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Creating a parallell universe between the recent presidential election, the handling of Sandy could be likened to the collapsed economy issue or,
proposing that Mitt Romney, the business man, would be better equipped to deal with our catastrophic rising debt, better than that,
`run-of-the-mill Obama guy. The bigger picture has been visible to LIPA for too long for them to be dealing with aftermath issues, the barn door
had rusted hinges and was was bound to go long before the horses ran off. The key word in your comment is planning, something that even America
has neglected to do for too long now, and if Katrina wasn't a `wake-up call to all of those who administrate, then we are fools to believe that things
will ever change. Romney had no plan prepared, Obama offered status-quo, LIPA has always been run as a "for profit" utility, an unregulated monopoly
which has been modeled after the methods of thieves and pirates, the `haves as versus the `have nots. Whenever I need to get in touch with the
`bigger picture, I roll a joint and smoke it, remove the veil over my eyes, and step through the mirror so that I can get a realistic understanding of the
subject matter. Us against them...
In today's NY Times, the article entitled Suffering on L.I. as Power Agency Shows Its Flaws
is a good commentary on some of the major ills at LIPA and National Grid. It notes that LIPA has long been a great source of patronage jobs by our fine politicians, most of which are staffed with connected people who have absolutely no utility experience.
Frankly, LIPA should be cleaned out. Hervey is going, but everyone, the trustees included, should be asked (told) to leave. They have been negligent in their support of the Island's infrastructure while stealing huge buckets of rate payers' cash.
Frank Petrone, Huntington Town Supervisor, sums up the Sandy situation very well:
“The upper management couldn’t communicate with the middle management,” he said. “The middle management couldn’t communicate with the crews. And finally, when we had sufficient crews coming in — resources that should have been arranged before — they came in and had very little direction and they were flabbergasted at the condition of the infrastructure, the wiring, the entire system.”
Frank Petrone forgot to add the shenanigans by the union in messing with the out-of-town labor.
Privatize the whole damn thing. Public entities do not invest in infrastructure or productivity. Visit any govt office on LI. It's 1997 at best. Typewriters, thermal faxes, etc. It's no surprise LIPA is running on a 25 yr old COBOL system. That's the public sector on LI. Every penny for salaries, pensions, benefits. Nothing for systems. Private companies need to be effective and productive so they INVEST in capacity and technology. Are they a nightmare to deal with? Of course. Is LIPA any better as a public entitiy? Any cheaper? Any more customer friendly? Nope.
Starting to be convinced that ALL OF LONG ISLAND will eventually be a patronage mill. A big employment Ponzi scheme.
We had privatized electric, known as LILCO.
That was also a disaster and a free-for-all of greed against the ratepayers. Remember, electric service is a monopoly, they have no competition, so they don't necessarily "need" to be productive or invest in anything if there's nobody looking out for the needs of the ratepayers, and with LILCO, it was all about lining the pockets of top management and shareholders.
The fact that LIPA is run by no-nothings on the Board and mediocre top management, plus has absolutely no oversight is the cause of this, not it's being a public/private hybrid company (I think that's what is is, as in not totally a "public" entity -- if anyone can explain it better, please enlighten me).
In today's NY Times, the article entitled Suffering on L.I. as Power Agency Shows Its Flaws
is a good commentary on some of the major ills at LIPA and National Grid. It notes that LIPA has long been a great source of patronage jobs by our fine politicians, most of which are staffed with connected people who have absolutely no utility experience.
Frankly, LIPA should be cleaned out. Hervey is going, but everyone, the trustees included, should be asked (told) to leave. They have been negligent in their support of the Island's infrastructure while stealing huge buckets of rate payers' cash.
Frank Petrone, Huntington Town Supervisor, sums up the Sandy situation very well:
“The upper management couldn’t communicate with the middle management,” he said. “The middle management couldn’t communicate with the crews. And finally, when we had sufficient crews coming in — resources that should have been arranged before — they came in and had very little direction and they were flabbergasted at the condition of the infrastructure, the wiring, the entire system.”
Venditto said that he sent TOBAY employees to the substations and they actually ended up doing LIPA's job.
=======
"Politicians often seem to focus on the authority when they are looking to place relatives and friends at jobs there, according to interviews, local news reports and payroll records.
Lynda Nicolino, the former counsel to the Suffolk County Republican Party, earns $260,000 a year as the authority’s general counsel. Barbara Ann Dillon, a $125,000 compliance officer, is the daughter of Denis Dillon, the former Nassau County district attorney. Andrew McCabe, an assistant general counsel paid $117,000 a year, is the son of a former top judge in Nassau County.
Other top executives include former aides to the state comptroller, Thomas P. DiNapoli, the former Suffolk County executive, Steve Levy, and the former head of the Suffolk Republican Party.
The executives did not respond to requests for comment."
