Power Plant Seeks to Remake Huntington Council Into a More Friendly Audience

Energy giant AES is backing an effort to radically reshape Huntington Beach government, which would give it an edge in a series of battles with City Hall.

AES has contributed $7,500 to a campaign by former Assemblyman Scott Baugh that would reduce the City Council to five members from seven and switch from citywide to district elections. Baugh, who works for a law firm that represents AES, hopes to place the measure on the November ballot.

The energy company said it’s frustrated with repeated clashes with the City Council, most notably over a proposal to tax the natural gas used by the company’s Huntington Beach power complex, which voters rejected in March. Changing the way the council is elected might prove beneficial to the firm, company officials said.

“We were thinking of ways to get around this thing, and this ballot initiative would perhaps change the whole thought process in the city,” said Ed Blackford, a senior project manager for AES. District elections “have worked well elsewhere.”

Huntington Beach officials said they will oppose the measure, calling it an attempt at political payback from a wealthy company that wants to get its way.

“This is not the first company to try to influence local politics,” Mayor Debbie Cook said.

“I would be upset if people support this initiative,” she said. “It would really show how out of touch people are with local government.”

AES and the city have had a rocky relationship for several years. During last year’s energy crisis, the state gave AES fast-track approval to restart two Huntington Beach generators that had been idle since 1995. But the City Council unsuccessfully fought the move, saying the generators would cause excessive pollution and noise.

The city then proposed a ballot measure that would require AES to pay an estimated $2.3-million municipal utility tax for its power plants. The ballot measure contained the line: “The AES plant is ugly, pollutes our air, and our ocean.” The company sued to strike the ballot language, which it says was unfair and inaccurate. Compromise language was eventually worked out, but the measure failed at the ballot box.

Baugh contends that the current council system, in which the seven members are elected at-large, has favored coastal and environmental issues at the expense of inland concerns.

The council has long ignored the city’s aging sewer system and other pressing issues, he said.

The result, he said, has been a “billion-dollar infrastructure problem related to sewers and roads. We’re the only city in the county that can’t fix our infrastructure to the tune of a billion dollars.”

His solution would be to have five council members elected by districts instead of seven elected citywide.

District representation would make council members more accountable to residents and reduce the cost of running for office, he said.

It would also ensure that all sections of the city are represented at City Hall, he said.

“What we are trying to accomplish here is to create a structure where the City Council is focusing on what their primary duties are: sewers, roads, water, police and fire,” Baugh said.

“We’re tapping into the feelings of people throughout the neighborhoods of Huntington Beach who don’t like the structure of the council.”

Baugh expects to spend $100,000 on the campaign. Volunteers and paid workers are circulating petitions at malls and supermarkets to collect the 16,000 signatures of registered voters needed by June to qualify for the November ballot.

Cook and other Huntington Beach officials reject Baugh’s criticism, saying they suspect the real motive is to produce a City Council more friendly to AES and other businesses.

“To get that amount of signatures, you have to pay for it, and where’s the money going to come from?” Councilman Ralph Bauer said. “It’s gotta come from someplace.”