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Archived News Articles

2000-2001

2001

2000

Electric Rate Reduction

(December 27, 2001) GEUS is pleased to announce an electric cost decrease effective January 1, 2002. The average cost of electricity will be reduced by an average of 14.5%. The average residential bill will go down by $11.50 per month or $138.00 per year for an average usage of 1000 kW hours per month.

The price of electricity is determined by the base rate plus a fuel adjustment to recover the cost of fuel burned to produce electricity. The GEUS' Board reduced the base rates for residential and small commercial in 1989 and for large commercial users in 1993. The average cost of electricity projected for the year 2002 is expected to be less than it was in 1988.

Dent Road Substation Back On line

(November 14, 2001) Approximately 1900 homes and businesses in the southeastern area of Greenville were without power for about an hour on Wednesday morning. "GEUS experienced a breaker misoperation during a scheduled testing event", said David McCalla, GEUS Assistant General Manager. Homes and businesses that are electrically-fed out of the substation at Dent Road and the one off of Jack Finney Blvd. lost power at 10:44 AM. The problem was isolated and power restored around 11:38 AM.

GEUS does testing and preventative maintenance during this time of year due to the system's load being near its lowest point of the year. GEUS Technicians continue to investigate as to why this breaker misoperated.


First Connection

(June 29, 2001) GEUS employees experienced a little déjà vu as they connected the first customer to the first municipally-owned cable television and high speed Internet operation in Texas. GEUS installed these modern-day high tech services in a Greenville, Texas home that is 103 years old. Since GEUS is over 110 years old and holds the distinction of also being the first municipally-owned electric utility in Texas, one can only assume that electric crews were installing power to the home for the first time back in the 19th century.

Clay and Judy Woods operate a business called Word Works out of their historic home near downtown Greenville. The Woods design and maintain websites for companies both locally and nationally. Until today, their Internet connection with those companies has been through a dial up modem. GEUS' new cable modem services will allow the Woods to transmit data 50-60 times faster than a standard 28.8K modem.

"The true potential of using the Internet becomes obvious with this kind of speed," said Clay Woods. "I feel like we've just been crawling on the electronic superhighway and suddenly we're driving a race car."

As an added bonus, the Woods signed up for GEUS' Digital Plus Cable Television Package, which will allow them not only 130 channels, but also a wireless keyboard giving them the capability to surf the web and email through their television.

"The citizens of Greenville were in desperate need for high speed Internet, but no company would provide it", said GEUS General Manager Tom Darte. "Citizens created their own destiny and brought the information super highway to Greenville through their ownership of GEUS", Darte added. GEUS is currently hooking up cable television and Internet customers in the downtown area and will make these services available to all Greenville residents during the next ten months.


Snake causes power outage

(June 13, 2001) Approximately 5400 Greenville residents were without power early Tuesday morning due to a snake coming into contact with 69,000 volts at GEUS' Terrell Road Substation. "Early Tuesday morning, a chicken snake climbed a ten foot steel support and came in contact with the Terrell Road Substation's 69kV buss which is the main conducting circuit that travels through the center of the substation", said GEUS Consumer Services Manager Jimmy Dickey. "It took approximately 55 minutes for crews to isolate the problem and restore power to the southwestern portion of the city", Dickey added.

Lauren Parker named the GEUS Scholarship recipient

(May 1, 2001) GEUS has named Lauren Parker, a Greenville High School senior, as their 2001 GEUS Scholarship recipient. Ms. Parker excelled in scholastics, athletics, and choir at GHS. She will continue her education at Texas A & M - College Station with plans to study elementary education.

The $500 GEUS Scholarship is awarded annually to a senior graduating from a public or private high school in the GEUS service area. To meet the application requirements, this year's scholarship candidates wrote an essay concerning energy conservation. The group of GEUS employees who reviewed the applications awarded the scholarship to Ms. Parker. For scholarship application information click here.

Fighting for DSL in rural Texas
By Todd Mason
Reprint Courtesy of the Fort Worth Star Telegram

(April 30, 2001) Getting Digital Subscriber Line service in Tarrant County is a lot like winning the trifecta. You're golden if your house occupies the right spot, the service technician shows up and then installs stuff that actually works.

Well, as the old proverb goes, I complained about my limp until I saw a person with no legs, or in this case, until I tuned in on the Web to hear testimony in Austin on efforts to encourage high-speed Internet access in rural Texas.

