In Pinellas County, Fla., Duke Energy has seemingly propped up a third party 501(c)(6) to advocate against municipalization as their 30-year franchise agreement comes up for renewal. Rather than the numbers and data being the focus of the campaign, all local media outlets are now calling out the group's refusal to state its connection to Duke.
Distrust with Duke is growing at a time when they desperately need to build community support. Consumers lose because they don't trust the data when it's presented by a source obscuring its connections.
It's unknown how this will shake out, but let the PR fallout be a warning for anyone planning to fight municipalization in the future: honesty breeds trust. If you're going to operate discreetly, don't get caught.
https://www.cltampa.com/news/in-pinellas-a-dark-money-funded-energy-alliance-is-working-against-the-push-for-publicly-owned-electricity/