The Tennessee Valley Authority board will hear from any interested persons wanting to address the board at 3:30 p.m. today at the Chattanooga Convention Center, but one of the leading environmental groups in the region won't be at the session because its leaders claim the forum shouldn't be separated from the more public TVA board meeting set for Thursday morning.
"The continuation today of TVA's 'pilot' program 'listening session,' forcing the public to travel on a different day and to a separate location, and thus preventing the public from directly addressing the TVA Board members at quarterly board meeting, is simply the latest evidence that TVA is completely out of touch with the people they are tasked to serve," Dr. Stephen Smith, executive director of the Knoxville-based Southern Alliance for Clean Energy, said in a statement today. "At a time where TVA is making major decisions about the future of large power plants and worker health, and adding stealth fees that increase small customers' bills, this self regulated federal monopoly is becoming increasingly less transparent. The word 'public' used to mean something in 'public power'; now it is used as an excuse to avoid oversight and accountability."
The Southern Alliance for Clean Energy today launched a new web site the group says is "dedicated to holding TVA and Tennessee Valley Local Power Companies accountable" at www.NotPublicPower.org.
"We are asking people from around the region to share their stories of how TVA and their operatives are abusing their power," Smith said. "We hope this information will lead to the necessary changes both large and small that protect the public interest."
TVA will conduct one of its four public board meetings at 9:30 a.m. Thursday in the Missionary Ridge auditorium of the TVA Chattanooga Office Complex. Such meetings are live streamed on the internet, but today's listening session is not and committees of the TVA board are meeting this week in private.
Smith's criticism of TVA's secrecy comes as U.S. Rep. Tim Burchett, a Knoxville Republican, is pushing legislation to revise the TVA act and require the federal utility board to conducts its committee meetings in open session with publicly available agendas and minutes. Burchett introduced his bill, "Tennessee Valley Authority Transparency Act of 2019," as his first piece of legislation since taking office in the U.S. House last month.
TVA, a federally owned corporation created by Congress in 1933, insists it is open and transparent and today's listening session is designed to be more informal and interactive with members of the public than previous listening sessions held at the quarterly TVA board meetings. TVA spokesman Jim Hopson said the new approach gives board members time to consider any public comment before Thursday's meeting.
On Thursday, TVA is expected to decide the fate of aging coal plants in Paradise, Kentucky and Oak Ridge, Tennessee where the Paradise and Bull Run fossil plants have operated for more than a half century. TVA also will get an update - and could possibly act - on hiring a new chief executive to succeed the retiring Bill Johnson.
TVA spokesman Jim Hopson said TVA is subject to the Open Records Act for federal agencies, regularly files detailed financial reports every quarter with the U.S. Securities and Exchange Commission and its 9-member board, which is appointed by the president and confirmed by the U.S. Senate, meets in public to make all major decisions.
In TVA's early history, the then 3-member TVA board didn't even meet in public sessions to make decisions. But Hopson said the agency now "works hard to be transparent while serving nearly 10 million people across seven states," with electric service through 154 municipalities and power coops in its 7-state region.
"In addition to public meetings on a host of topics and the TVA Board of Directors' public listening sessions and business meetings, we offer numerous public comment periods associated with potential policies and actions, provide simple instructions for submitting Freedom of Information Act requests, and file detailed financial reports with the Securities and Exchange Commission."