Bielarski: Fact or Fiction, Part 3
Letter to the editor
Is the GRU Authority trying to silence the will of the voter?
Purpose
As the general manager under the Gainesville City Commission for several years and the CEO under the nearly new GRU Authority (GRUA), I am uniquely qualified to provide perspective on the rhetoric you may be hearing about GRU’s current governance. To help navigate this rocky road, each week, I will address a new subject that I think needs clarification or, in some cases, is simply untrue. If you have specific questions about GRU or want to clear up something you’ve heard, please feel free to email me at bielarskiej@gru.com.
Claim
The GRUA is trying to silence the will of the voter, through its filing of lawsuits to either stop a referendum or nullify it.
Facts
GRUA is protecting the rights of GRU customers disenfranchised by the City Commission, honoring the will of the Florida Legislature, following Gainesville’s City Charter, and holding the City Commission accountable.
Key Point #1: Given the fact that HB 1645 is the law, the GRUA is mounting legal challenges in support of Gainesville’s City Charter, not contrary to it.
House Bill 1645, signed into law in 2023, granted representational rights to customers living outside Gainesville’s city limits based on “the ratio of total electric meters serving GRU customers outside the city boundaries to electric meters serving all GRU customers.” The state was granted the right to appoint one Authority member if that ratio is under 40% and two members if it is 40% or above, to represent the city’s extraterritorial customer interests — a fair, novel, and democratic process.
This newly created representational right was the first time in GRU’s over-100-year history that non-city GRU customers were given a “seat at the table” to decide how the utility would be governed. The magnitude of this right, granted by the elected Florida Legislature, cannot be overstated, and those rights demand protection by the GRUA.
Key Point #2: The City Commission is attempting to disenfranchise almost 40,000 GRU customers.
If the November referendum is successful, the City Commission would resume governance of GRU, eliminating governing board representation for about a third of GRU’s electric customers. Through its legal defense of HB 1645, the Authority is protecting those customers’ representational rights.
In a further twist, many claiming the will of the voters is being denied are more invested in granting voting rights to students temporarily living on campus — who aren’t GRU electric customers — than maintaining the representational rights of GRU customers living outside the city.
Key Point #3: The City Commission is trying to silence the GRUA, the Florida Legislature, and the courts by undermining the judicial process and fundamental due process.
Ostensibly, the Authority’s opponents are trying to dissolve the board and remove it as a plaintiff for its appeals. GRUA’s opponents are seeking to disband the Authority, even though its existence is a matter of law and it is responsible for protecting representational rights of non-city customers, a most democratic principle.
The judicial and legislative branches balance the will of the people. GRUA opponents refuse to recognize that the Commission voted for an ordinance creating a referendum in direct contravention of the Authority’s right to an appeal. The referendum would remove the Authority from the City Charter and effectively deny it the appeal process. This frightening omission should strike fear in the hearts of our residents as an affront to democracy.
GRU CEO Ed Bielarski, Gainesville
Click here to read Part 1 in the series.
Click here to read Part 2 in the series.
The opinions expressed by letter or opinion writers are their own and do not necessarily represent the views of AlachuaChronicle.com. Assertions of facts in letters are similarly the responsibility of the author. Letters may be submitted to info@alachuachronicle.com and are published at the discretion of the editor.
Wish you would’ve won Mayor, Ed. Thanks for trying to help save our city and its most valuable asset. Unfortunately, in San Frainesville, Liberalism exceeds Common Sense.
Gainesville’s ruling oligarchs are torn. They want revenues from GRU non-citizens, but not the voters. If they got the voters too, the rulers would lose elections and their DEI sidewalks altogether. They can’t risk that.
Taxation without representation 250 years later 💩👹👺👿
I read and studied Bielarski’s three part series and he convinced me. I used to be for the city controlling GRU and now I’m for the GRU Authority retaining control.
#1) The Bielarski lawsuit intends to prevent Gville citizens from voting, from having our voices heard because he knows voters will speak again with the same voice.
