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Governor Andrew Cuomo is finishing the job of destroying Long Island’s power grid and finances under LIPA that his father started under LILCO.
Privatization step 1: Governor Mario Cuomo sold Long Island down the river to LILCO (Long Island Lighting Company) buying giving them our money and sticking the taxpayers with a failed nuclear plant and its debt. So Long Islanders basically bailed LILCO investors out for the stupid decision to put a nuclear power plant on an island with millions of people. Even more brilliant we didn’t get any of the LILCO’s working power plants, they were sold off to National Grid. Cuomo The laws that originally the public power authority LIPA included the ability for voters to elect the LIPA board of directors. that was taken out of the law before any election could be held. LILCO got the gold, and we got the shaft.
Privatization step 2: Governor Andrew Cuomo wants to take away the shaft. He wants to turn LIPA into a shell that outsources all functions, and to finance the continuation of privately-owned global warming causing fossil fuel power plants. Now, more than ever, there is a desperate need for visionary leadership. Instead Cuomo gives us fracking and kills a massive wind farm on the Great Lakes. We must turn LIPA into a model of sustainable energy. Long Island has the ability to harvest solar and offshore wind on a grand scale. The Dowling study of offshore wind said it was financially sustainable if done with public bonds. If LIPA had elected directors we could have a public debate of its direction, and vote for leaders who would take it into the future rather than the past.
None of these ideas are new. I discussed them in a 2008 post NY Governor Paterson vetoes bill to provide LIPA accountability which was quoted in Karl Grossman’s 2009 article, Why should LIPA be afraid of Suffolk?:
“LIPA was supposed to become the people’s power authority. That has not happened,” declares Ian Wilder of North Babylon, [former] co-chair of the Green Party of New York State, on his website. “When LIPA was first set up, there were supposed to be elected members of the LIPA board … That never happened. They are all appointed; with no accountability to the public … Vetoing a bill that the legislators passed to try to give some accountability is just another step backward.”
Related
- LI Dem Electeds Support Nuclear Power
- Unhappy with LIPA?
- My LI Pulse Green Energy Rant: Director’s Cut
- LIPA/NYPA: Don’t Bailout National Grid
Filed under: Action Alert!, activism, Ecology, economy, election, energy, Environment, Global Warming, local, long island, Long Island news, Long Island Politics, News, politics, safety, Solar, suffolk, suffolk county, sustainability, sustainable Tagged: | andrew cuomo, Karl Grossman, LILCO, LIPA, Long Island Power Authority, Mario Cuomo, National Grid
[…] Tell Gov. Cuomo: LIPA needs Elections, not more Privatization August 11, 2012 […]
[…] in 1985, Governor Mario Cuomo drove the bus over Long Islanders by saddling us with LILCO’s bad decisions on Shoreham Nuclear Power Plant and the monumental debt it incurred while he sold off all the valuable assets of LILCO to a private company. Now Governor Andrew Cuomo is trying to back the bus back over us by taking away the little we have left and putting us back under another LILCO. No thanks. This is explained in more detail in our August 11, 2012 post Tell Gov. Cuomo: LIPA needs Elections, not more Privatization […]