PSC candidate sees Grand Forks green projects

Post Date November 01, 2012
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By: Christopher Bjorke, Grand Forks Herald

http://www.grandforksherald.com/event/article/id/248304/

North Dakota Public Service Commission candidate Brad Crabtree was in Grand Forks to discuss energy efficiency and green energy jobs with Mayor Mike Brown on Wednesday.

Brown took Crabtree on a tour of the city Industrial Park and talked about workforce reductions at wind blade manufacturer LM Wind Power.

Crabtree said that continued federal aid to the wind power industry through the Production Tax Credit would support energy jobs in the state. The North Dakota PSC does not have a role in the federal tax credit, a subsidy to wind energy producers.

“You don’t produce oil in Grand Forks County. You don’t have coal mines. In fact you don’t have wind farms,” Crabtree said, but “Grand Forks and LM Wind are the ones adding real value.”

He also complimented Brown on the city’s energy efficiency initiatives, including timed stop lights to reduce stop times, hybrid city buses and energy efficiency goals.

“It helps to have cities like Grand Forks take the lead and push things,” Crabtree said.

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Dear Friends,

We ran a spirited and principled campaign on important issues. In the end, we came up short.

I wish Randy Christmann well on the North Dakota Public Service Commission, and I want to thank Libertarian candidate Joshua Voytek for his participation and positive public engagement in the campaign.

Words cannot express my gratitude to so many of you for the tremendous contributions you made to my campaign. We raised over $130,000 directly from 730 individuals, the large majority of you from North Dakota. Many of you worked tirelessly as volunteers. It’s humbling to have such support, and I cannot thank you enough.

I am so grateful to my wife Renee, who bore the burden of this campaign more than anyone else. Her dedication and commitment inspired me every step of the way.

My daughter Suria helped out, provided campaign advice and rode her horse Cinnamon at parades. I can see Suria running for office one day—and I already feel sorry for her opponent.

My campaign team showed complete dedication and did fantastic work. Thanks to Anne Krapu, Becky Ronkowski, Paige Jensen, Chris McEwen, Natalie Wolff and John Jorgensen. Their earned media, advertising, social media and grassroots outreach efforts helped transform this PSC campaign into one of the top tier races of this political cycle. We finished strong in the final weeks, and they deserve a great deal of the credit.

I also want to thank Raul Gomez and his students who took on my campaign as a class project. They helped generate the social media attention that gave us such a boost.

We put issues of vital importance to North Dakota’s future squarely on the public agenda.

We made ending the unethical practice of PSC commissioners and candidates accepting political contributions from regulated interests a signature issue of the 2012 campaign cycle. The impact of our efforts will endure past this election.

We also advanced a comprehensive agenda of real, commonsense solutions for the future of energy and agriculture in our state:

Some will interpret this election outcome as a rejection of the values and issues we ran on. They will be wrong. We secured a credible 41 percent of the vote in a state fully dominated by one political party and in a race where the third party candidate polled over 4 percent. We won 11 counties, including Grand Forks, and we nearly won in Cass and Ramsay Counties.

While not what we hoped for, this campaign validated our reform agenda. Campaigns are often the first step in calling attention to critically important issues and marshaling public support to address them. The media and the public are now paying attention.

Thanks again to all of you who were part of this campaign. It was an honor run for the Public Service Commission on your behalf.

Best regards,

Brad