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However, as recent events have demonstrated, our decision to stick around for 

 the implementation phase turned out to be a prudent one. If we've learned anything in 

 the last decade, it's that a lot can get lost in the translation from policy and planning to 

 actions on the ground. The Regional Act sets forth the most comprehensive, 

 integrated, and intelligent regional energy and natural resource planning process in the 

 world. The Power Council invented least-cost planning and still leads the known 

 universe in its practice. We jusdy deserve to pat ourselves on the back for these 

 accomplishments. And that's exactly what we've been doing for the last decade. 



The time has now come for us to stop con^tulating ourselves and face a new 

 and more urgent challenge. Our policy and planning achievements will now be 

 subjected to the only test that ultimately matters: can they be successfully 

 implemented? 



The questions that you have asked us to address can be summarized roughly 

 as follows: How are BPA and the Council doing on this all-important test? Are they 

 rising successfully to the challenges posed by the transition from least-cost planning 

 to least-cost action? Our answer can be summarized as follows: We have had 

 enough successes to indicate that if we are determined to succeed, we wUl. But BPA 

 and the Council have not demonstrated that they are determined to succeed. Progress 

 has been slow, and repeatedly interrupted by mixed signals, equivocal commitments, 

 and lack of resolve. In short, BPA and the Council can do it, but they have not yet 

 convinced anyone that they have decided to do it 



What's the problem? I suspea that you will hear a dizzying array of answers 

 to that question before you finish this process. But we submit that none of them is 

 more salient than this: The people who will benefit most from successful 

 implementation of the Act - the citizens of the Pacific Northwest and the public 

 officials who represent them - are generally not paying attention and demanding 

 results. Your presence here today is a welcomed exception and, we hope, the 

 beginning of a lasting trend toward active involvement in the implementation of the 

 region's energy plans. 



The people who are paying attention - the people who are paid to spend their 

 days following die detailed pirocesses that make or break the implementation of the 

 Act - by and large do not represent the public interest. They are primarily interested 

 in securing the largest possible share of the benefits of the regional system and the 

 smallest possible share of its costs on behalf of the utilities and industries they 

 represent. They are not malicious people. They think they are doing their job. But we 

 - the people and public officials of the region - have not made it clear to them that 

 implementing the Act in the broad public interest is their job. They have no reason to 

 believe that when they walk out of the BPA meetings where programs are designed, 

 there will be a price to pay for failing to implement regional policy in the public interest. 



This is no small probleno. Its solution requires systematic mobilization of the 

 human and political resources of the regioiL But the encouraging aspect of this 

 analysis of the problem - the thing that makes us hopeful and determined - is that it's 

 entirely within our power to fix it In convening this Task Force, you have taken a 

 very heartening and important first step in that direction. 



Testiniony of K.C. Golden, NCAC BPA Task Force 



July 12, 1993 Page 2 



