from staff
Engineer Art Graham, a former Jacksonville City Council member, was appointed to the Florida Public Service Commission July 14 by Gov. Charlie Crist to fill an unexpired term. Graham has a Georgia Tech degree in chemical engineering and most recently ran his own company. A Beaches resident, he served on the Jacksonville Beach City Council 1998-2002 and Jacksonville City Council 2003-09, when he left in an unsuccessful bid to fill the state Senate seat vacated by the death of Jim King. Graham was appointed back to the Council seat this year, following the suspension of Council member John Meserve, until his PSC appointment. He met Monday with the editorial staff of the Daily Record.
How’s life?
I am blessed and highly favored.
How so?
Things are going pretty well. The appointment I just got from the Governor, I feel very lucky to have it. It allows me to use my engineering degree again, and also stay in public service.
Tell us about that process. What’s the year been like for you?
It’s been a roller-coaster ride. A year ago, I was running for state senate, and there was talk that (Florida Sen.) Jim King put his name in for chancellor of (the state university system). There was a lot of talk that he was going to get the job, and that went back and forth. Then we came to find out he had cancer, and he’d withdrawn his name from the chancellor position. He had surgery, and then he ended up passing away.
The election that was supposed to have been actually right now, this Aug. 24, ended up getting pushed up. People started jumping through hoops, things got very crazy, and I ended up losing the election, to who I think is, in my opinion, a very good senator, John Thrasher.
It’s amazing how that guy was able to hit the ground running the way he did. And you know, leadership is basically everything, and he’s definitely in line for senate leadership. It’s been very helpful to all of us here in Duval County.
After that loss, I tried to get my business up and running again, because I had shut it down. Most of it is tied to development, and since the economy was bad and everything was slow, I tried to figure out the next steps. I started throwing my resume out there to different paper mills, and the only real bite I got was up in Charleston, and needless to say, I didn’t want to go there.
I was looking for an opportunity, and I started looking down the path of the Public Service Commission. I had a friend who got appointed to the Public Service Commission. He and I went through Leadership Florida together.
The more I looked into it, the more I thought it was perfect for me. As I was looking at this, and there was a seat coming available, at the end of this year, it so happens that John Meserve (was charged with a third-degree felony related to real estate deals and suspended). It was a perfect opportunity for me to come back to the City Council.
And it’s definitely a much better horse to ride in on, being called back when there’s ethical challenges out there, rather than leaving on a loss.
It felt good going back, and representing the Beaches again. And also about that same time, when the Senate decided not to confirm two guys that were on the Public Service Commission. So rather than me going through the process now, I went through the process about three months earlier than I should have.
I think there were 61 applications that went in, and there’s a nominating committee of 12. It went from 61 applications down to 28 and they interviewed 26. They narrowed it to eight recommendations to the governor, and the governor had to pick two. I was fortunate enough to be one of the two. And so I’m on the Public Service Commission, and had to resign from City Council, and now that seat’s open again.
Do you have any input on your successor? Do you make recommendations?
I haven’t gotten a phone call from the governor’s office. I would imagine I probably will, but I have not. Needless to say, I’m sure the governor’s got a lot of other things on his mind right now. I mean, he’s got a lot of oil out there in the Gulf, he’s got an election, and I think there’s also a special session coming up in September, so there’s a lot of balls in the air for him. And on the other side of this, John Meserve, his court case is coming up. If he beats that, there’s a chance that he could be back in September.
Looking back now, what are some of the things that you’ve learned from the senate run and serving on City Council?
You’re on City Council, and you see somebody in front of you, and you’d think that they were a raving lunatic, trying to get their point across. And sometimes you’ve got to step back and you’ve got to think to yourself, this guy is in his 60s, he’s had a job for over 35 years, he’s raised a family, he had three kids, he’s got grandkids. There’s something here, there’s something that brings this guy to the podium. What is that he’s trying to tell us that he’s not doing a very good job of getting it done? Sometimes you’ve got to slow down and listen to what they’re not saying. If there’s nothing else you’ve learned, it’s how to put yourself in somebody else’s shoes.
