A continuing dialogue on the city’s contract with an Illinois power facility dominated discussion at
council Monday night.
"While I understand and appreciate … those thoughtful and well-intentioned voices of concern and
despair, I am convinced that Bowling Green and its Board of Public Utilities has and will continue to
proceed on a responsible pathway toward even greater degrees of energy sustainability that will benefit
the citizens of BG, its industrial clients and indeed Bowling Green State University for years to
come," said Mayor Richard Edwards in a statement read at the meeting. The remarks were to address
another statement provided to an area news outlet last month giving historical background to the issue.

The statements concerned the city’s contract, entered into in 2007, with the Prairie State Energy Campus
in southwest Illinois. The city has contracted with the facility, through American Municipal Power, to
purchase much of its electrical power for the next 40 years. Concerns about the arrangement have been
brought up by the local group Citizens for a Liveable Future.
At the end of April the group brought David Schlissel of the Institute for Energy Economics and Financial
Analysis to meet with local organizations. Schlissel asserted that, in the next seven years, the
contract could cost the city and its power customers between $48 and $54 million more than other
available sources.
Edwards said that, though energy technology is changing rapidly, the city "has been among the
leading cities in Ohio in sustainability" and he looks forward to when BG can invest in a solar
project and "we can purchase more power from wind-driven turbines."
Council President Michael Aspacher, in presenting a statement from council, noted the body’s support for
the city’s energy policy and said BG’s long-term energy policy "continues to serve the interests of
both the citizens of Bowling Green and our business partners well." Council, he said,
"respectfully" rejected suggestions to investigate options for withdrawing from the contract,
or to ask the Ohio Attorney General’s Office to investigate Prairie State.
He said that better efforts would be put toward improved efficiency at the facility.
Neocles Leontis, a member of Citizens for a Liveable Future, addressed points made by Schlissel and
echoed Edwards’ statement that "the energy market is totally changing very rapidly."
That’s why, he said, the city should not lock itself into a decades-long contract "because we are
locked in to 19th-century technology."
"Now we have modern ways of doing that. And we are paying an opportunity cost if we remain in this
arrangement," and risk being unable to move into a more progressive energy grid.
"I hope that we consider investigating why we will keep paying this," said group member
Jennifer Karches regarding the reported extra millions to be paid. She said that another community, in
Missouri, was able to get out of their contract by paying a monthly fee.
Leontis’ wife, Vassiliki Leontis, countered a statement by Councilman Bob McOmber, who opined the group
was supporting natural gas "that produces from fracking technology."
"We are not advocating that," she said. "However, we should keep perspective as to how
much energy costs no matter what its sources are."
She also addressed what she termed "a sense of permanence" in Edwards’ remarks "about the
decisions that have been made" regarding the Prairie State contract. She said there are reasons to
believe that the city was misled by AMP in the contract, citing the idea that AMP’s consultant for the
matter was also contracted by the city – calling the arrangement a "conflict of interest" on
AMP’s part – and saying that AMP should have been able to predict skyrocketing costs at the time and
discuss that with the city.