PORT HADLOCK — Jefferson County Public Utility District commissioners have entered into a confidentiality agreement with Puget Sound Energy, taking negotiations over PUD’s proposed acquisition of PSE’s county facilities behind closed doors.
“It’s to the best interest of the PUD to do it that way,” said Portland attorney Kirk Gibson, contracted to counsel PUD officials through negotiations with Puget Sound Energy executives. “We’re in a letter of confidentiality.”
Following a closed executive session Wednesday with Gibson, the PUD commissioners agreed to no longer discuss the negotiations in public.
Gibson, choosing his words carefully Thursday, said, “We’re involved in a discussion, we’re making progress, and I can’t say anything else under the agreement.”
Confidentiality agreement
Gibson said he signed a letter Wednesday on behalf of the PUD, agreeing to PSE’s conditions of confidentiality.
“It’s a way to go into frank talks and to encourage it,” Gibson explained.
“We are behind closed doors trying to do it in the best interests of Jefferson County.”
Karl Karzmar, PSE director of regulatory relations and liaison to Jefferson PUD, further explained the reasons the company wanted to take talks out of the public eye.
“The nature of the discussions are very complicated and deal with very confidential matters,” Karzmar said.
“For that purpose, and given the threatened action of condemnation by Jefferson County, PSE and Jefferson County agreed that the utilization of legal tools to protect the confidentiality of the discussions would be appropriate.”
PUD Commissioner Dana Roberts on Thursday confirmed that the commissioners “agreed with Puget to have kind of a veil of all but silence.
“We’re on the move, but I wouldn’t call them giant steps yet.”
Roberts assured that PUD progress reports would still be made as negotiations developed.
PUD leaders, including commissioners Chairman Wayne King and General Manager Jim Parker, have met PSE Chief Executive Officer Steve Reynolds and Karzmar to discuss negotiations.
The last public business the PUD commissioners discussed and approved two weeks ago was a “Request for Information” list of 22 items that they handed to Karzmar.
“I felt that they sincerely are going to work with us,” King said of PSE executives at the time.
King said he informed Reynolds up front that PUD has never considered going through condemnation proceedings to acquire PSE’s facilities in the county.
Seattle law firm Perkins Coie is representing PSE in the negotiations.
Gibson is from the Portland, Ore. firm of Ater Wynne Attorneys at Law, which has handled other such utility acquisitions.
The PUD list asked what PSE considers fair market value for its East Jefferson County facilities and requested a power distribution and transmission system map for the county, total property taxes PSE paid the county in 2008 and the total number of customer accounts, energy sales and demand and revenues.
Other information requested was the number of miles of overhead and underground transmission lines, the year of installation for all east county substations and a detailed list of any known reliability issues in the county.
Budgeting about $250,000 this year, the PUD commissioners have assembled a team of advisers to evaluate the elements involved in developing a community-owned electric utility.
PSE has served Jefferson County for more than 100 years and its executives campaigned hard against Proposition 1, which county voters approved in last November’s general election.
PSE now serves about 17,900 customers in East Jefferson County.
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Port Townsend-Jefferson County Editor Jeff Chew can be reached at 360-385-2335 or at jeff.chew@peninsuladailynews.com.