Suffice it to say that telecommunications in the hinterlands has not yet advanced to the appointment-breaking stage.

House Bill 1736 hopes to break the stalemate by putting some teeth in a 1999 law requiring Southwestern Bell and Verizon to provide rural customers with the same advanced services they provide to urban customers and at comparable prices.

The bill would allow small cities to take matters into their own hands if the phone companies ignore them. They could pool the town's telecom needs to pitch as a package deal, for example, or they could develop broadband as a municipal venture using state grants or loans.

Not surprisingly, Southwestern Bell and Verizon cry foul. The specter of Texans solving their own problems prompted a remarkable exchange on March 26 between Verizon Texas Region President Larry Atwell and state Rep. Steve Wolens, D-Dallas, chairman of the State Affairs committee.

Wolens dissected Atwell in his objections to the bill -- principally that communities shouldn't be able to demand DSL if Verizon offers a competing technology such as satellite dishes.

I'll let testimony excerpts speak for themselves after a warning. What the House is promising rural Texans, the Senate is about to take away in a bill masquerading as friendly to progress.

On to the tapes:

Wolens, picking up his scalpel: "If the community says they want DSL and you ... don't want to provide them DSL, you don't want them to be able to go out and get what they want through some other provider. Is that accurate?"

Atwell: "No, that is not accurate. ... I'll get to another point here --"

Wolens: "I want to stay with that point. I like that point. Let's see if we can do this sentence together. If a community wants DSL and the incumbent phone company doesn't want to provide it, the community should not be able to go to another provider to get DSL."

Atwell: "If we have refused to do that, I'm OK with your statement. But we've offered a different capability that gives the same bandwidth --"

Wolens: "OK. ... We can go to your next sentence, which is that you want, if you can provide a like service even if they don't want it, you should be able to do that and the community should not be able to go shop for what they do want."

Atwell: "Now we're on the same page. Yes."

The exchange qualifies as high point as Atwell raised other objections to the bill, such as Verizon's definition of acceptable high-speed access as 128 kilobits per second, or the operating speed of a slow precursor to DSL called ISDN.

"You're required to provide 128 [kilobits] up and down anyway, aren't you?" Wolens asked. "You've been required to do that since 1995. So here you are six years later suggesting that the Legislature require you to do something we required you to do six years ago. Is that right?"

"We're suggesting that as a floor, correct, because it is readily available," Atwell answered.

"What you're saying is that you don't want to do any more than you have been required to do for the last six years, as a floor," Wolens said.

The digitally inclined can hear the rest for themselves at www.house.state.tx.us. Click on "Committees," and then "Audio Files of Meetings" for State Affairs. Atwell got his turn at the microphone almost exactly 10 hours into the meeting.

But a Senate committee's substitute of Senate Bill 1783 may be more important. On the Senate side, 128 kilobits per second is misrepresented as progress. The phone companies can cite ISDN and satellite offerings as proof that small cities are sufficiently wired and don't need DSL.

Meanwhile, cities are asked to petition the Public Utility Commission to be certified as local telephone exchanges before undertaking broadband ventures.

As a final insult, the bill waters down the 1999 mandate to Bell and Verizon to provide equal treatment in small cities by requiring rural customers to present a formal petition to the PUC and wait 15 months for the phone company to respond.

Progress in the Senate is back to 1999, unless the phone companies prefer the 1995 law.

City dwellers, count your blessings, even if the DSL installer stiffed you three times in a row.

- Todd Mason's column appears in Fort Worth Star Telegram on Tuesdays, Thursdays and Sundays.

More nodes announced

(April 12, 2001) GEUS announced today that they will be focusing their cable & Internet construction in four additional areas of the city. Construction in these widely-scattered areas will allow approximately 800 more homes and businesses to have access to the first municipally-owned cable television and high speed Internet operation in Texas. Consumers in these neighborhoods should be able to begin signing up for cable and/or Internet service in June and July of this year.

A node is a section containing approximately 200-250 homes and/or businesses. Node 30 is the area around the intersection of Wesley and Mitchell Ave. Node 25 includes the area around Wesley and Stanford. Node 13 is located on the west side of Greenville in the Wellington and O'Neal area. GEUS anticipates all three of these nodes will be available for hook ups in June 2001. Node 27, which is located near Sayle and Shelby, is expected to be available in July.

