Grover D. Clifton Jr.

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My name is Grover Clifton Jr. and I am running for Director on the board of Pedernales Electric Cooperative for District 6.

I am asking for your vote to represent you as a PEC member. I have been a PEC member since December 2019 when I moved to Spring Branch with my wife Amanda and daughter Arlyss.

I’d like to offer a bit of background about me, and then how I intend to benefit the PEC members if elected to the board.

I have been in the oil and gas industry for over 15 years now. I am currently the Vice President of Operations for a large midstream company and I'm responsible for all aspects of the operations, control room, SCADA, measurement, automation, instrumentation and electrical. I have spent my career in pipeline, terminal, and processing operations, and I understand the key drivers for safety, success and how to properly execute these objectives. I have extensive experience interacting with governing and regulatory agencies such as the USCG, TCEQ, PHMSA, RRC, GLO, and EPA. I'd like to bring this knowledge to the leadership at PEC.

I have a Bachelor of Arts in mathematics and am a PMI certified Project Management Professional. I serve on the American Petroleum Institute Committee on Liquid Measurement as well as two different Gas Processor Association committees.

I am running because as a PEC member I believe there needs to be a better structure for system reliability, company accountability, and overall communication and customer support to the PEC community. Over the past several years there have been weather and grid-related events that have led to widespread outages in the PEC service area. While the weather is within no one’s control, the preparedness and response to it is.

Now, for my intentions if elected to the board of PEC: I'd like to present a bulleted outline and summarization of the objectives that I intend to foster if elected to the board, with further explanations available on facebook at https://www.facebook.com/groverforpecd6.

System Reliability

• Operations need to begin tracking and reporting on other metrics such as Mean Time Between Failure, Mean Time To Repair, Utilization, and Availability. These need to be made public on the website regularly at the close of each month to show marked improvement in each area. Currently there is a larger focus on SAIDI and SAIFI metrics and these are not enough to truly show the overall system and employee performance.
• Each year a capital improvement plan needs to be outlined and made available to the public indicating what system improvements are being implemented in the coming year and the timeline to completion, as well as showing the results at year end if the projects were completed.
• A priority should be placed on vegetation management, as this seems to be a repetitive reason for large-scale outages during the period of freezing ice storms.

Company Accountability

• The board, senior management, and mid-level management compensation need to be tied to the above outlined reliability key performance indicators. Goals for each metric needs to be outlined each quarter and a report issued to all PEC members showing performance.
• Likewise, compensation also needs to be tied to the completion of the capital improvement plans.

Communication and Customer Support

• A crisis communication team needs to be established, whose job is to regularly update PEC members in the event of a large-scale outage. Most people understand it may take time to repair significant interruptions, but personally my biggest frustration during the most recent outages was that we had no idea when power was going to be restored, and we could not find a reliable place to get any information. The website was being updated at a very irregular pace and was widely inaccurate. This needs to change.
• Potentially allow members to vote on grid improvement projects.
• Increase auto-pay and paperless billing incentives.
• Protect, if not increase, solar buyback rates.
• Offer more specific and targeted free training to the community in electrical safety and the importance of energy management.
• Provide more detailed information to members on the role of ERCOT and what impacts the high energy usage days (4CP) have on the Texas grid, businesses, and consumers.
• Improve rates for members; if PEC continues to focus on efficiency and holds employees accountable then decreased operational costs can help the customers through improved energy rates.

I see this position as an opportunity to improve upon the providing of a service that is a critical resource that each and every one of us use. There are simple objectives that can result in measurable changes for the betterment of each service member, and if elected I will work tirelessly to deliver upon my outlined agenda. I believe in transparency as a leader; with something as critical as power we must be forthcoming with everything, good or bad.