a little with your own words, and fire it off). 

* Be sure to include you name, address and telephone numbers in letters.  Otherwise they won't print it.. 
* Focus on money issues.  Use PG&E's strength - money - to defeat them.  Their polls obviously demonstrate that the risk and fear factors are critical.  Well no company on the planet is more fraught with poor money management don't have the resources to do our own polls.  But we can certainly demonstrate
KGO\'s call-in line is 808-0810
KSFO is 398-5600
(The trick to getting past the busy signal is to anticipate the previous callers finish and start speed dialing.  Then when the producer asks what you want to talk about, respond with the topic they are discussing at the time.  Once you are on the air just weave public power into the conversation.  Keep it simple to allow the host - if an opponent - to hoist himself by his own petard.   He was opposed to public ownership less than two months ago when I spoke with him.  What a turn around!).
 
Letters To Journalists at the Chronicle:
Stephanie Salter  ssalter [at] sfchronicle.com
Debra Saunders (not our friend)  dsaunders [at] sfchronicle.com
Carla Marinucci  cmarinucci [at] sfchronicle.com
David Lazarus  dlazarus [at] sfchronicle.com
or
John Diaz
Jerry Roberts (managing editor:  \"why isn\'t the Chronicle covering the public power campaign?\")
Dick Rogers
Linda Strean
Address is: c/o SF Chronicle,  901  Mission,  SF, CA  94103
 
Storm the media. 
I just got on the Bernie Ward call-in show tonight on KGO.  I innocently asked about the\"Paid for by PG&E\" stickers that I saw around town today, hoping for a dialogue to develop.  Instead, he proceeded to do a whole commercial for us:  \"Anyone in SF who doesn\'t vote for public power is crazy\", he said.  Then he went on for several minutes about how corrupt and evil PG&E is.  Call these programs.  It works! 
 
The media is deliberately allowing PG&E\'s spin doctors to put doubt and fear into the minds of San Francisco voters - with no public discussion. 
 

We don\'t have money.  But we do have enormous power.
We can overwhelm the media with our numbers.  
Increase the volume. 
Create a huge buzz in the voting public.

Everything you do will make a huge difference.  Keep the pressure on. 
Please, Write or call today!
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Hi, I wanted to question the Chron\'s decision to fight I & F. I can\'t imagine how you justify advocating that we stick with the status quo of PG&E polluting our environment and charging us exhorbitant rates, when there are proven effective MUD\'s accross the country which lower rates and produce cleaner energy. Consider the following:

* Public ownership of electricity is as American as the Constitution.  Publicly owned utilities have existed for over 100 years in America.  There are more than 2000 cities across the country that own their own electricity.   Their customers pay, on average, 18% to 22% less for electricity than do the customers of privately owned (shareholder owned) utilities like PG&E.

* 40+ cities in California have publicly owned utilities.

* Sacramento\'s SMUD is a shining example of the success of public power:  30% lower electricity rates, no blackouts, clean energy. 

* PG&E is bankrupt, forcing the state (you and me) to pay its bills, while spending millions on advertising against public power. 

* Bankrupt PG&E continues to pay millions in executive bonuses - ostensibly for their outstanding management, investment, and leadership abilities. 

* PG&E walked away with $4.5 billion from Deregulation which they themselves helped to write.  They are now hiding that money in their holding company refusing to pay their own debts - forcing the public to pay instead.  Is this the kind of company we want to control our energy future?

* Deregulation forced the ratepayers to pay for PG&E\'s so-called \"stranded assets\", a euphemism for  bad investments by incompetent executives - like nuclear power which they forced on us in the first place.  Now they are forcing us to pay a second time for that same mismanagement while they use our billions to buy and build polluting power plants in other cities around the country.  Is there no end to their arrogance?

* More about Sacramento\'s MUD:  it was able to de-commission a bad nuclear power plant called Rancho Seco.  Their low rates were not adversely effected.  They replaced it with innovative efficiency, conservation and renewable energy programs.  Their service is first class.  Even Republicans in Sacramento love SMUD.  They refuse to allow PG&E in the door.

* Example of a SMUD energy solution that no private utility will ever do:  they covered the Sacramento garbage dump with a membrane, thereby controlling the methane release.  They put a stack on top of it and it is now a low-cost 50 megawatt power plant.  That means 50,000 homes are serviced by it.  And this process allows for the effective cleaning of its waste materials thereby decreasing pollution from the garbage dump.  Win/Win.  Why won\'t PG&E ever do something like this?  Because their whole investment premise is based on economies of scale.  They must build 500 Megawatt plants.  Those are only fossil or nuclear fueled.  The former is dirty.  The latter is dangerous (no insurance company will cover a nuclear plant.  So we the public have to insure them).  The economies of scale investment policy precludes efficient small projects because they are not \"cost effective\" to them.  But to a publicly owned utility they are completely cost effective.  Because they reduce consumption.  And, of course, their is no money in reducing consumption for PG&E.  They make money by selling more electrons - not less.  So they resist all forms of conservation, efficiency and renewable programs.  They always have.  And they always will.