Construction of the cable & Internet project in the downtown area is nearing completion. As GEUS announced earlier this year, approximately 600 homes & businesses in that area will have service available to them in June 2001, when the first customer hook-up begin.

Installation of equipment at the head end facility, which will supply programming for the network, is steadily progressing. Equipment has been set up on site and multiple earth station satellite dishes have been installed. The head end is located just East of the GEUS Service Center at 6000 Joe Ramsey Blvd.

GEUS plans to announce channel line up and cable & Internet pricing in May.

Advantage of Municipally- Owned Power Systems becomes Apparent

(AUSTIN, TX - April 9, 2001) - Major changes are underway in the electric utility business with deregulation starting in some parts of Texas. One thing hasn't changed, the consumer orientation and the community value provided by publicly owned municipal electric utilities.

Greenville is one of 73 cities in Texas, which own and operate their local electric utility systems. The municipally owned electric utility here in Greenville has been in operation for 110 years. The citizens of our city are both the customers and the owners of our local electric system. Regardless of changes in the electric business, the mission of our municipal utility will not change: we are in business to provide competitive electric rates, community value, and utility policies, which are responsive to local needs.

Statistics compiled by state and federal authorities have shown that, on average, municipal utilities have the lowest electric rates in the state of Texas. Unlike the customers of private investor-owned utilities in Houston and Dallas - whose electric rates are set by state regulators - your electric rates are set locally by action of the GEUS Board of Trustees. Local participation and cost scrutiny result in reasonable electricity prices in our community. Those who pay determine how much rates will be.

Local control of your municipal utility also means high quality service and utility policies that are responsive to our own local situation. Utility policies concerning service
offerings, maintenance levels, and system reliability are the result of decisions made right here in our community - not by state regulators in Austin.

Rural Telecommunications bills

(April 6, 2001) Representative Steven Wolens (D-Dallas) introduced HB1736 and Senator David Sibley (R-Waco) introduced SB1783. The stated purpose of these bills is to bring advanced broadband services to rural communities. According to Brett Perlman, a PUC commissioner that regulates telecommunication services for private telephone companies in Texas, there are 513 cities in 196 counties with populations under 25,000 that represent 15% of the Texas population that do not have access to high-speed Internet, which is sometimes referred to as the Information Super Highway.

GEUS is participating as part of a consortium of rural cities in support of the overall purpose of these bills. It is important to protect the right of cities to be able to offer these services. The cities are seeking to overturn the present prohibition against municipalities providing telephone service. Texas is only one of 4 states that prohibit municipal participation. It is too early to tell at this point the final outcome.

Representatives from Greenville and other rural cities have testified at the House Public Affairs Committee hearing and the Senate Committee on Business and Commerce recently. The bills generally require private telephone companies to offer advanced broadband services after certain specific conditions are met, such as a given number of bona fide requests for service.

GEUS plans to offer cable TV and high-speed Internet service beginning June 1, 2001, with completion by June 2002 making Greenville the first city to provide advanced broadband services.

Good news for GEUS bond rating!

(February 9, 2001) GEUS recently received very good news from both Standard & Poor's(S&P) and Moody's Investors Service. S&P and Moody's are the premiere bond rating agencies responsible for analyzing companies throughout the world to determine bond issuance risk. Moody's upgraded GEUS from an A3 to an A2 rating while S&P retained GEUS' past rating of A with a Stable Outlook. A Moody A2 and an S&P A rating is traditionally the highest rating given to medium sized utilities.

Both agencies showed confidence in GEUS' financial status, despite electric deregulation problems in California and uncertainty in Texas as it moves toward a deregulated electrical market. Bond rating agencies are now scrutinizing utility financing much more closely than they have in the past. Another factor considered in the Utility's bond rating was the fact that GEUS will be entering a competitive cable television and Internet market in Spring of this year.

S&P backed up the good rating with four factors. Those factors included strong coverage levels, which provide rate flexibility; competitive electric rates; a manageable capital plan; and a stable local economy. Peter Murphy of S&P stated, "Financial operations have been sound as the system generates sufficient surpluses to fund a debt reduction fund and a capital improvement fund". The capital improvement fund is used to upgrade the overall reliability of the GEUS system.

