I met with Emily Francis outside of Mugs Coffee in Old Town on a beautiful, and HOT, August 20th afternoon. Our conversation was slated for 30 minutes and turned into an hour plus. I wish there was a drone recording it! As with all the candidates, I could have talked with Emily all afternoon. Unlike the other candidates, Emily and I have a history, as we ran against each other in the 2019 city council district 6 race. Obviously she won. I’ve done my best (and continue to) to not let anything taint objectivity. Maybe our history influenced the tone of the interview, maybe not.
There was definitely an adversarial tone in the air. Emily was under the incorrect impression that CforSE was telling folks that Fort Collins was capping residential solar at 5%. I cleared up that we are talking about goal setting, not caps or limits. I asked if she got that impression from the emails that are sent to city council. She said, “You’re false”. I asked what that means. She said we are spreading a false narrative about council, Fort Collins Utilities, and PRPA. I asked what is false in the emails members send. She said those are “forms” and she doesn’t respond to forms. I told her that most people put their own thoughts, experiences, and opinions into their email, but that we do all have the same request. She said there are too many of them and she wasn’t responding because they were sent to “city leaders”, not to her personal email. I told her that Tricia is responding and she said, “everyone’s different”. I said, “So that by that logic, the more people who voice their concerns, the less you listen?” We had a chat about what it means to be a council member, leadership, constituent relations. She has different ideas from me about those roles.
Moving on to the subject matter, she said that the City is facing budget shortfalls and couldn’t fund more solar. I pointed out that the City Manager said that solar on City buildings has a 10% annual ROI. Solar investments actually save the city money, according the City Manager. I pointed out that citizens passed a sales tax dedicated to climate action and that a better investment for those funds hasn’t been identified. She then asked what increasing the local solar goal would accomplish. I mentioned that goals drive innovation and actions, and that there are several policy objectives such as community solar, virtual meter aggregation, and true value of solar study that could greatly increase the amount of local solar if city council directed Fort Collins Utilities to do so. Other CO communities including Denver, Boulder, Adams, Douglas, and Eagle counties are doing it. This is when she referenced an old refrain, “We can’t increase local energy like Denver can because we are part of the Platte River Power Authority (PRPA) family and we share ownership of PRPA with 3 other cities.” I’ve head this excuse several times now over the past year, so I asked, “How does that preclude us from increasing local energy”. Again the refrain repeated with no added context or explanation. The old, “because I said so.” Trump was also thrown into the mix for blame, as if we couldn’t do anything without federal support.
We did reach some consensus: The staff/council communication relationship is f@$ed up. Staff doesn’t act without council direction, but council relies on staff recommendations. Staff can’t reach out to council, councilmembers must initiate the conversation. It is near impossible to have a conversation without an official work-session. She said that she can see how folks get frustrated when I pointed out that we’re seeing innovation happening everywhere but here. CSU is leading the charge, while Fort Collins stays home on the couch. There was a lot more conversating. In the end, Emily agreed to direct utility staff to update council on the 100% renewable goal. That takes place on Oct. 28th at the council work-session.
Ironically, Emily told me I should have reached out to her sooner. I thought the 1,050 emails from CforSE supporters was the reaching out. And I’ve been to council meetings asking for action on this issue several times since this current round got started in 2022. She chose not to respond until election season.
Oh, and she has stated that she does not support the citizens’ right to form an energy co-op, or increase local energy, or do anything differently to uphold the Mayor’s role as regulator of PRPA.