City of Greensboro water fraud: The Randleman Dam Scam

Dam Scam is finished—FINAL POST

2010-07-21T06:38:00.003-04:00

THE END OF THE ROAD

Forrest Gump said he stopped running because he was tired. I am tired, and that’s why I am concluding my exposé about Greensboro’s fraudulent pursuit of the Randleman Dam. I’ve been unsuccessful at galvanizing any support for an investigation into municipal corruption regarding its approval and funding so here is my final wrap. If you appreciate having abundant low-cost water delivered to your tap please read my final post and discover what's wrong about the workings of the average water works.

A NATION’S WATER AT RISK
The most misunderstood threat to our nation’s water supply is municipalities like the City of Greensboro, NC that sell water for profit. Why?—because they will always try and sell all they can. They won’t address gross water inefficiencies like Greensboro’s 35,000 leaking toilets because toilet leaks increase water sales by 2 million gallons a day. This industry is all about sales and expansion.

Water works expand their operations even when water sales are declining because they’re managed by engineers who build things for a living. The manifest destiny of the average municipal water works results in the waste of billions and billions of US gallons annually and nobody is watching. That’s not all—water is heavy—so they also waste enormous amounts of non-renewable fossil fuels to provide the energy to distribute, collect and treat all the water that should have been be conserved but instead was sold for profit.

Sadly, this unnecessary waste of water and energy will continue forever unless and until municipal water works are forced to change their ways. Who will force them? If you said the government you’re wrong. Currently state and federal governments encourage and reward municipalities like Greensboro for expanding their water works, so it does not appear that government will ever become the change-agent that mandates water efficiency for municipalities.

A CASE STUDY IN THE MAKING
Soon the water-for-profit quagmire will be demonstrated locally right here in Randleman, NC. Although more than a decade behind schedule, the Piedmont Triad Regional Water Authority (PTRWA) (The Randleman Dam agency) will begin selling water within the next few months. And like most municipal suppliers, PTRWA will sell as much of the new Randleman Reservoir as it can every day! And PTRWA will expand its operation regardless of need because that's the mindset of water engineers.

WHAT ABOUT WATER CONSERVATION?
PTRWA will never promote the practice of water conservation until drought happens and its reservoir empties. Once the drought ends it will go right back to selling (wasting) all the water it can. PTRWA’s take on water conservation will be just like the majority of US municipalities that offer plenty of water con-VERSATION and no real water con-SERVATION.

FACT: The national water conservation conference is the place where WC coordinators lament to one another that their engineer-directors are only interested in water sales and water works expansions and not interested in water conservation.

WC coordinators resort to conducting school tours and printing WC literature because they are prevented from doing real water conservation. The only time their bosses appear interested in water conservation is when they are on camera or in front of a microphone. Whenever the water engineer/director oversees the water conservation program the fox is guarding the henhouse. Do you still not understand the problem with municipal governments and water engineers selling water for profit?

As water conservation manager I gave the City of Greensboro my best effort. My one-person WC office led citizens to spare 4 billion gallons and win back-to-back 1st place United States Environmental Protection Agency awards for municipal water efficiency. During my 5-years of service real water sales declined every year while the Greensboro economy was booming and record numbers of building permits were being issued. The unanticipated decline scared the crap out of my water bosses and it became a direct threat to the approval and funding of the Randleman Dam. I was toast.

I was hassled for three years and then fired in 1999 for succeeding at what I was hired to do. I was never replaced. Then in 2003 the City of Greensboro released the WC specialist I had hired and it never filled her vacant position either. So the City of Greensboro shut down its nationally recognized water conservation program without any complaints from taxpayers, local environmentalists, NCDENR, the EPA because the local news didn't report it.

I’ve given this dam scam exposé my best shot since 2007. Unfortunately I have been unable to convince citizens and news reporters that they were scammed into an unnecessary dam and vast supply of new water. The City of Greensboro used every trick in the book to get its new dam by hook or crook. The dam scammers were successful at their game and it appears they will never be held accountable for fraudulently expanding Greensboro’s water works by 75% during a 15 year decline in water sales. Only a monopoly can behave like that—and it certainly helps when the local news media serves as cheerleaders for the expansion.

I have no doubt that people more talented than me will continue to risk their careers and expose the harm caused by municipalities driven to sell water-for-profit. Perhaps the evidence I have archived here may become useful to those wishing to advance this issue. As for this whistleblower, I have been at this for too long and my health has been affected. I am so grateful to the Internet and Google for the opportunity they provide to fight city hall. I send my best wishes and this word of caution to all those involved in the uphill battle for water efficiency in a water-for-profit environment.