"We are very pleased that the rating agencies have shown this degree of confidence in us as we diversify into the cable television and Internet markets", said Tom Darte, GEUS General Manager.

These improved ratings will allow GEUS to purchase bond insurance for the $7.895 million worth of bonds to be issued at a special meeting on February 14. Insured bonds are issued at a discounted interest rate, meaning substantial savings to GEUS consumers. GEUS will issue revenue bonds to finance improvements to the electric distribution system, which will free up cash for the new cable operation. Security for these bonds will be future GEUS electric revenues. (GEUS is not a taxing entity.) GEUS will pay off some existing bonds while refinancing and issuing new bonds.

GEUS' total indebtedness will be $10.3 million dollars, which is $300,000 less than it owed in 1997. The Utility had $22.3 million in outstanding bonds in 1988.

California Shockwaves? (part 1)

By Brad Kellar
Herald Banner Staff (Jan 28, 2001)

Rolling blackouts, skyrocketing electric bills, public utilities facing bankruptcy-just a few of the problems which California is having to address in dealing with the aftermath of electric deregulation

While most experts believe Texas, which is scheduled to begin electric deregulation in 2002, will be able to avoid many of the same pitfalls, one Greenville electric utility official believes there is a very real possibility a similar nightmare could be on the local horizon and, in fact, may already have begun

General Manager Tom DarteGEUS general manager Tom Darte will be the first to admit he is no fan of electric deregulation and two years ago he was issuing warnings about what might be in store for California.

Still, Darte takes no satisfaction in what has been transpiring on the west coast this winter.

"Basically, I guess you could say it is a disaster," Darte said. "It seems to be a market out of control."

Southern California Edison Co. and Pacific Gas & Electric Co., the state's two largest utilities, say they have lost $12 billion since June because rate caps prevent them from passing on to their 10 million customers the full cost of wholesale electricity.

The caps are part of California's decision to deregulate the electricity industry.

Over the past few weeks, Californians have had to deal with Stage 3 electricity alerts, complete with random rolling blackouts, as the utilities themselves have faced what at one time might have been unthinkable - that they simply don't have enough power to go around.

The State of Texas is on the verge of entering its own electric deregulation era, beginning next year, although the situation in California is causing some state legislators to consider calling for a delay in the process.

Most experts believe the safeguards which are in place in the Texas plan, which was passed in 1999 and which goes in to effect on Jan. 1, 2002, will prevent anything similar from occurring in the state.

Darte is not so sure.

"It looks like we'll be okay for a couple of years," Darte said. "I don't see any shortages in the short run like they have in California, but there is a danger ahead.

Electric deregulation is the process whereby electric utilities, which under state law have previously been restricted to serving specific market areas, will be allowed to begin providing electricity to markets in all areas of the state.

For example, under electric deregulation TXU would be allowed to sell electricity to homes and businesses in communities which it is not currently servicing and compete directly with whatever utility is already there.

TXU is an investor-owned utility (IOU), a privately-owned company which operates to make a profit for its investors.

GEUS is a municipally-owned utility (MOU) which operates on the funds raised by the consumers it serves, namely the residents and businesses in Greenville. GEUS is a non-profit entity and whatever funds it takes in beyond its budget it returns to those consumers.

GEUS and the City of Greenville officials, along with representatives from other MOUs in Texas, worked alongside State Sen. David Cain and others to add provisions to the electric deregulation legislation which would help protect the smaller utilities once deregulation began.

The fear was that the smaller utilities would be unable to compete against the larger companies, such a TXU, on a direct head to head bases and would face the danger of going under.

Those utilities such as GEUS, who had invested heavily in power generating plants like Gibbons Creek or other improvements, would default on millions of dollars in outstanding debt, which inevitably would be passed on the consumers.

Among the most important conditions in the legislation was the stipulation which grants GEUS and other MOUs the opportunity to either "opt in" or "opt out" of deregulation, thereby possibly avoiding a direct showdown.

As of now, GEUS has not made a decision to either opt in or opt out once deregulation begins. Darte said that choice will ultimately be left up to the utility's consumers.

BUT DARTE FORESEES difficulties for utilities across the state, regardless of whether they join in with electric deregulation.

The Energy Reliability Council of Texas (ERCOT) is what is known as the state's Independent System Operator, which regulates the entire power grid which feeds all of the homes and businesses across Texas. Darte was a member of the ERCOT board of trustees until his term expired last month.

