Autumn Johnson talks about Salt River Project: a publicly-owned Arizona utility engaged in some shady behavior. The public’s only accountability measure? Board members who are elected by land-owning customers and punished for their dissension.… Read More
For our final Building Local Power episode of 2022, we invited Co-Founder, David Morris, to offer a history lesson on the self-reliance framework that underpins ILSR’s work. He discusses how that framework has evolved over four-plus decades, the organization’s inherent aversion to bigness, and the successes and hardships of ILSR’s early years. … Read More
Ted Thomas, former chair of the Arkansas Public Service Commission, discusses access, fairness, cost shifts, utility monopolies, and innovation in the electricity sector.… Read More
On this episode of Building Local Power, Christopher Mitchell and Sean Gonsalves talk about the work that immediately lies ahead for the broad array of communities seeking to free themselves from the unbridled power of monopolistic Internet providers.… Read More
Derek Cressman and Fatima Malik, who both ran for seats on the Sacramento Municipal Utility District (SMUD) board, describe the evolution of SMUD, how the public utility is failing its customers, and share their proposed solutions.… Read More
Stacy Mitchell explains on Pitchfork Economics how for the last forty years, merging companies have convinced regulatory agencies that their merger will be better for customers — most often pledging that it will lower prices. Stacy argues that the company’s statement promising to pass savings on to consumers is blatantly false.… Read More
On this episode of Building Local Power, three members of ILSR’s Independent Business team, Lauren Gellatly, Katy Milani, and Kennedy Smith, answer: What challenges are small, independent businesses facing? And what legislative solutions are on the way? … Read More
Host John Farrell is joined by Jesse Gray and David Mendels. They discuss the six provisions in the Municipal Climate Empowerment Plan, state legislation that would enable Massachusetts communities to tackle their clean energy challenges with local solutions and greater local funding.… Read More
The three members from ILSR’s energy team engage in a riveting conversation on the biggest energy stories from 2022, including the Inflation Reduction Act’s big funding for solar, the antimonopoly focus in the Biden administration, how utility companies are continuing to use their financial power to lobby against energy, and a new tool designed to bring distributed solar to more communities.… Read More
