Boardroom heats up over e-mail

At the Jan. 2 meeting of the mayor and board of aldermen of the City of Holly Springs an e-mail from TVA drew a fiery discussion from Mayor Sharon Gipson and Ward 4 alderman Patricia Merriweather.

The discussion covered the last 48 minutes of the meeting during the report/discussion section on the agenda when Merriweather brought up an e-mail she received the same day from the Tennessee Valley Authority (TVA).

Merriweather said an e-mail from Melanie Farrell, vice president of External Strategy and Regulatory oversight, said the agency is hiring an accountant to come work with Annie Mason, accounts manager at the Holly Springs Utility Department, to get information TVA needs to verify accuracy of accounting reports it received from HSUD.

She said Farrell asked for a motion from the board authorizing the information be provided to TVA so the authority can do its job. TVA, which used a Central Service Association request form in the e-mail, said TVA wants to work alongside account information in financial reports.

Specifically, TVA asked to see the financial information provided in a March 2022 report received from HSUD, Merriweather said.

Gipson said she did see an e-mail late in the day but did not have an opportunity to go over it before the meeting.

She said TVA’s “bullying throughout the region is beyond what I could have ever imagined, even when I was on the board of aldermen.”

Gipson served as Ward 2 aldermen after being elected in 2013, serving one term during Kelvin Buck’s first term as mayor.

“So, to give them this type of access to the city would be like tying the utility department up in a ribbon and saying Happy New Year and Merry Christmas,” Gipson said.

She said TVA is both a partner and a vendor and she wants a detailed discussion to find out exactly what TVA is asking for and who the accountant TVA wants to send would be.

“This is an agency that is a vendor and also has regulatory powers,” Gipson said, also alleging that she gets conflicting information when speaking with different representatives of TVA.

“The city has to protect HSUD. TVA has put out misinformation under the guise of being a partner with the City of Holly Springs. It’s amazing to me. They have done this to no other department, ever.

“I will definitely take a look at the e-mail later in the week. They frighten me. They terrorize me.” The mayor said HSUD has worked through most of the challenges it has had and that TVA did not address the effect GE had on the HSUD system.

“I do get that and I hear you,” Merriweather said. “But, at the end of the day, TVA is our vendor and for them to sabotage us would sabotage TVA. I’m sure they try to make sure their interests are protected.”

Merriweather brought up incomplete audits of HSUD for 2021, 2022, and 2023.

“I just see them as protecting their interests,” the alderman said. “I don’t see anything underhanded.” Ward 2 alderman Andre Jones asked if having TVA send someone alongside Mason is in the agreement HSUD has with TVA.

“They are constantly asking for information,” Gipson said. “I had to put my foot down, at the same time TVA and TVPPA were working with us. We have provided everything they requested and they did not find what they were looking for.”

Gipson said vendors have a right to ask for information. She said if TVA was looking for something specific they should just ask, but they do not have a right to just come in.

“What they think they have right now, they think they have a board that they can push around and who will agree and who will allow what they are asking for,” the mayor said.

Jones asked if in the agreement with TVA, does it require board authority (to authorize TVA to come in to verify information in reports).

Attorney John Keith Perry said TVA says it has the authority and there are “a string of documents through the years going back to the 1970s that lists triggering provisions that say what the agency can do if it does not receive documents by a certain time, going back to when Mayor Coopwood was in office.

Accounts manager Mason was asked about any communication she has had with TVA.

“We are working with CSA and that is sufficient,” she said. “I have to agree with the mayor, they are bulling and pushing us.”

“The bottom line is what I see TVA is doing is protecting their interest and has not been provided with audits for three years,” Merriweather said. “We are not their only company. I hear what the mayor is saying, but I have reservations about that, too. I don’t see they have an axe to grind. They are giving us services, too. And they want to continue to get paid.”

She said if someone is providing services to you they need to know if you are financially sound.

“They want to know if HSUD is stable. That’s all I have heard TVA saying,” Merriweather said.

Perry said the issue cuts both ways.

“They have vested interest with Federal Regulatory Commission policies,” he said. “Sometimes they write politically weighted...in a way that is saying, hey, you’re doing this and this. You need to go back to 2012. And they do put a stack of things on one person to say, if we need to have that information. But at the same time they haven’t provided the utilities with updated meter reading devices or with other items listed out in the contractual agreement. So what they will do is create interest in the community that will put pressure on you guys to fight each other and if you buy in to it....”

“But at the end of the day...” Merriweather said. Gipson began repeated use of the gavel interrupting Merriweather, saying Perry had the floor.

“There is a need to try to get an organized general manager in place,” Perry said.

TVA wrote things to cause splintering in the community about outages while at the same time Memphis was having outages everywhere, Perry said.

He said TVA knew HSUD was having outages at the same time as Memphis because they knew HSUD’s power grid was crumbling like local power companies that are having the same problem across the country.

“I would strongly suggest you get a G M in place so that heat can be on that person,” Perry said. “We’re getting bogged down when they’re asking you to have this information. You have to understand it’s initiated by TVA.”

He said TVA is asking for things that make it seem like a person at the utility department is taking money out of a source and spending it inappropriately.

“We have the same concerns as TVA has,” Merriweather said. “The reason we don’t hire is because we don’t have a good grip on the money coming in.”

Large part of the city’s $9.1 million annual budget [18.8 percent] comes from the Holly Springs Utility Department’s fee in lieu of taxes under the regulatory authority of TVA.

Gipson said TVA is never satisfied as she talks over Merriweather.

“Nobody heard about audits behind before we got here,” she said, adding that TVA is pushing HSUD to make its own rate increase.

Jones said that audits were completed before the current board took office.

“Maybe we need to look into another auditor,” Mason said.

Ward 1 alderman Bernita Fountain said HSUD should have completed the 21, 22, and 23 audits.

“They have had three years,” she said.

“So what’s holding up the 2021 audit?” Jones asked Mason.

Mason said the auditors came down to the utility asking for papers to be ready for them.

“Now they want them emailed,” she said.

Jones said if the audits had been completed since the current administration took office, he would not be as concerned about TVA’s requests for information.

He said he knows the accounting department is having a difficult time taking care of their duties and at the same time being asked to pull documents for the auditor.

“I know your plate’s full,” he said to Mason.

“Since TVA is apparently going to send in an accountant...” Merriweather said.

“They will be stopped at the door,” Gipson said.

“Can you legally stop it?” Jones asked.

Gipson said she would ask Perry then began heavy pounding of the gavel to prevent Merriweather from being heard.

Mason said the audit is completed for 2021 on the electric side.

“So have we got started on 2022, yet?” Jones asked.

Jones asked if HSUD can deny TVA entry to ask to see documents.

Gipson said she will instruct employees that if anyone from TVA comes in to the facility, employees will stop them at the door until it has been determined if they have the legal authority to enter the building.

In a separate interview with Fountain after the meeting, she was asked to comment on TVA’s request.

Fountain said under previous administrations TVA was allowed to come in and help get the books back on track.

“It’s nothing to be ashamed of,” she said, “but it is something that has to be done to clear up this discrepancy.”

She said the previous administrations she worked with also had to complete audits but the current administration has not completed an audit of HSUD in the three years it has been in office.

“We ought to get our audits completed,” she said. “You can’t keep blaming the previous board for the audits when we have set three years and completed no audits. That type of action has to be rectified. You have to get it done.”