"Although there is a lot yet to learn, I feel like I have some grasp of what's happening in Texas," Darte said.

On the positive side, Darte notes how Texas has built and is continuing to build plenty of new plants to generate electricity. And, until recently, all of the state's utilities had voluntarily agreed to install a "generating reserve" of electricity of 15 percent beyond what they would need during any time of the year.

The electricity, should it be needed by another utility during times of peak demand, would be readily available for sale, thereby avoiding much of what is occurring in California.

"It was to protect reliability and Texas has had a great record of reliability by deepening that reserve over the years," Darte said. "This is now a thing of the past."

None of the new electricity producers who are entering the market have agreed to maintain the reserve, Darte said, meaning existing utilities have begun to question the need for their reserves in order to stay competitive.

"That installed reserve costs al lot of money," Darte said. "Who is going to want to install it if they can make a buck by not installing it."

Darte said while on the ERCOT board, he fought hard to reinstate the 15 percent reserve as a requirement. So far, the issue remains under study by the agency.

"I will make a prediction that if that installed reserve is not reinstated, then sometime in the future we are going to have a problem," Darte said. "Reliability will suffer."

There are other factors which have created difficulties in California and which are also creating problems here, even though Darte feels they haven't been as widely publicized in the Lone Star State.

"Right now, we have our own crisis in Texas as far as natural gas prices are concerned," Darte said. "It doesn't seem to get the same attention that California does, because there are no blackouts associated with it."

Natural gas is being used more often, especially in newer plants, to generate electricity. In previous years, the cost of natural gas was so low it was unprofitable for natural gas producers to explore and find new supplies.

Now that demand has increased, and continues to do so as more new generating plants are built, the cost of the natural gas which GEUS and other electric utilities use has jumped fivefold in a little more than a year.

"These costs have to be paid for by the consumer," Darte said. "They are getting double whammy. They are not only having to pay higher prices if they use natural gas for heating their homes, but they are having to pay higher prices for electricity generated by natural gas."

GEUS obtains more than half of its energy from the coal-fired Gibbons Creek plant and earlier this month switched from natural gas to diesel fuel at its local steam electricity generating plant.

Darte noted there has been a public outcry over the enormous hikes in prices that the impacted California utilities are having to pay for purchased power from other utilities during the crisis.

The same situation occurred in Texas last summer, he explained, a problem which was brought about under wholesale electric deregulation, which is what the state is under currently.

"Under a regulated environment…you knew that if you gouged your fellow utility, you'd get gouged back," Darte said. "We didn't need a rule, we just agreed to provide emergency power at a modest price increase. But now as we move to a deregulated environment, price gouging is definitely taking place. You can't say that everything is wonderful in Texas. There are problems already surfacing and it is apt to get worse."

- Reprinted with permission from Greenville Herald Banner

Officials question deregulation safety (Part 2)

By Brad Kellar
Herald Banner Staff (Jan 29, 2001)

News reports regarding California's current energy crisis have placed the blame squarely on the measures taken by the state's government a few years ago to deregulate the market for buying and selling electricity.

Many of the same analysts who point to the faults in California's system for electric deregulation have also heaped praise on the legislation adopted by the
Texas Legislature in 1999 and note the same problems won't happen here.

One local electric utility official disagrees and warns that even if everything proceeds as planned when electric deregulation goes into effect on Jan. 1,
2002, Greenville residents may eventually pay the price.

Second of a two-part series.

Two years ago, the State Legislature drafted and approved a bill which calls for electric deregulation in Texas beginning on Jan. 1, 2002.

Lawmakers and utility officials claimed the measure would lead to lower electric bills and greater reliability. Many of the same promises were made to California residents in 1996, when that state passed its own electric deregulation legislation.

But California has been suffering through an electricity nightmare this winter, with rolling blackouts, skyrocketing electricity costs and public utilities reportedly on the verge of bankruptcy and unable to afford to purchase emergency power from other electricity producers.

Analysts said the state's difficulties stem from the legislation which ordered utilities to sell their power plants and buy wholesale power, but capped the rates they could charge customers.

Unforeseen rises in the price of the natural gas used to generate electricity and an assortment of other, smaller, problems have combined to create the chaos in California.

Energy experts have said Texas will likely avoid such dilemmas. They note how the state's deregulation plan includes none of the harmful provisions that California's legislation entailed.