What do you bring to the PSC?
For the most part, my engineering background. At the PSC, we’re in charge of all the investor-run utilities. A perfect example is Florida Power & Light. Florida Power & Light decides they want to put in more capacity, they have to come before us, almost like we’re their board, and justify spending the money.
You want for people to grow their business, you want to employ more people, and to do well, and expand, and now the Public Service Commission, you’re trying to rein that all in, because when you hand somebody a monopoly like this, somebody’s got to control it. And it’s our job to control that.
How much time does the PSC take?
About 90 hours a week. It’s full time.
What was your business?
It was Art Environmental and Consulting. For the most part, it’d been shut down for over a year. I had shut it down to run for office and couldn’t get it back up running again. It feels good not to try to go out running around hustling for a paycheck.
Was it always a goal to serve on the PSC, or when did you decide?
Actually, I didn’t know anything about it, being here in Jacksonville, because we’re not affected. Since JEA is a municipally run utility, it’s controlled mostly by the voters and by the elected officials. In Jacksonville Beach, we have Beaches Energy, and once again, it’s municipally owned. So you know, it was nothing that ever affected us. But as I said, a friend of mine from Leadership Florida had got onto the Public Service Commission, and he was telling me about the job. And as I looked into it, I thought, well, this is the perfect opportunity for me to stay relevant when it comes to being in public office and to use my degree, and maybe even open up some other doors. So four years from now, or eight years from now, to do that kind of consulting work, power plant design, or power boilers, I’ve got a background in dealing with wastewater, it opens up another door of opportunity.
Or perhaps for a state office.
I don’t have any real desire to do that. My race for Senate opened my eyes to a lot of things. I think my focus is more on a local level, and one of the regrets I have, of being on the Public Service Commission, is not being able to run for mayor of Jacksonville Beach. I’ve always wanted to do that, and that was always going to be kind of my swan song to politics. And I was planning on doing that in two years, and this came along, a great opportunity, and I can always go back again, in four years or eight years, and run for mayor of Jacksonville Beach. I mean, I love it out at the Beach, I’m a huge advocate of the Beach. It’s almost like the way that Jake Godbold used to be mayor of Jacksonville, you know, you tell everybody about it.
Now that you’re out of City Council, are you keeping your eye on this budget? Are you happy to be out of that process now?
One of the things I can honestly say is that I have never voted for a tax increase. Last year, when they voted on the budget, it just so happens, I wasn’t in office. This year, when they’re voting on the budget, it just so happens that I’m not in office. So I can honestly say in four years in the Jacksonville Beach City Council, and six and a half years in Jacksonville City Council, I never voted on a tax increase. So, no, I do not miss the budget.
Are you going to be spending a lot of time here, or Tallahassee?
I’m in Tallahassee Monday through Friday.
You’re a Beaches guy. Is it going to be tough to be away?
Not really. It feels good to be working on problem-solving, and doing true engineering work again. Hopefully, maybe six months from now, when I get a better feel for what’s going on, I’ll open an office here in Jacksonville, and I’ll only have to go to Tallahassee for hearings and maybe staff meetings. But for now, I think I’ll spend most of my time there, just understanding it all and staying involved.
How do you think you can best serve Northeast Florida in your role on the PSC?
For the most part, I really don’t touch Northeast Florida. The only interaction I have with JEA would be for energy conservation, water conservation. They have to come every couple of years for the conservation plan. My understanding (is) the last time they came before the PSC, they sent them back and told them to do better, because their goals weren’t grand enough. And so when they come back the next time, I guess we can turn the screws a little bit, make them conserve more. The only thing we really regulate would be the natural gas line that’s coming through. For the most part, that’s not there for the individual homeowners. That’s more for the large businesses, the large industrial businesses.
Have you heard of any critics who say you should have stayed and fulfilled commitments?
