Public over Private

Public utilitarians were dazed and disappointed by last fortnight's elections. Where the issue was raised, citizens revealed a determined desire to try municipal ownership and operation of local power & light systems. Not so many communities balloted on public ownership as last year but what worried private operators was the fact that the propositions were carried this year despite a notable decline in the chances of borrowing government funds.

Electric Bond & Share, having suffered a major defeat in Knoxville last year, was again completely routed in Memphis. There TVA Director David Eli Lilienthal scored when citizens voted 18-to-1 to buy or build with the proceeds of a $9,000,000 bond issue a municipal system using TVA power. Private ownership rallied a vote only a little larger than the number of utility employes and only one-half the number of customer-stockholders.

Pacific Gas & Electric was defeated in Sacramento. Calif, where citizens, after having turned down less ambitious projects for the past ten years, gave the necessary two-thirds majority to a $12,000,000 public utility program. Wapakoneta, Ohio voted to build a generating plant to supply the distributing system it now owns. In St. Paul, where a power bond issue was roundly rejected last spring, voters refused to grant 20-year franchises to Northern States Power.

More significant than local tussles were results in three state-wide campaigns. By only a slim margin Oregon rejected a proposition backed by the Grange to put the State into the power business. In Washington voters approved (2-to-1) the Bone Power Bill which authorizes municipalities to acquire power properties outside their corporate limits. Thus Seattle's plan of buying the $100,000,000 Puget Sound Power & Light Co. is now legally possible. In Minnesota the citizens endorsed public-ownership by re-electing Farmer-Laborite Governor Floyd Olson (see p. 13).

The roster of communities rejecting public ownership heartened few utility stockholders. Muskogee, Okla. refused to approve a $1,250,000 bond issue for a local plant. Mount Olive, N. J. also thumbed down a municipal system. In Morenci, Mich. the citizens voted 435-10-393 against a power bond issue.

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