Moreover, Texas has opened 22 new power plants since 1995 and 15 more are to go online by 2002. And yet Tom Darte, general manager of GEUS (formerly known as the Greenville Electric Utility System) feels there are still plenty of reasons to worry, even if everything goes as planned next year. It's the potential for unexpected bugs in the system which has been bothering Darte as the deadline draws closer.

"Some people say the market will take care of it and I believe the market will take care of it," Darte said. "But what are the consequences in the meantime until it does? That's what concerns me."

Until his term expired in December, Darte was a member of the Energy Reliability Council of Texas (ERCOT) board of trustees. ERCOT is the state's Independent System Operator and regulates the entire power grid which feeds all of the homes and businesses across Texas.

As such, Darte has had hands-on experience in preparing for the transition to electric deregulation. Darte said the more he has seen of the plan, the more questions he has been raising about what may happen. For example, while the building of new power plants
may mean enough electricity is generated for the near future, Darte noted more should be done to correct shortfalls in the ability to transmit that power to where it will be needed.

"We already have transmission constraints in Texas," Darte said.

Although there are several transmission construction projects already underway, problems are still expected in shuttling sufficient power through the corridor from Houston to Dallas to meet growing demand. The bottleneck has already on occasion impacted GEUS, which gets much of its electricity from Gibbons Creek in south central Texas.

"We may be able to solve the problem for the short term," Darte said. But it is a problem Darte sees as only getting worse, and for a surprisingly simple reason. "In the past, utilities would try to build the plant near where the load was, the load being where the high usage is," Darte said. "Now, under the new deregulation law, you can build generators anywhere and serve any load any place. It is going to take more transmission to be able to do that. Who is going to pay for that transmission? The market participants, you and I, are going to pay for it."

Darte believes the promises of lower electricity costs under deregulation will be no more than a myth, no matter what happens.

"It's going to allow more people to get into the business to make money," Darte said. "This is about making money. This is not about the public saving money." By way of illustration, Darte notes how, even if there are no unexpected snags associated with electric deregulation in Texas, the process itself will prevent residential consumers from gaining any substantial benefits, due to costs inherent with utilities adjusting to the new system.

"There are several different areas where it is going to cost more due to deregulation," Darte said. Utilities are going to have to pay more to sell the bonds needed to pay for generation and transmission projects, he said, because investors realize there is more risk involved.

"You no longer have a guaranteed market," Darte explained.

Advertising and marketing expenses will have to be incurred.

"You didn't have to advertise in a regulated market," Darte said. "Now, millions and millions of dollars are going to be spent on advertising and marketing that wasn't done before."

ERCOT's budget alone, Darte said, has grown from $7 million in 1999 to $45 million this year. The original prediction was that ERCOT would need to spend some $93 million for the computers and equipment needed to monitor deregulation in Texas.

"The latest estimate I've heard is as much as $150 million," Darte indicated, adding GEUS itself has spent $100,000 just on lawyers and consultants to keep tabs on all the possible consequences of deregulation. All utilities joining in deregulation are having to contribute a total of $65 million to a "system benefit fund", to compensate low-income counties for the loss of property tax revenues for devalued power plants.

Which brings up when, or if, Greenville will "opt in" to deregulation.

Under the Texas legislation, GEUS and other municipally-owned utilities have the option whether to enter the fray.

Should it opt out, Darte said GEUS will have to chip in for statewide renewable energy projects and the like, as well as face having to go head to head with utility giants like TXU.

"Opting-in carries a cost with it and that cost is substantial," Darte said.

On the plus side is the opportunity to market and sell power to communities outside of Greenville, with the potential for additional revenue.

There is no timetable as to when GEUS will decide the issue. Darte said that choice will ultimately be left up to the utility's consumers.

If the utility opts in, Darte believes outside utilities would immediately target local industrial customers with lower electric rates. Any lost revenue would have to be passed on to the remaining GEUS consumers, namely smaller businesses and residential customers. But Darte asserted it is a scenario which will occur in Greenville regardless of whether the utility opts in or opts out. He said the nature of the business dictates GEUS would have to attempt to match what is being offered by outside utilities to industries in other parts of the state.

Otherwise, there would be little to keep those industries from relocating to those areas where electricity is cheaper.