2018 = 60% rejected the idea of an Authority governance model
2022 = 58% rejected Bielarkski’s bid for mayor
2024 = 73% rejected an Authority model again
2025 = the trend is in favor of the people of Gainesville
#2) HB1645 as written and implemented by the state legislature that intentionally disenfranchised ALL customers of GRU: No GRU customers were given the right to vote for/against HB1645. No GRU customers were allowed to vote for/against any of the appoint of any of the Authority members. The 2025 referendum will restore democracy.
#3) There’s been due process all over the place. Beilarski just hates it when our side exercises our rights and utilizes the courts and political processes and actually wins where it counts: at the ballot box.
Ok Susan,
You totally ignored the fact that GRU customers outside city limits used to have less recourse than the average FP&L customer.
The GRUA puts these customers on the same footing as those within city limits. Is it a perfect system? No, but its a lot fairer to those outside city limits.
I would prefer that GRU were run like a co-op, where customers voted in the GRUA board members (or at least approved their retention).
Susan, you seem to subscribe to a version of democracy that avoids history.
We had an election and the GRU board was created. That election represented everyone who buys GRU power.
The election you want does not include those of us who live outside city limits and are required to buy GRU power.
Tell us how your version of democracy does not violate the rights of those of us who do not live within the city and until recently had no representation in GRU?
Dude, there was no such election for the GRU board and being a customer does not give you control of it’s profits. Cripes, what nonsense.
The board was appointed after the election.
This is a fact.
Still not making sense.
Susan,
Here is the history of the bill that created the authority.
https://www.flsenate.gov/Session/Bill/2023/1645
This bill was passed and signed into law after the regional election that removed city authority over GRU.
Simple facts: We would not be here without the election.
Some people want an election that limits who can vote because they want to over ride a previous election’s results.
To That Guy:
Seriously, please do your research before you spout STUPIDITY.
The GRUAB WAS NOT APPOINTED AFTER THE 2024 ELECTION.
The GRUAB was appointed by meatball maggot bootlicker dictator in March 2023.
Than the GRUAB all resigned.
Than the maggot morons took over again.
How about all of you maggot chumpers MOVE to Chump land in Margologo.
With your fake idol !
HANDS OFF GRU.
HANDS OFF ALACHUA COUNTY !
https://www.wcjb.com/2024/03/14/gru-authority-board-members-all-resign-due-lawsuit-challenging-their-appointments/
Seek help for your TDS and DAD. You are wanning
You said, “We had an election and the GRU board was created”. When? You can’t make up your own “facts”.
The truth, the real fact is the 2018 was election where voters were asked whether they wanted an Authority style of governance and it lost by 60%. Then in 2024 we were allowed to vote on whether to abolish the Authority and 73% of people said YES!
To That Guy:
✨Do you remember the NOVEMBER 2024 Alachua County Election ?
https://www.wcjb.com/2024/11/06/gainesville-residents-vote-return-oversight-gru-back-city-commission/
✨In which GRU Governance was VOTED ON BY 73 % of the Good People.
✨The Vote was to disband the GRUAB.
💚And, to return GRU to the Good People & the City of GNV.
☝️DO YOUR RESEARCH FIRST.
🙀Stop listening to Fox.
🌺THINK OUTSIDE THE BOX.
Gee Susan, you cant use simple logic and the principles of ownership and democracy here! These people swear up is down, that they have a right to not only decide how an entity they buy from uses it’s money, but also state clearly that they think their opinions of legal policies pursued by a democratic government of which they are not a member should be taken account of.
How did this happen? Elected officials – by the way, not elected in Gainesville – of a party in power in the state, just took away ownership rights of a local government usually ruled by an elected – in Gainesville – different party.
Hey, this “Free Florida”. Free control of other peoples property and government without compensation.
What’s especially depressing is the unprincipled and illogic demonstrated by those self interested customers and a very well paid administrator trying to justify the unjustifiable.
Jazz: the c of g is subservient to the state of Florida. The governor was elected by the people…and there’s your democracy and representative government.
