Sup. Jake McGoldrick just had an epiphany: install solar panels on affordable, low-income housing projects, citywide.
That way the City can green San Francisco, create local jobs and business opportunities—and eventually reduce to zero the utility bills of low-income folks.
McGoldrick’s moment of clarity came in face of increasing pressure from local solar businesses and work creation programs to support Mayor Gavin Newsom’s recently announced Solar Energy Incentive Program.
McGoldrick says he supports going green and hiring locally, but he balked at the lack of public discussion about the mayor’s program, which uses tax payer dollars to subsidize solar installation on private property.
Pitched as a pilot project, Newsom’s solar energy incentive program proposes to allocate $3 million between now and the end of June, and $3-5 million in subsequent fiscal years. That adds up to more than $50 million by 2018.
McGoldrick believes these monies would be better used subsidizing installations on public housing and non-profit-owned, low-income projects.
Supporters of Newsom’s proposed Solar Incentive program argue that could better leverage a portion of the SFPUC’s Mayor’s Energy Conservation Account, and get more out of Hetch Hetchy dollars spent in energy efficiency and solar.
But as McGoldrick observes, the Mayor’s current plan fails to address public ownership concerns.
‘That’s why I’m going to try and give these MECA funds to affordable housing projects,” McGoldrick said.. “That way, people get jobs, solar companies come here, the city goes green–and we do power purchase agreements.”
San Francisco only has a 30 percent home ownership rate. But since a portion of that percentage are absentee landlords, the City could only target an ever smaller fraction of the city’s roof tops for solar installation, under theMayor’s current Solar Energy Incentive Program.
‘Tenants can’t jump in and spend $25,000 to replace their roof, and you can’t have the question of jobs be the tail wagging the dog,” McGoldrick said.