"We can't remain an island," Darte said. "We will have to remain competitive with our industrial rates, if we are going to keep those industries in Greenville."

- Reprinted with permission from Greenville Herald Banner

Jim Tyler to manage the new cable operation

(January 25, 2001) GEUS announced today the hiring of Jim Tyler to manage the new cable operation. Tyler brings close to twenty years of both cable management and technical expertise to the GEUS project. Tyler's initial task will be to oversee the construction of the first municipally-owned cable operation in the state of Texas. As the cable television and high speed Internet network becomes operational in spring 2001, Tyler's responsibilities will evolve into maintenance and operation of the new network.

Tyler will be hiring approximately six employees to assist him with the operation of the system and the production of local cable programming. Included in these plans is a local daily news broadcast. "I am very excited about the state-of-the-art cable television & Internet system that is currently being built in Greenville", said Jim Tyler, New GEUS Cable and Internet Supervisor. "The redundant feeds that are being built into this network should result in a very reliable system for years to come", added Tyler.

Channel 11 visits Greenville

Tom Darte being interviewed by Channell 11(January 8, 2001) CBS Channel 11 had a news crew in Greenville today filming a segment on GEUS' recent decision to begin burning No. 2 Fuel Oil. Fuel Oil, instead of natural gas, is being used to produce electricity at the GEUS Power Plant in northwestern Greenville. CBS Reporter Marisol Calvillo interviewed GEUS General Manager Tom Darte and Greenville resident Roy Baker while in Greenville. Darte discussed the decision to begin using fuel oil while Baker focused more on the increased cost of electricity due to the natural gas price spikes. CBS was alerted to this story by a Greenville Herald Banner article that ran on January 6th. The segment is scheduled to air at 5 P.M. this afternoon on CBS Channel 11.

Line Men Honored

GEUS line crews honored.

(January 2, 2001) GEUS recently held a luncheon honoring the cold weather efforts of its line and tree trimming crews. Line crews were able to maintain power to most all of the system's 13,000 customers despite two recent winter storms that left a layer of ice on power lines and trees. Much of the success is being attributed to GEUS' year round tree trimming program Ice broken limbs interupt power serviceand ongoing distribution line maintenance program. "Icy tree limbs can cripple an electrical distribution system", said GEUS Assistant General Manager David McCalla. "Tree trimming efforts are directly related to a system's reliability", McCalla added. GEUS tree trimming crews work to maintain proper clearance around the system's power lines and fiber optics network throughout the year. Consumers wanting more information concerning the tree trimming methods used by GEUS crews can visit the tree trimming area of the this web site. GEUS is also replacing many of the system's transmission poles in order to maintain reliable power for the future.

Fuel Change at power Plant Saves Money

(January 5, 2000) GEUS recently began using No. 2 Fuel Oil instead of natural gas to produce electricity at the Power Plant located in northwest Greenville. The grade of No. 2 Fuel Oil, commonly known as diesel, that is being used is the cleanest burning grade which contains very low levels of sulphur. "Natural gas prices have recently reached levels five times higher than they were just fourteen months ago", said Tom Darte, GEUS General Manager. Fuel oil becomes economically feasible to use in electric generation when natural gas prices rise to a certain level. Darte added, "The increased costs of burning natural gas, that we have had to pass on to consumers, has been lessened by our ability to burn coal and oil". Darte was referring to the coal-fired Gibbons Creek Plant near Bryan, Texas which not only produces a majority of Greenville's power, but also produces electricity for the cities of Garland, Denton and Bryan.

"Fuel Oil was last used in this plant in 1996 and 1989", said Kevin Warren, GEUS Acting Plant Superintendent. "In a normal market situation, natural gas is a much cheaper source of fuel than oil. This is certainly not a normal natural gas market", added Warren. GEUS has the capability of storing 230,000 gallons of fuel oil.

Cold weather is compounding the natural gas shortage problem. The National Weather Service at DFW International Airport is reporting the average temperature for this past month to be 39.4 degrees Fahrenheit. This tied the record for the third coldest December in history. December 2000's average temperature was 12.1 degrees colder than the same month in 1999. Click here for a more detailed history of this areas temperatures.

