The Tennessee Valley Authority celebrated its 80th birthday on Friday, but officials insist America’s biggest government utility shouldn’t be retired or sold off yet even though President Obama has suggested studying the idea.
“TVA’s mission is as relevant and essential as ever,” TVA President and CEO Bill Johnson said during an anniversary celebration of the agency among employees in Knoxville. “The good jobs and quality investments we help bring to the Valley have never been more important to the people of our region.”
President Franklin Roosevelt signed the TVA Act on May 18, 1933, creating what has become the nation’s largest public utility and a significant economic driver and environmental steward for the Valley. TVA serves parts of seven states.
But with more than $24 billion of debt, the federal utility also has added to Uncle Sam’s overall debt. In the president’s budget proposal released in April, the Office of Management and Budgeposed a strategic review of TVA that could lead to selling the U.S.-owned power company and “help put the nation on a sustainable fiscal path.”
OMB has yet to release any specific recommendations, however, and Tennessee’s U.S. Sens. Lamar Alexander and Bob Corker, both Republicans, have criticized the president for suggesting TVA might be privatized.