Whether Wendover Gas is purchased or not the company will cease to exist before next winter, said Jeffrey Crockett Attorney for Nancy Green.
“The PUC have been watching the situation carefully,” Crockett told the council by telephone and if Nancy (Nancy Green, owner of Wendover Gas) and if she cannot find an alternative plan we will have the transition for her customers to switch to propane tanks this summer. There will not be another winter like this.”
Last November the West Wendover City Council agreed to be the source of emergency funding for the near bankrupt gas company under its emergency powers for the first time in history.
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City Council Meeting
At least four and perhaps six times the city came to the rescue purchasing loads of propane for Green and her customer. The purchases totaled so far some $60,000 for 37,500 gallons of propane.
But while those emergency loans came in handy for Green they apparently did not come cheap. Indeed they may have cost her, her company Crockett strongly implied.
“The PUC cannot stand idly by and allow the situation to continue” he added.
The meeting is now being webcast of the High Desert Advocate’s website www.coyote-tv.com.
Crockett’s announcement adds another wrinkle to a possible purchase of the gas company by the city of West Wendover and could give opponents of the purchase more ammunition against the buy and also adds a deadline to supporters of the buyout.
“The problem is that no one wants to buy Nancy’s pipes,” explained councilman Izzy Gutierrez. “There are several companies who said they could up her customers and deliver propane in tanks but no one wants the pipe system.”
A major supplier of propane in Wendover for almost half a century, Green created Wendover Gas in 1997 and began piping propane to some residences and businesses.
In order to secure funding and right of way to lay the pipes Green and the city agreed on a franchise ordinance that gave Wendover Gas a monopoly on all piped gas. Where the ordinance falls short Green complained to the council is that the monopoly applies only to piped gas. There is nothing in the ordinance that prevents a business or a home from buying propane from another supplier and filling a tank on a regular basis.
Also by installing gas lines, Green’s pricing came under the jurisdiction of the Public Utilities Commission which had to approve each and every price adjustment Green wanted to make, while any potential competitor could slash the price of propane they were charging at a moment’s notice.
And that is exactly what happened. Where she once had all of the five major Wendover casinos as her customers Green said now she had none.
While Green lost most of her major commercial accounts she has been able to retain most of her residential customers. PUC investigators made frequent mention of supply problems in 2005 and in 2007. In 2009 Green was just days away of losing her company to the city when at the almost the last minute she was able to secure a new source of propane after her original supplier refused to deliver more until he had been paid at least half of a $140,000 bill.
The largest customer Green has on the pipe system is the Elko County School District for the West Wendover Elementary and the West Wendover Jr/Sr High School.
And it was primarily the specter of the schools being closed for lack of heat that prompted the council to lend Green the city credit card this winter.
“We really didn’t have much of a choice,” said councilman Gerado Rodriguez. “We couldn’t let our kids either or cold or go home.”
But because of the close call this winter, the school district is reportedly looking for a more stable supplier itself.
“When it comes to the health and safety of our children we really can’t cross our fingers and hope for the best,” said Superintendent Jeff Zander in the past. “If that means buying tanks and switching suppliers then we might have too.”
If no deal is in place to buy the company before the PUC takes its action, it may never come to pass. With the entire customer base of the company back on tanks which can be refilled by any propane the already over priced pipe system will be rendered redundant.
Meanwhile the odds of quickly coming up with a deal are not considered good. The feasibility study already delayed for more than half a year had to be tabled in the meeting to give councilmen more time to review it.
“I got my copy about 10 minutes before the meeting began,” Gutierrez added. “It is about an inch thick and about two hundred pages worth of charts, numbers and graphs.”
In addition to the West Wendover city council , Wendover, Utah input is vital to the success of the project.
“If this is to be successful everyone on both sides of Wendover have to be on board,” said the company’s court appointed trustee Steven Shute.
Getting a Utah okay might be difficult and time consuming.
Wendover, Utah’s first set of demands to the purchase last summer was one of the major reason for the delay and according to Mayor Mike Crawford, his council is still not enamored of the buyout.
If no agreement can be reached in time West Wendover may find itself agreeing to buy a company that has already all but ceased to exist.