Ground Breaking Ceremony

(December 15, 2000) GEUS broke ground today on the first municipally-owned cable television operation in Texas. The ceremony was held on the grounds of the GEUS Service Center at the site where the Utility will house the head end equipment that transforms the television programming to be sent throughout the community. It was announced during this ceremony that Greenville's downtown area would be the first section of town to receive service. GEUS will be offering both digital cable television and high speed cable modem Internet service. Citizens interested in knowing whether their home or business is included in this first construction can go to the new GEUS web site at www.geus.org to view maps showing specific areas of construction. GEUS crews are working in these areas now trimming trees and moving wires on some poles. This work is being done to allow for faster installation of the fiber and coaxial wire that will be installed by contractors. The project is on pace to allow for the first hook ups to begin around spring, 2001. GEUS plans to have service available to the whole Greenville community by spring of 2002. "We expect this project to bring both an economic boost to the community and competition to the local cable television market", said Tom Darte, GEUS General Manager.

Cable Contract Announced

(December 8, 2000) GEUS announced today that the GEUS Board of Trustees authorized the execution of an $8.2 million cable construction contract with VECTREN Communications Services. VECTREN, formerly SIGCORP Communications, has been under contract with GEUS to offer multiple services involving the cable television and high speed Internet project in the past. This new contract covers the material and construction of the head end equipment and the outside plant that will stretch throughout the city. "VECTREN is very experienced in the design, construction and operation of hybrid fiber coaxial networks", said Tom Darte, GEUS General Manager. "GEUS crews will begin working with VECTREN crews beginning next week", added Darte.

GEUS will be holding a public hearing on December 14, 2000 concerning the issuance of bonds for both the cable operation and for improvements to the electrical distribution system. The issuance calls for $4.5 million to be issued for the $8.2 million cable project. The remainder of the project will be paid for out of GEUS cash reserves. The VECTREN contract is subject to the successful issuance of the GEUS bonds.

GEUS has projected for several months that they would be able to hook the first customers up by spring 2001. "This contract specifically calls for VECTREN to have the network available for the first hookups by spring, 2001", said David McCalla, GEUS Assistant General Manager. These new services should be available to all Greenville citizens by Spring 2002.

GEUS has also retained Danny Leinart and Jack Howard under a construction management agreement for the construction of a building to house the cable operation's head end equipment. Leinart and Howard will also be responsible for the construction of the cable operation's production studio. The studio, which will be used to film the daily news and other programs, will be located in the GEUS Service Center Building. A local newscast has been a part of GEUS's plans since focus group studies showed the public was very interested.

GEUS to hold public hearing

(December 4, 2000) GEUS will be holding a public hearing on December 14, 2000 to announce that it will be paying off all of its existing electric debt. GEUS then plans to issue a total of $9.75 million in revenue bonds for improvements to its electrical distribution system and for the construction of the first municipally-owned cable television operation in Texas. The cable project will be funded with $4.5 million of the total bond issuance plus additional cash from GEUS. This move lowers GEUS's total debt to a level below the $10.6 million owed in 1997. "GEUS's ability to aggressively pay down its debt over the past several years has allowed us to substantially reduce the amount of money to be borrowed for the construction of the new cable operation", said Tom Darte, GEUS General Manager. "Even with the additional cable operation debt, GEUS will owe less money than it did in 1997", Darte added. The public hearing will be on December 14, 2000 at 6:15 in the GEUS Service Center. This hearing will be held in conjunction with the December GEUS Board of Trustees regular meeting.

The time has come

Tom Darte, General Manager of GEUSIn a recent issue of the GEUS Consumer Update newsletter, General Manager Tom Darte referred to a conversation he had several years ago with a leading citizen. He "practically begged me to go into the cable television business" said Darte.

At the time, the utility's focus was on lowering electric rates and improving service to consumers. Darte cites current emphasis on competition and diversification in the electric utility industry as a new priority, as many utilities, both public and private, move toward offering "bundled services".

"Our municipal, non-profit status gives our consumer owners an advantage," said Darte. Cable television rates are expected to decrease not only for GEUS subscribers, but for subscribers to other cable providers in the area as competition drives prices down. "The citizens of the community we serve have a right to serve themselves with cable television and high-speed Internet services."

Consumer surveys conducted earlier this year indicated widespread support for the new services. GEUS established a Channel Advisory Committee to analyze consumer input and devise a suggested list of channels available to GEUS cable TV subscribers.

The new services are expected to be available to some subscribers as early as Spring 2001.

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