TPU director keeps his job after Tacoma Council’s 7-1 vote

Tacoma Public Utilities Director Bill Gaines will keep his job for another two years, after a 7-1 City Council vote Tuesday night.

It was the first time the council has had a say in the utility director’s employment. Tacoma voters gave the council that authority last year in an election to change the city charter.

In 2014, TPU’s overall revenues amounted to $569 million. But most speakers Tuesday focused on a line of business that earns a fraction of that.

Many speakers urged the council to fire Gaines because of how they say he has managed Click Cable TV, a cable and Internet utility with $27 million in revenue last year. Click is considered part of Tacoma Power under TPU’s structure.

Earlier this year Gaines proposed leasing Click’s network to a private company for 40 years, an idea that many in the audience condemned. Others said Click can be leveraged as an economic development tool, and that’s best done when policymakers retain control of the infrastructure.

Many in the audience blamed Gaines for not giving the City Council the information it needs to make a decision about Click.

But at the end of the night, some council members placed that blame squarely at their own feet.

“We’ve been sending mixed messages to the utility,” said Councilman David Boe. The council hoped an easy answer could be found on what to do with Click by crunching numbers, he said. “We have a lot of work to do.”

Click subscriber James Williams told the council that the city needs to use Click to bring high-paying jobs to Tacoma.

“Nothing against high-rise condos, but people are not going to move here just to live in high-rise condos,” Williams said. “They want good, challenging, interesting jobs.”

Gavin Guss, another Click supporter, said Gaines is out of step with the council.

“We in Tacoma have reached a crisis in confidence with Bill Gaines,” Guss said. “We don’t trust his numbers. His salary is twice that of our state governor.”

Gaines will earn $338,229 this year. Gov. Jay Inslee earns $171,898.

Business owners largely heaped praise upon Gaines, focusing on TPU’s works as a whole with energy conservation, fish habitat restoration and efficient rail service.

U.S. Oil CEO Bob Redd said his company’s relationship with Tacoma Rail is a “perfect example” of a public-private partnership.

“Without the assistance we had at Tacoma Public Utilities, particularly Tacoma Rail, there’s a very good chance we would not be in business today, and the 300 jobs we have would be lost,” Redd said.

Councilman Anders Ibsen, the lone “no” vote, said he could not in good conscience vote to keep Gaines.

“This is clearly an administrative culture in which people who work for this organization feel very dissatisfied and feel very uncertain about what’s going to happen,” Ibsen said. “We’ve seen the same uncertainty and the same frustration from members of the public.”

Gaines will be given goals, council members said. Councilman Ryan Mello said Gaines will meet with various council committees once per quarter, will align TPU’s strategic goals with the rest of the city’s, and will work with the city to have a unified legislative agenda for federal and state policy. A copy of the work plan was not available Tuesday night.

Gaines started at TPU in 2006 as director of its power division, after working at Seattle City Light as a power supply administrator. He ascended to the director post the following year.

This story was originally published September 23, 2015 at 6:50 AM with the headline "TPU director keeps his job after Tacoma Council’s 7-1 vote."