Reflection on Lobbying for the Clean Energy Opportunity Act

[This post is written by Fiona Grant, a senior at Presentation Academy in Louisville and co-counder of OurEarthNow, and was originally posted on KentuckianaGreen.com.]

The idea of lobbying has always been a bit intimidating to me. I imagine suited corporate representatives armed with briefcases of expendable millions and smooth arguments that slide through the faceless politician's defenses and lodge in the dark crevices of their base instincts. It turns out it isn't quite like that, or at least not always so sinister.

On February 28th I joined a group of Kentuckians For The Commonwealth members, staff people, and Tim Darst (executive director of Kentucky Interfaith Power and Light) on a lobbying trip to Frankfort. The Kentucky Sustainable Energy Alliance put together a lobbying day for the Clean Energy Opportunity Act (HB 167). This bill is considered quite progressive, although 30+ states have passed similar bills. It has three basic components:

1. The bill mandates that by 2022 12.5% of Kentucky?s energy would come from renewable sources (solar, geothermal, wind, low-impact biomass, hydro-power, landfill gas, anaerobic digestion... etc). A certain part of the 12.5% would come from solar.
2. By 2022 it would mandate that there would be 10.25% drop in energy consumption in Kentucky; basically that through efficiency programs (such as the ones that LG&E provides) Kentuckians would learn how to use our energy more efficiently.
3. Feed-in tariffs would establish the rates at which utility companies would pay renewable energy producers. This would help utilities meet their renewable energy production goals and create more stability in energy supply.

All of these components would help create a system within which renewable energy could compete, would curb energy costs for all Kentuckians, help get our economy back on track, reduce our dependence on coal, and improve our health and well being. For more specific information click here.

I became excited about this bill when I attended an informational session about it on I Love Mountains Day, and I jumped at the chance to lobby for it. The Clean Energy Opportunity Act, as I said before, is still considered quite progressive in Kentucky, and is therefore having trouble in committee. It has been presented to multiple committees in an attempt to get a sympathetic response, and last year it was finally able to get a hearing. The goal of lobbying on February 28th was to convince members of the Tourism Development and Energy Committee, where it currently resides, to co-sponsor the bill, or help us convince the committee chairperson to give it a hearing. So this was not a landmark part of the process; this lobbying day is not the kind of day you would make a movie out of in which some brave teenager faces the cold politicians and wins a great ideological battle. This was a simple attempt to move the bill through another level of the bureaucracy that is our state government.

Upon arriving at the capitol, we were given information packets on the bill for ourselves and the House of Representatives members that we were to meet with, then headed off up the stairs to the representative's offices. The first representative that we were scheduled to meet with had told us to drop in on him between 9:30 and 10 a.m. We put in a request card at the desk that separated us from the maze of representative?s offices and sat down to wait. I fervently studied the materials on the bill that I had been provided with, imagining the sticky questions I was sure would follow. Slowly, the clock ticked and those waiting around us were called to keep their appointments. 10 came and went and, to my surprise, we saw the representative we had been scheduled to meet come out of his office, followed by his assistant, and head to the elevators. We jumped up and tailed him.

"Representative, could we ride the elevator and speak with you for a moment?" He looked up from his Nutragrain bar and Diet Coke and nodded. Tim Darst gave the pitch quickly, stressing the economic benefits of the bill and shying away from mentions of the mandate, aware of the representative's party affiliation and political ideology. The representative listened, or at least appeared to listen. When Tim had finished, the representative took another sip of this Diet Coke and asked us what we wanted him to do.

"Co-sponsor the bill," Tim answered and I waited with baited breath for his response.

"It'd be pointless," he said bluntly as the elevator doors swung open. "All the Republican sponsored bills have been put on hold since the accusations of gerrymandering came up." And that was that. He accepted our packet of information on the bill, quickly passing it off to his assistant, before turning and rushing off to another meeting.

Throughout the day we managed to see four more representatives. Two of them were already supporting the bill, another was sympathetic and was easily convinced to co-sponsor the bill. The last representative we spoke to was not sympathetic but his words stuck out to me more than anything else that was said that day. We filed into his neat office, settled in his guest chairs and gave him our usual pitch, focusing again on the economic boom that this bill would bring to Kentucky. At the end I watched for his reaction, he looked up from the note card on which he had been taking notes and, like the other representatives, asked us what we wanted him to do.

"Co-sponsor the bill, or help us get a hearing in committee." His response made me cringe: "I have no power," he capped his pen and then continued, "I'll keep an open mind, but how could I possibly influence the bill getting a hearing?" With that, I felt hope drain from me. I thought I was the powerless one. I thought I was the one who needed to influence representatives and they, the officials with power, could make the change. But through the day, every politician we met had told us to look elsewhere for help. "The committee chair is really in charge, my support wouldn't help... Go to their constituents, they'll have influence over the representative... You can't talk to me, talk to higher ups, they've got the control..."

And so, when the whole thing was over and I was back in Louisville, I had to ask myself a difficult and painful question: What if the whole thing was completely worthless? What have I really accomplished? Trying to distract myself from the difficult question I took a book and a blanket outside and laid down in the grass to enjoy the mild weather. The sparse grass around me was dotted with delicate wildflowers, and the daffodils were beginning to bloom. The warm breeze ruffled my hair and set the heads of the daffodils bobbing. There it was, I thought, the evidence of the tragedies that were to follow, right in front of my face: perked up, yellow flowers blooming in February.

I watched them sway for a couple moments, my book forgotten in the tide of fear and sorrow that washed over me. The planet is warming, I thought, and I am contributing. Am I doing enough? Lobbying seems so futile. I thought of the representatives that I had visited and the myriad of paradoxes they presented. They existed in a constant state of motion, without a single moment to spare for us, not even a fraction of a second for any type of follow up on their promises. But they also exist within a system that is painfully slow, a system within which receiving a hearing once a year is a victory.

The image of Anikan Skywalker flashed into my mind, the fictional boy who had been driven to insanity by the endless bureaucratic fiddlings of the Senate that was constantly in gridlock and could do nothing, even in the face of great suffering. I laughed softly. Is our system much different? The Clean Energy Opportunity Act, a bill that asks for only 12.5% of our energy to come from renewable resources in ten years, is ambitious. Ambitious? We have five years left until the point of no return. In ten years our world and energy consumption need look radically different if our race is going to continue to exist on our pale blue dot. How can I put any hope in a system that has absolutely no sense of urgency, even when faced by the greatest problem of our age?

But yet, how can I abandon the system? It still holds the potential to make such a sweeping change. It has the potential to guide, control, cajole so many voters, businesses, corporations. But again, how can I be content with working with this system that moves so slowly when I am so aware of how quickly it must move? I was left with a buzzing mess of unending questions as the first spring birds began their gentle song.