In a blog post Tuesday, P-I "Strange Bedfellows" blogger Joel Connelly explained Puget Sound Energy's backing of a campaign to stop three WA counties from forming their own public utility districts.

"The utility has put $150,000 into creating "astroturf" citizen groups in Island, Skagit and Jefferson Counties, where initiatives on the ballot would create PUDs to take over electrical service."

Joel goes to great lengths to expose the carefully disguised underpinnings of a public affairs campaign to keep ratepayers in those counties as customers of PSE.

The argument given to Joel by the public affairs firm was that Bonneville wouldn't have enough power to serve the new utilities. That, he threatened, would force BPA to cut the electricity it supplies to existing PUDs.

Sue Ellen White's Whidbey Examiner article "Anti-PUD group well-funded front for utility" goes into more detail about the political action groups -- none of which have local members or local offices, she reports.

Supporters of the PUD initiatives said the benefits would be more stable service, lower electric rates, and new, local jobs. They also promise more investment in renewable energy.

Could it be true? Many PUDs are political-bureaucratic quagmires with reputations for bad service.

Related:
"Choice on PUD proposal is simple" (South Whidbey Record)