Edward Bielarski Jr. became general manager of GRU in June 2015, and he’s made his mark in 15 months since then.
His work includes restructuring GRU’s management, increasing employee involvement in decision-making, mitigating the impacts of an above-market power contract and helping the new Utility Advisory Board get off the ground. The Gainesville City Commission created the UAB, which includes residents of the unincorporated area, so the group could look at policy direction in depth. Bielarski previously was the chief operating and financial officer of the Lehigh County Authority in Allentown, Pennsylvania.
Business in Greater Gainesville interviewed Bielarski about the progress he’s made.
You’ve come from the North, which has a somewhat different culture than Gainesville’s. How have you brought your strengths but also become a part of this community?
I guess I’ve been a geographical Yankee with a southern soul. It was really easy to become part of the community. Coming from the Northeast, the industrial Northeast, there’s a certain pace, a certain style how things are done. And that’s not Gainesville style.
Gainesville has its own culture and pace, and you have to learn that culture. It’s easy on a personal level. Folks are inviting; they’re engaging.
On a professional basis, my style has been: “Let’s get this done, that done, this done, that done.” But before you do any of that, you have to see where people really are – what the culture of the organization is, why we even do what we do. I feel like the organization and I are starting to hit our stride right now.
You created a new position of chief operating officer, which is filled by Thomas Brown. What were you trying to achieve?
When I first came on board, I realized that silos existed within your energy supply, energy delivery and waste water systems. That was largely because each assistant general manager was kind of on their own. And they did what they had to, to try to make their organization as efficient as possible. I come from organizations where there’s a common thread across operating entities, and that’s why I created the chief operating officer position.
I wanted to increase continuity, which allows me to pull off and deal with the new Utility Advisory Board, as well as a little issue named GREC (the biomass plant’s owner).
How are things going with the UAB?
It began in June. It’s comprised largely of business leaders in the community. It’s chaired by Darin Cook (the president of Infinite Energy), who has good instincts for the business side of the community, plus the culture of the community. He is a former GRU guy. I found out that he set up GRU’s first risk management program.
There are seven people who are outside the city. In addition to Darin, there is Michael Selvester, who is corporate counsel for Infinite Energy; Mary Alford, who is a principal with the Sustainable Design Group; Sandy Campbell, who is financial director at the University of Florida’s Department of Otolaryngology and Ophthalmology; David Denslow, who was “everyone’s” economics professor at UF; Annie Orlando, who is a leading local businesswoman; and Robert Walpole, principal with CHW and an active participant in Gainesville’s Blue Ribbon Committee.
We put a proposal in front of the UAB and the commission to upgrade our Enterprise Resource Planning (ERP) Software called SAP. It’s very expensive, but it’s going to take us into the 21st Century.
Three members of the UAB have gone through similar conversions. That is the usefulness of the UAB. They’ve gone through similar situations that we experience at GRU.
There’s more information discussed at a UAB meeting in three to four hours than maybe several months’ worth of Commission meetings – because they’re getting into the details. It’s like a board meeting for GRU, Inc.
How much have you held down electric rates below what was projected?
I’m proud that last fiscal year and this coming fiscal year GRU asked for no increase in its base electric rates. That’s below projected increases of 3.5 percent and 2 percent. Moreover, in this past fiscal year, we were able to reduce the electric fuel adjustment by more than 10 percent. That’s real rate relief.
We achieved this by increasing operational efficiencies and managing the GREC contract. At the same time, we created a 2 percent pool of funds for employee pay increases.
We did a good job. I have to give some credit to Kathy Viehe, who was the interim general manager before me and had started to lay the groundwork for our success.
With your streamlined internal administrative structure and the UAB, what else does that free you up to do?
It gives me time to think of us as the 21st century utility that the City of Gainesville deserves.
When I came to town and they turned on my service, a GRU guy came out in a truck, and he checked to see if there were leaks with the gas service. As he was writing up the ticket, I said, “Wow, you don’t have a tablet?”
He told me that he takes his tickets back, and that a clerk types it into the computer.
I didn’t realize we were that far behind. A 21st century utility needs to have the ability for its crews to be able to enter information in real time.
There’s a host of things that could be done on demand-side management. For a discount on your electric bill, we could have access to the thermostat so on peak days we could move it up from 76 degrees to 78 degrees during alerts.
The other thing is, why aren’t we an electric vehicle city? We’re 124 square miles. We have a university, where the kids drive their scooters. Shouldn’t we be thinking about charging stations? Shouldn’t we be thinking about teaming with electric vehicle manufacturers?
How have you fostered employee involvement?
With our new ERP system upgrade, we have about 60 employees working together. This is important because people will be changing the very nature of how they communicate within our organization, how we communicate with each other.
Michelle Smith Lambert, she was my other newly created position – as the chief change officer – is leading change in that arena. We’re establishing a center of excellence which will have champions in each sector. They’re going to help change the way we think, talk and communicate throughout the organization.
People who are at the screens inputting the data need to know what the change is about. They have to understand what the new system will derive for them and understand that, in the end, it’s going to make their life easier. The hard part is letting them realize the benefits on their own. We’re never convinced when someone like me comes in and says, “I’m here to make your life easier.”
On the operational front, I also tasked my folks in Energy Supply to develop “outside-the-box” power options. They answered the bell by developing a joint dispatch arrangement with Jacksonville Energy Authority, which allows both parties to benefit from using the most efficient generating units in our combined portfolios at any hour of the day.
We have been able to import up to 120 megawatts of power daily at costs below some of our alternate generating costs. We have already seen significant savings.
The biomass plant owner, Gainesville Regional Energy Center, has filed a lawsuit against GRU, claiming that you have been overly aggressive in dealing with the company. Can you discuss your philosophy dealing with GREC?
Whenever I’m dealing with contracts or agreements, it’s my job to ensure that the organization gets the rights it bargained for. That is a principle tenet of any manager, any leader of an organization. Anything short of that, you’re not earning your paycheck.
A lot of the lawsuit revolves around what qualifies as an outage period for GREC and what is GREC’s obligation to perform during those outages. When they’re in an outage, it’s clear that GRU shouldn’t have to pay GREC $194,709 a day – the amount we are supposed to pay every day for the biomass plant being available.
That’s the other issue. Just what constitutes GREC being available? There are significant concerns as to whether GREC is available during times it declared itself to be so. GREC’s charges for power generation are on top of the $194,709 a day.
Senior Writer CHRIS EVERSOLE has been a keen observer of business, government and culture in the Greater Gainesville Area while living here over the past two decades. His experience includes work with the University of Florida and Alachua County Government. He also has been a journalist and public relations professional in the Tampa Bay and Sarasota- Bradenton areas, as well as in Michigan, Ohio and New York.