DeSantis – like Trump – and the state GOP have abused their office to extend their powers pver local governments, other elected officials, and even businesses in ways not intended by previous existing laws. If you favor that, I don’t. I thought conservatives stood for small government.
From the gillum voter
Bottched and F$@*ed up as always.
1) How is it keeping Gainesville citizens from voting?
2) The City Commission has for years disenfranchised voters. The rainbow sidewalks, converting NW 8th Ave. to a bicycle lane, bio-fiasco, prior to the Authority – excessive rate increases…on and on. Financial incompetence.
3) There’s a difference between due process and frivolous abuse of tax funds and the legal system. Stop taking pages from Trump’s playbook.
You and your kind have botched things up enough already.
Go crawl into a hole somewhere and let nature run its course.
1) The Authority is trying to file lawsuits to prevent the referendum from appearing on the ballot, and to invaldiate the election results if they don’t like the outcome. Very Trumpian.
2) City Commission does not have the power to allow non-city residents to vote in city elections. If county GRU customers feel disenfranchised, they can either move into the city or ask to be annexed into the city.
3) Ad hominen attacks are childish and show an especially impotent mindset when you’re too afraid to post as your real self, with your real name.
Don’t you have something or someone else to bottch up?
1) Idiots like you have and are trying to undue legislation that was previously enacted. Very f#@$ed up.
2) The City Commission could make a resolution within the Charter to allow non-residents who are subjected to GRU usage to vote specifically for GRU items. You are delirious.
3) Just because many of us don’t lie down with those you do doesn’t mean we don’t value our anonymity. I’ve seen the ways you’ve influenced those you’ve proclaimed fealty to, and how you’ve gotten them to do your bidding.
Like I said, crawl in a hole and let nature take its course. At the very least, stop being a hypocrite.
Get real
Susan: I did not vote for going biomass which put GRU $2billion in debt …Hanrahan & co were so eager to stop climate change a la Kyoto protocol which the US was not a signatory to.
I’m in the County. I’m stuck with GRU and I can’t vote for the board because I’m in the county paying for GRU. Remember the little clown cars at the circus going in circles. If I have to buy GRU where are my voting rights?
Sorry Susan….not buying your so called ‘facts’. Looks like you’ve lived up to your name again…and ‘bottched’ this argument too.
She known for selling herself out to certain groups.
Link?
Look it up
Naturally, Susan conveniently ignores the facts that the 2018 vote was because the GNVCC rigged it so THEY would be picking the board members and with veto power on anything they did. 2022 and all elections in the city and county have required approval of the local Democrat machine for at least the last 20 ruinous years. 2024 was thrown out by the courts, and the so called “trend” is based on UF students being encouraged to vote as GNV residents, even though they have neither a dog in the race or even care about local politics.
Get a life
Funny how you start off complaining that your voice isn’t being heard. Too bad you refused to listen to all the folks who tried to tell you what a bad deal the GREC PPA was before the plant was built and despite the deletion of the back out clause, we still could have found a way to get out of such a bad deal for Gainesville. But no, you wouldn’t listen because making an energy speculator from Boston rich was more important than listening to anyone who got in the way of making sure the bad deal went down no matter what. Now you’re doing everything you can, no matter the cost to get your cash cow back, including spreading lies about some boogeyman who took GRU away from us, instead of the truth, that your friends already sold GRU to Wall Street bond holders.
Waldo residents are GRU customers, we all use wastewater treatment. GRU has been a cash cow for Gainesville, but when Gainesville milks GRU, they are taxing us.
No Shannon, they’re selling you electricity, just like Duke and FPL do with their customers and without asking them how they should spend their profits. Talk to the county if you don’t like it.
Here’s a question: if Duke or FPL had among the highest rates in the state, and were spending more on side projects than they made in profits each year despite having debt beyond their ability to pay back, were making expensive and questionable purchases for their future, and were ignoring all calls for them to change their ways or even admit there was a problem– wouldn’t the state step in at some point?
Shouldn’t it? Isn’t utility regulation one of its functions?
Uh, according data Belarski presents in this article Duke and FPL do have among the highest rates in the state.
