San Joaquin Valley Partnership Program September 2010 Focus: San Joaquin Valley kWh and peak kW reductions This Month’s Major Accomplishments: The monthly Partnership meeting and quarterly Marketing meeting was held on September 2nd. The 2010 Holiday Light Exchange program changes were discussed and Partners were still excited to continue with this year’s efforts. The implementer worked with Costco to secure 500 lights and arrange for deliver to participating partners on November 2, 2010. SCE announced that Direct Install would return to the area in January 2011. The implementer will work with each jurisdiction to promote the program to ensure a high capture rate. The first publicity will start in early October with the Mayors’ Letter Campaign. The Partnership had a booth at the Visalia Home Expo Friday, September 24 th through Sunday, September 26th. The MEU 2nd unit and its volunteers, Partner and Utility volunteers, and a retired Gas company volunteer staffed the booth throughout the event and made contact with over 1000 attendees. Maureen Hoff, SJVCEO, and Gas company representative, Frank Lauro, joined Jurisdiction partner, Gail Henry, for the County of Tulare Health Fair on September 30 th where the Partnership had a booth. The event had high foot traffic and the Partnership was well-received. 79 forms for low-flow showerheads were turned in to the Gas Company. The implementer continued to draft the processes and procedures document for benchmarking on the Strategic Plan. Working together, the implementer and both utilities’ analysts were able to bring current reimbursement requests for 2010. Key Issues or Emerging Concerns: The County of Kings Partner does not have the staff time to devote to a Jurisdiction Needs Assessment follow up meeting. The Utility Partners and Implementing Partners will probably have to schedule a time to travel to the County of Kings’ Partner’s office if a face to face meeting is preferred. Partnership is continuing to see the effects of staff cuts and reduced budgets in all our partner jurisdictions. Meeting attendance is waning and volunteer participation is more of a challenge. As one partner aptly put it, “it's just where we are these days between this program and the economy, staff reductions, etc. But, we will find a way!” The challenge for the partnership is to help make that way more reachable. In conversations with the Kern Energy Watch the implementer learned that their partnership is looking into using a web-meeting service, like WebEx to help increase attendance from outlying partners. The VIEW implementer and KEW implementer will stay in contact to determine if the results make it worth effort for the Partnership