EDITORIAL: Time to take notice

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It’s easy to point a finger and blame officials for not acting fast enough to take action when a problem surfaces. The truth is, the wheels of government move slowly.

As a result, when things do go right, when action is finally taken, it can go unnoticed and be unappreciated.

So, for a moment, it’s time to reflect on what’s going right with Jefferson County Public Utility District (PUD).

What’s happening that’s good?

The PUD’s effort to help all customers with low incomes pay their high winter heating bills deserves a moment of reflection and thanks.

The thank-yous start with the PUD’s Citizen Advisory Board, which last year recommended that PUD commissioners expand the low-income program to include all people in the county, not just seniors and those with disabilities. So, thank you, advisory board members, for hearing the concerns of the public.

Those calls of concern came not just from the woman who returned home from a stay in the hospital to find her power had been disconnected, but from members of Irondale Church, who were constantly being asked to help pay power bills to keep low-income people from having their power, even their water, shut off.

Some of the headlines in The Leader in the past few years have no doubt been tough for PUD officials to read.

But PUD officials kept listening, and the result is that commissioners Ken Collins and Wayne King, former commissioner Barney Burke as well as current commissioner Jeff Randall worked on a proposal to expand the low-income program to help as many as 1,000 of the PUD’s 19,000 customers.

PUD manager Jim Parker also kept the issue on the agenda.

Good work, gentlemen.

Now it’s up to customers in need of help to apply. And to do that, there is the rigamarole of paperwork involved in filling out an application through Olympic Community Action Programs (OlyCAP). Applications are available at the front counter of OlyCAP, 823 Commerce Loop.

Back in 2013, when the public company took over the grid in East Jefferson County from the private Puget Sound Energy, the power stayed on, but the switch otherwise was not easy. It was, as The Leader pointed out back then, “a bumpy road of transition.”

There have been criticisms about customer service, three black-eye bad audits as well as two lawsuits. And those have all made headlines.

Earlier this year, the PUD passed its 2015 audit and has hired several new people in its financial department. And now, the program to help low-income is underway.

So thanks, PUD Citizen Advisory Board members, commissioners and others who have worked to help those in need.

It’s what neighbors do, and what government needs to do more of to be relevant to its constituents.