Trivia question: What two words can make businesses, politicians and journalists all tremble in fear while energizing a select portion of the population?
Public hearing.
In my decades as a journalist, I’ve covered plenty of public hearings of all stripes, including for utilities. There’s a no-win situation for many people.
Businesses, politicians and journalists don’t have much in common (nor do they typically even like each other), but there are few things more painful than sitting for hours listening to people make the same points (usually ineloquently) over and over.
I don’t often have too much sympathy for spokespeople, but I have often found myself siding with the poor PR person who usually has to deal with the angry masses. And when you’re having a hearing dealing with proposed rate increases, green energy (or the lack thereof) or postmortems of weather-related outages, it’s likely a no-win situation.
Consider the proposed rate hike. No matter how justified it is, nobody wants to pay more. People aren’t going to listen to reason; they’re just going to complain.
And since public hearings tend to attract, shall I say, an interesting slice of the population, listening to reason is a rarity. You’re going to get malcontents who just like to complain, “consumer advocates” who don’t understand basic economics and conspiracy theory proponents who think businesses and governments are out to get the world.
So, how should your utility approach a public hearing? It doesn’t make a difference if the hearing is a goodwill gesture on your part, government-mandated or something else.
The best strategy is to treat it as an educational opportunity, even if few people learn anything.
Depending upon how much control you have of the proceedings, here’s a game plan to follow, using a rate hearing as an example:
Start with an overview of your utility and what you do. That should include a brief overview of your history and how operations have changed over the years. PowerPoint tends to be overused by corporations, but here it can effective; also distribute printed handouts to the audience.
When you speak, avoid jargon that will confuse the public. Speak in general and basic terms.
Now go into the meat of the presentation.
Explain how rates are calculated, detailing the various components, such as customer charges, maintenance surcharges, distribution charges and taxes (subtly point out that the utility has no control over taxes levied. Use a sample customer bill to point out the charges.
From there, explain why the rates need to rise and what the increased revenue will go toward. Keep the explanation short and straightforward.
A question-and-answer period likely will follow, perhaps first by politicians and then by the public in attendance.
That means there are two perilous periods to coms.
Politicians like to grandstand as “protectors of the public,” so they’re likely to be overly critical and questions to which they already know the answer. It’s all part of a game, so you need to play along. Answer those questions as succinctly as possible.
As for when the public begins to ask questions, you ’re likely to get a few well-informed and reasonable people asking questions, but you’ll probably get more people who don’t understand much, don’t want to understand and just want to complain about having to pay more.
Remember to always be polite and patient, even when you get the same questions again and again.
It’s important to remember to be polite and patient – you’ll get variations of the same questions over and over. Never lose your cool, no matter how much people try to incite you.
Also remember that if someone asks a question that you can’t answer on the spot, it’s OK to admit that you don’t know but will try to find the answer. Promise to get back to that person – then follow up on it.
Above all, never lie. With the prevalence of video these days, lies come back to haunt officials more than ever.
At the end, wrap things up by summarizing your main points and pledging to work with the community to make your utility as responsive as possible.
Stick around afterward to ask any lingering questions. Having a table with bottles of water and light snacks can’t hurt, as people like free food, and you may be able to disarm some of your critics. Ask for feedback.
Now this game plan isn’t perfect because there will be no satisfying some critics, but it’s about the best you can do. You may walk away frustrated, but you’ve probably minimized complaints to some degree, which is the name of the game.