Not really. You know, everybody at the Beach has been very supportive. They said, ‘Art, you’ve put in your duty time, and now, we thank you, and do well.’ It’s funny, one of the Beaches newspapers had called, and called the three Beaches mayors, and asked, are you glad Art Graham’s leaving us? ‘No. We’re glad he came back for the time he did.’ It’s funny, I rarely ever read the blogs in the newspaper, but one blog that was in the newspaper, that somebody at the end is chiming in, and he said, ‘What has Art Graham ever done for the Beaches?’ And that got my dander up, and so I put my blog out there as well. I think I listed about 23 things that I did. I said, ‘if you have any other questions, please call me.’
What do you think about the future of nuclear power? Do you think nuclear power has a future in Florida?
The biggest mistake that we made, 30 years ago, 35 now, was when Three Mile Island happened. The fail-safes worked. We didn’t have a nuclear explosion, the fail safes actually worked. And we all turned and ran from nuclear power, and that’s the worst thing we could have done. It’s ridiculous now, that France is considered the nuclear expert. We’re the United States of America. We’re an industrial nation. We should be deep into nuclear. It’s good, clean energy. We have more fuel, we have more uranium than we’ll ever use. So why are we not doing it? You don’t have to worry about all the carbon footprint, you don’t have to worry about burning up the coal, burning up the oil, that sort of stuff.
Do you still sense there’s public opinion against nuclear power?
It’s definitely going to change. Without a doubt I think it’ll change. I think the only problem we run into is the NIMBY - ‘not in my backyard.’
The construction and investment in a nuclear power plant, as well as the employment, perhaps might make it more acceptable.
I would love to have a nuclear power plant, because of the jobs that are going to come, the money that’s going to come. They’ll be at work, and just think of the impact that’s going to have on the community. It’ll be huge. That, and cheap power. You’ve got to remember though, the startup of a nuclear plant, the cost is ridiculous. You start to see the return on a nuclear plant maybe 15 years into it.
You’ve served the Beaches, you’ve been on the Jacksonville City Council, you’re in Tallahassee. What do you see as the major challenges to Northeast Florida?
The major challenge for everybody right now is just the economy. It’s scary out there right now, and I don’t think we’ve hit bottom yet. We need people working, we need jobs, and the more jobs we can bring to Northeast Florida, the better off we are.
I think the port is a great opportunity for us. We’re roughly going to triple the size of our port in the next five years, and I think there’s a lot of growth opportunity out there. We’re fortunate that we have a lot of vacant land out and around the port.
One of the things that scares me is Amendment 4 that’s on the ballot, Hometown Democracy. I can give you an example of a story of a broker who had some investors that came over from Asia, and they want to build a distribution center. There’s roughly 50 jobs, the average salary is going to be about $50,000. They looked for a spot, over near the port, and in about six days, they found a spot. And so now they start going through the process.
They went through a land use change, they went through the zoning change, there was a little bit of wetlands there, so they dealt with the Army Corps of Engineers, the Department of Environmental Protection, the St. Johns River Water Management District, and about 13 months into this thing, the investors got frustrated. They said, ‘this is ridiculous.’
They turned and went up to Georgia, 38 miles away. Within 30 days, they had a building permit in hand, and they’re under construction.
Now, (if Amendment 4 passes), they have to put it on the ballot. Now they have to run a campaign explaining to everybody why we need this land use change to go from agricultural to industrial.
You remember when the Navy was talking about coming back to Cecil Field? You had the guys that were against the Navy coming back, they spent $1.5 million advertising, letting people know why the Navy shouldn’t come back. And then the guys that wanted the Navy to come back, they spent about $1 million advertising how they want the Navy to come back. Can you imagine doing that for every land use change we do?
Sounds expensive.
Sounds crazy. I mean, it really, really is, and if you can picture this, everything’s got to be condensed down to 75 words or less (on the ballot). When I get a land-use change coming before me, it’s 75 pages. So how do you condense that down?
Is there anything we didn’t ask?
How great Charlie Crist is? On the Public Service Commission, I cannot come out publicly endorsing anybody, but I couldn’t imagine me voting for anybody else. There are a lot of Republicans out there who don’t like Charlie Crist because he left the party, but if you look at his record, he truly, truly, truly was a fiscal conservative. Look at what he’s done to the insurance industry, holding the rates down, cutting taxes.