Otherwise a lot of ‘ifs’ in your comment which ignore facts like FPL giving illegal campaign funds to Sen Perry ($100k) which we presume came from profits, GRU having an A credit rating, just like FPL, when the state seized it, and that there are a lot of types of oversight which do not require theft of property to accomplish.
Folks in Gainesville have lost sight (or maybe not) of what the Gainesville City Commission is really after. They want the cash cow back so they can pay for their personal agendas. All the freebees they need to fund to take care of the people who are feeding off the public trough. Some, if not most, of these people are here illegally. But the Gainesville City Commission will also raise our electric rates to the highest in the state to get the cash cow fatter. You only need to look at the rate increases the Gainesville City Commission have already passed to see where this will go. GRUA is doing a 1000 times better job of overseeing GRU than the Gainesville City Commission ever did. If this referendum does get on the ballot VOTE NO.
“Folks in Gainesville” have the right and power to throw out the current and any future city commissioners with whom they disagree at election time. You don’t if you don’t live there. Is that too difficult to understand? Did you take civics in high school?
The GRU board answers to the governor in Tallahassee, who we assume and hope has bigger issues to deal with.
Jazzy, apparently YOU were asleep during those classes. Us ‘folks in Gainesville’ who live in the county but are forced to buy GRU do NOT have the “right and power”. There is a proven track record with past city commissioners to use GRU as a cash cow for personal agendas. That’s proven history. At least the GRUAB is trying to keep the rates lower. Heaven forbid a government entity look out for ALL of its customers.
GRU does look out for county customers like me by providing exemplary service. I’ve had service from other providers, including at my present location, and GRU has many fewer outages, quicker restorations of power, and service in terms of actually checking on us in times of severe weather.
The majority of “folks” in Gainesville love their servitude to the rulers in City Hall. They gripe and complain about the wasteful spending, but they still vote for the same idiots who are identified more by their fiscal incompetence than concern for the community.
Maybe those voters failed math, economics and were barely able to pass social studies.
Your opinion of city politics is irrelevant since you either don’t live there or if you do, apparently always vote for losers.
I’m in the County. I can’t vote for the city. But I can pay for more and more and more parks.
I live outside of the city limits as do my neighbors we DO NOT WANT Cynthia Curry & the City Commission governing our electric bills! Not fair our voices don’t count!
Yep!
“GRUA is protecting the rights of GRU customers disenfranchised by the City Commission,…
This newly created representational right was the first time in GRU’s over-100-year history that non-city GRU customers were given a “seat at the table” to decide how the utility would be governed.”
Hellloooo! These 2 statements are internally inconsistent double speak nonsense. You can’t “disenfranchise” someone who never had a right or vote. The City built GRU 100 years ago, owned it then, and still owns it. If those of us who are customers outside the City don’t like it, we should try to buy it or try to find service elsewhere. The proper government to appeal to on this is the county who represents us, not the City which rightly does not.
Cripes, what idiotic non-logic by those who just want what they want and don’t care if they steal it!
Jazz,
Looking up the meaning of disenfranchise took seconds.
Disenfranchised means not having the right to vote or a similar right, or having had that right taken away.
Thatguy, “dis-enfranchised” means you were previously “enfranchised” at some point.
Hey, this might come up on your citizenship test, so you’re welcome.
“If those of us who are customers outside the City don’t like it, we should try to buy it or try to find service elsewhere. The proper government to appeal to on this is the county who represents us, not the City which rightly does not.”
LOL Jazz… the county has done nothing to fix this injustice and it took the state DECADES to finally do something to help us.
The state has fully regulated investor-owned utilities but not municipal utilities with customers outside their corporate city boundaries. From my research, it seems municipalities have fought against bills that would provide this regulation.
Maybe if the city wants the utility back so bad, the GCC should approach the governor with a plan to give representation/recourse to all of GRU’s customers. Perhaps, that means reorganizing as a co-op, where ALL customers vote on board, gft, etc, but city still owns utility (ergo, why they would receive a gft). Or, perhaps the city agrees to full regulation of GRU by the FL PSC.