===========
Hervey was quoted as saying he was already looking to leave LIPA before this resignation, so I think we need to go further and remove the entire board and the entire Authority if we can. Replace them with folks who have no political ties and who actually want to improve the system.
Quote:
Originally Posted by I_Love_LI_but
We had privatized electric, known as LILCO.
That was also a disaster and a free-for-all of greed against the ratepayers. Remember, electric service is a monopoly, they have no competition, so they don't necessarily "need" to be productive or invest in anything if there's nobody looking out for the needs of the ratepayers, and with LILCO, it was all about lining the pockets of top management and shareholders.
The fact that LIPA is run by no-nothings on the Board and mediocre top management, plus has absolutely no oversight is the cause of this, not it's being a public/private hybrid company (I think that's what is is, as in not totally a "public" entity -- if anyone can explain it better, please enlighten me).
LIPA is basically just another branch of gov't with unelected "officials" running it. To get a real public-private partnership going we would need a private company (like Veolia or GE) or some company of that caliber that can be held accountable and removed from the contract if they fail to run it properly. Private companies are forced to keep up with modern technologies because they operate in the real world where supply and demand forces exist. LIPA does not.
Quote:
Originally Posted by mongoose65
Privatize the whole damn thing. Public entities do not invest in infrastructure or productivity. Visit any govt office on LI. It's 1997 at best. Typewriters, thermal faxes, etc. It's no surprise LIPA is running on a 25 yr old COBOL system. That's the public sector on LI. Every penny for salaries, pensions, benefits. Nothing for systems. Private companies need to be effective and productive so they INVEST in capacity and technology. Are they a nightmare to deal with? Of course. Is LIPA any better as a public entitiy? Any cheaper? Any more customer friendly? Nope.
Starting to be convinced that ALL OF LONG ISLAND will eventually be a patronage mill. A big employment Ponzi scheme.
spot on, especially the bolded part. This Island has been hijacked and the looting is out of control.
Privatize the whole damn thing. Public entities do not invest in infrastructure or productivity. Visit any govt office on LI. It's 1997 at best. Typewriters, thermal faxes, etc. It's no surprise LIPA is running on a 25 yr old COBOL system. That's the public sector on LI. Every penny for salaries, pensions, benefits. Nothing for systems. Private companies need to be effective and productive so they INVEST in capacity and technology. Are they a nightmare to deal with? Of course. Is LIPA any better as a public entitiy? Any cheaper? Any more customer friendly? Nope.
Starting to be convinced that ALL OF LONG ISLAND will eventually be a patronage mill. A big employment Ponzi scheme.
Cuomo was talking about Jon Kaiman as a replacement...yeah...that will work.
Twingles, I was doing the happy dance when I first heard the idiot apparent was none other than Jon Kaiman, so happy was I that he might be out of my hair here in NH. Then I read the "fine print" ....LIPA and all I could do was say to myself screwed again and even more, if that is possible.!!!!!!!
I found it very suspicious no other employers were mentioned. What were they trying to hide? Who knows what he was really working as before LIPA. The degrees he had are as common as dollar bills.
!
His profile is on Linkedin and he has experience at a midwestern utility including being chief engineer which is a BIG job, probably the most important job when it comes to actually making sure the distribution of electricity is running properly.
Seeing Pequa's post about the people on the payroll makes me even more convinced that Hervey was up against it with a long ingrained "do nothing" mentality and it's no surprise he was looking to get out after Irene. He was probably praying the Big One didn't come before the end of the year - Mother Nature screwed him!
His profile is on Linkedin and he has experience at a midwestern utility including being chief engineer which is a BIG job, probably the most important job when it comes to actually making sure the distribution of electricity is running properly.
Seeing Pequa's post about the people on the payroll makes me even more convinced that Hervey was up against it with a long ingrained "do nothing" mentality and it's no surprise he was looking to get out after Irene. He was probably praying the Big One didn't come before the end of the year - Mother Nature screwed him!
If he is so top notch I'm surprised nobody snapped him up over a year ago after Irene.
Although I agree that no matter what his particular skills were he was SURROUNDED by incompetence anyway.
Last edited by I_Love_LI_but; 11-14-2012 at 12:02 PM..
LIPA is basically just another branch of gov't with unelected "officials" running it. To get a real public-private partnership going we would need a private company (like Veolia or GE) or some company of that caliber that can be held accountable and removed from the contract if they fail to run it properly. Private companies are forced to keep up with modern technologies because they operate in the real world where supply and demand forces exist. LIPA does not.
Actually that is what is going on already.
LIPA "owns" everything, but National Grid, a private company, has the contract to run and maintain everything. National Grid's performance was lackluster, so they lost the contract before Sandy even struck to PSE&G of NJ. However, PSE&G does not start the new contract until 2014.
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