A group of foreign investors, led by Macquarie Bank of Australia, is seeking to purchase Puget Sound Energy, and since it will be a privately owned corporation, the details of its operations will not be available to the public.
Many citizens are concerned about Macquarie's management and accounting practices with the potential for problems they could cause.
Concerns include the possibility that:
- PSE could be saddled with billions in new debt
- PSE's infrastructure could fall into disrepair or be sold off
- PSE's rates could increase faster than the cost of energy
- Buyout of our water utilities and other infrastructure could be next
- Economic growth and job security could be jeopardized throughout Washington State
What Can We Do to Prevent These Problems?
Here are three very quick steps you can do right now to make your voice heard:
1. Start your email program, then follow the directions in steps #2 and #3 below.
2. Click the link below to send an email to the Utilities Commission.
Ask the WA Utilities Commission to stop the takeover!
3. After you have finished sending an email in step #2 above, click the link below to send an email to the State Attorney General's Office.
Ask the WA State Attorney General to Stop the Takeover!
If you are serious about protecting our State and our Economy, then SHOW UP at one of these Utilities and Transportation Commission meetings and tell them to Stop the Takeover:
- 6:30PM, May 15th at Bellevue Community College, Room 130B, 3000 Landerhom Circle SE, Bellevue
- 6:30PM, May 20th at Bellingham Senior Activity Center, 315 Halleck Street, Bellingham
- 6:30PM, June 4th at WUTC Offices, 1300 South Evergreen Park Drive SW, Olympia
For Skagit County Residents
The Skagit Public Utility District is taking a poll of its residents to find out if Skagit PUD should seek a vote of County residents to determine whether the utility should take over electrical distribution in Skagit County. Click the link below to take this survey:
Click here to take the Skagit PUD poll now!
Fortune magazine article (October 2007) about Maquarie's wheeling and dealing, their high-risk reliance on borrowed money, and the rest...
Fortune asks: Would you buy a bridge from this man?
Macquarie's Past
Comments made by informed observers in the wake of previous Macquarie deals:
In The Guardian (London, UK), Will Hutton quotes on unnamed Australian executive as saying that Macquarie's approach is to "hollow what it holds and walk away".
- In 2002, Australia's electricity code administrator accused a Macquarie subsidiary of minimizing power output solely for the purpose of maximizing profits.
- In the July 2007 edition of the The Monthly, Australian journalist Gideon Haigh stated that Macquarie is in "the business of privatizing mature businesses and ratcheting up their returns with liberal applications of debt".