MEMORANDUM
To: City Council
From: David J. Deutsch, City Manager
Subject: BGE Communication Plan
Date: April 16, 2008
BGE is scheduled to present the Communication Plan that they have developed
while working with the BGE Task Force. Doreen Hartley, Director, Customer
Relations Contact Center, will be making the presentation to City Council
from BGE. William Jahn, Chairman of the BGE Task Force, will make some comments
following the presentation by BGE. Other BGE Task Force members will be in
attendance and may wish to provide comments as well.
Once this information is available, it will be sent electronically to City Council, Bowie members of the BGE Task Force, the Bowie Blade and Bowie Star, and will be posted on the City’s Web Page. It may be Monday during the day before this is available.
The focus of the April 21, 2008 meeting will be on the BGE Communication Plan. A subsequent meeting is scheduled for June 16, 2008 for the BGE Task Force to present their Final Report to City Council. The BGE Task Force was appointed for a one-year term on May 7, 2007. The Resolution establishing the BGE Task Force outlined ten items under the Purpose and Function section of the Resolution for the Task Force to focus their efforts on. The final BGE Task Force report that will be presented on June 16th will provide an update as to how these items were addressed by the BGE Task Force. Any follow-up issues raised by City Council at previous meetings that have not been addressed up to now will be addressed prior to June 16th.
The BGE Task Force’s work ended up focusing on two main areas. One area related to improvements to the reliability of electric service in Bowie. A report on this component was presented to City Council on February 11, 2008. At this meeting, BGE committed to making a $25 million investment in the Bowie community to focus on: 1. The evaluation and improvements of feeder design and construction; 2. To upgrade infrastructure; and, 3. To provide aggressive vegetation management (tree trimming).
On February 27, 2008, BGE made a presentation to the Public Service Commission (PSC) outlining this program. The PSC agreed to technically evaluate this program and to monitor progress. Also, BGE held an Open House for Bowie residents impacted by the first phase of improvements on March 12, 2008 at Bowie City Hall. A second Open House is planned for June 12, 2008.
The tree-trimming component of this program is already underway. Engineering work on three of the feeders proposed for improvements in 2008 has been completed. The construction aspect of this program will begin on April 21st.
The second major area of focus for the BGE Task Force was on improvements to communication. As indicated earlier, these communication improvements will be the focus of the meeting on April 21st.
The BGE Task Force has expressed a desire to continue to meet on a quarterly basis to evaluate performance and to monitor whether the improvements being made by BGE result in the anticipated improved performance. When BGE presented their Bowie Electric Reliability Action Plan to City Council on February 11th, City Council also requested this type of performance review. The BGE Task Force is working to determine what will be evaluated in these quarterly reviews. This will be presented to City Council for your review and concurrence.
Staff would suggest that the Council, by Resolution, formally extend the term of the BGE Task Force for the purpose of holding quarterly meetings to monitor the success of the implementation of the BGE reliability and communication improvement plans.
JLF/adf