By VERNON ROBISON
Moapa Valley Progress
The Overton Power District (OPD5) staff will be getting help from a public relations firm over the coming year with a goal to provide a more consistent and efficient stream of information to OPD ratepayers.
At a meeting held on Wednesday, Feb. 19 in Mesquite, the OPD5 board unanimously approved a proposal to hire Las Vegas firm, B&P Public Relations, on a part-time basis to help staff with advertising and communications needs. The proposal was for a one year contract for a monthly retainer of $3,500. This entailed an estimated 20 hours of work from the B&P team per month.
OPD5 public information officer Keith Buchhalter said that the agreement would help the district in formulating a more unified plan in its public relations efforts.
“(The B&P team) will help us create a yearly plan that is going to match the strategic goals that the board is giving staff to pursue during the year,” Buchhalter said. “That will make us more effective in that type of communication, having a set of clear goals and trying to enhance that communication to our customers.”
Mesquite Board member Mike Young said that he saw two major benefits to the proposal.
First it would be to provide an outside look at what the district is doing in its public relations and instruction on way to improve, Young said.
“Keith is doing a good job right now, but he is going to learn a lot here,” Young said. “These people are going to be hopefully like mentors to him, where he will really be able to step up. It’s almost like a college education.”
The second benefit of the proposal would be developing a bigger picture in how the district communicates with ratepayers.
“I’d like to see us develop a strategic plan for our communications so that, if we don’t choose to have a PR firm on retainer anymore in the future, we will have a plan in place that we can follow.”
Board chairwoman Judy Metz also saw value in the proposed contract. “Since I’ve been on this board, we’ve had a number of times when there has been misinformation sent out before our information has had a chance to go out,” she said. “That makes our customers uneasy. I think if we can be proactive – and I think these people will help us be proactive – I think it will make our customers a lot happier in the long run. And that’s basically what we want.”
At the beginning of the meeting, the board had heard a single public comment which came out against the proposal to contract with a PR firm. Mesquite resident David Ballweg had stood to make the comment at the meeting’s opening and then had to leave the meeting before the item was discussed.
“Why would anyone on this board think it’s a reasonable idea to spend money to advertise to a monopoly customer base, and communicate propaganda to the same, when all you need to do is correct your reliability issues?” Ballweg said. “Stop making excuses and just address head-on the issues at hand.”
During the board discussion of the item, Young expressed his disagreement with Ballweg’s sentiment.
“What was said in that earlier public comment was totally, way, way out of line,” Young said. “We are not producing propaganda. We are giving information to our customers that they want.”
In the end, Metz made a motion to approve the contract as presented. The motion was approved with unanimous vote.