Disenfranchised, “regulation” can mean may things, but a complete take over is not usually one of them. Yes, a negotiated compromise might be available, but since those of us in the county have no skin in the game – we didn’t build GRU, don’t own it, and are not responsible for it’s debts – I don’t think we should have equal voice to city customers. I suggest the county as the place to make noise about that issue. They are our agent and voice and negotiate with the city all the time.
Jazz,
The county isn’t going to do a damn thing to help us.
It’s up to the state. That’s where my efforts will be focused if GRU goes back to the Gainesville CC.
Has anyone thought that this is like Blazing Saddles? Politicians trying to protect their ‘phoney balonie jobs’!
Been here since late 80s. Have seen where City Commissioners raided GRU for personal projects that brought little benefit to even 50% of their constituents. When citizens who identify as Democrats saw the same, they began asking for help from Tallahassee and they listened.
The GRUA has directed staff to cut budgets, accelerated debt payments, and kept rates as flat as possible. All while maintaining its excellent reliability and bond ratings. The City Commissioners raided GRU had no appetite for these moves. You only have to look at the natural gas repurchase agreement that will save GRU and its customers millions, which was denied by numerous Gainesville commissions.
Now look at the flip side…Gainesville has an almost 10 MILLION shortfall in its budget. They are raising trash rates, property taxes and burdening their constituents with payment fees. Anything so they can soothe their egos by being able to say, ‘I did that!’ But they have to put ballot initiatives out to pay for basic services like roadway maintenance (where do those gas tax dollars go?), or the fire assessment fee to help cover GFR costs. When will the taxation stop?!?
The Commission’s plan was to also continue to raise rates on all utility systems within GRU (look at past meetings online). That would cause many more defaults and not be looked upon as favorable by most constituents. Not to mention it didn’t take any input from County ratepayers.
Is GRUA perfect? No! But it is far better than Gainesville City Commissioners! If the Gainesville Commission wants to only have Gainesville voters decide the fate of GRUA, then they should allow those outside the City limits to vet other companies for their utility needs. But then again they may lose their’phoney baloney jobs’!
HB 1645 repealed 3.06 the City Charter. Ed. is supposed to be GRU HR only. Instead, our “Authority” has yet to assume the role of governance and management and simply is a rubber stamp for whatever gets decided behind closed doors which is everything. No public discussion or input. No execution of critical HR 1645 mandates. Ed is untethered and freestyling. The IRP, ascertainment of SLA Losses, the legislative agenda and many other critical matters are being ignored at monthly meetings with no action items on the agenda. Meanwhile, we are descending into a legal by quagmire caused by inaction on the part of the “Authority”.
Everything BS Bielarski states is a LIE !
Do NOT believe BS Bielarski or the GRUAB.
BS Bielarski & GRUAB were appointed by the maggot meatball to take over GRU against the will of the Good people.
BS Bielarski rakes in $335k a year to destroy GRU & cause chaos & discord in Alachua County.
RETURN GRU TO THE GOOD PEOPLE !
While once again telling those of us on GRU outside city limits to “Suck it up?” Sounds like a fine plan.
Where are the good people and who’s defining them?
Ed: use best management practices….don’t worry about CO2 emissions… CO2 is good for photosynthesis which makes the oxygen we breath….
don’t worry about zero waste by 2050…that’s UN BS and unattainable.
Look what Hanrahan did going biomass…your orders do not come from UN ! She committed barratry .
What she did was not a mandate from the state of Florida or the US federal government…she implemented a foreign governments plans here…Agenda 2030 is the devil…
Clean coal is good!
The planet is just fine. Just generate electricity at the lowest rate for the customers.
Run the utility with zero political BS.
The 39,500 GRU customers should be represented…the Utility authority is trying to do this…they’ll get it right.
The people did not want the wood burner..foreign investors got rich,
GRU got $2billion debt!
I see the wicked witch botcher commenting, where’s Hanrahan defending her boondoggle?