Mike J Baron
Greensboro’s only water conservation manager
1994 to 1999
mikejbaron@triad.rr.com
Google dam scam to find my reports

News & Record Editor John Robinson

2010-07-09T10:29:00.001-04:00

Dear Editor John Robinson:

Today in your blog “All aboard” you defined what news is: "The train arrives at station isn't news. It's supposed to arrive at the station. It's only news when the train doesn't arrive."

In 1997 as a whistleblower working inside the Greensboro water works I began feeding you sensitive information that Greensboro water use was declining. You would not print it. You said to me, "That’s not news—with water conservation in place, water use is supposed to decline" ….a la the train arrives at the station."

But water use continued to decline several years during a booming economy when record numbers of Greensboro building permits were issued! The City of Greensboro had predicted that even with water conservation in place, water use would skyrocket. TRANSLATION: Greensboro warned that 10 trains were going to arrive on just four tracks—and only two showed up! That's news, Mr. Robinson.

Declining water demand was BIG NEWS because had the public known that water use was going DOWN instead of UP, it might have begun to question the approval and the funding of the controversial Randleman Dam.

15 years have passed and the citizens of Greensboro still don't know that water use (water sales) is lower now than when RanDam was being pitched as the only solution for a city "running out of water."

You know that the citizens don't know these facts ....and you still refuse to print them. You sent a reporter to cover my post-termination news conference who was on her last day of work and beginning a new job the following week in Texas. That shows how little interest you have in reporting the truth.

Why didn't the News & Record inform its readers that the City of Greensboro shut down its USEPA award-winning water conservation program? Why won't the News & Record inform its readers that water sales are lower now than 15 years ago? Why won't the News & Record tell citizens that the City of Greensboro's 1995 projected water needs created to justify RanDam never came true?

Mike J Baron
Greensboro's only water conservation manager
1994 to 1999

To the Jamestown News: Get your dam story straight

2010-07-08T09:51:00.000-04:00

Today the Jamestown News published a dam story based on fiction. Reporter Carol Brooks wrote:

“Discussion about building a regional water system actually began in the 1930s because the Triad area is prone to drought.”

Ms. Brooks, who told you that proneness to drought is what began the discussion of the dam and reservoir in the 1930’s? That’s a lie! The dam was for flood control and the initiative was eventually abandoned.

Drought has become the new excuse for RanDam—because Greensboro, the driving force behind the approval of RanDam never did see the huge increase in water sales it had projected (See chart at end of post).

The Army Corp of Engineers employs government engineers who build things for a living. They will think up projects because that’s their job…and their job security. The Army Corp of Engineers operates just like the Greensboro water works that continues to build in spite of a decline in water sales. When you give government engineers a giant Erector Set and a big budget they are going to propose projects and then build them. That’s the name of the game. If Greensboro’s water engineers stopped designing and building they would be out of a job (DUH)! But when you are a monopoly like the Greensboro water works you can do whatever you want!

Greensboro and High Point never needed RanRez water and now their taxpayers and water customers are stuck paying for daily allotments. Greensboro residents should realize that it costs more to operate three water plants than it does to operate two water plants.

FACT: Greensboro purchased 53% of RanRez and it has expanded its water works by 75% during a 15 year decline in water sales. And nobody knows but the few who read the Randleman Dam Cold Case Files.

QUESTION: During periods of dry weather would the City of Greensboro ever prematurely impose water restrictions on citizens and businesses when restrictions aren't needed?

ANSWER: Of course it would! It's a proven tactic that works ever time it is tried. Restrictions convince citizens of the "need" for Randleman's water and prepare them to foot the bill.

Greensboro Water Director claims we are headed for a disaster!

2010-07-04T07:23:00.000-04:00

The Miami Herald did a story yesterday about the rising costs of repairing the water works infrastructure—a growing national problem. It interviewed Greensboro’s water chief Allan Williams because he was formerly Jacksonville Florida’s utility director. Several experts quoted in this story indicated that water rates need to rise 20 to 25 percent and Williams agrees.

"People don't want to pay for this so they take it for granted,'' said Williams. “But by keeping rates artificially low, the effects are going to snowball and it's going to become a disaster.''

What the City of Greensboro is not telling you is that infrastructure costs are skyrocketing but water sales are lower than 15 years ago. Therefore, cash flow is a problem. But Greensboro cannot cite low water use as the problem because it predicted that water sales were going to increase and they didn't—they fell. Without the anticipated revenue from increased water use the only way to raise cash now is to raise the water rates.

Greensboro never needed the Randleman Dam. The money it wasted for it could have been applied to water works infrastructure repairs.

Lack of rain excites dam scammers

2010-07-01T09:10:00.000-04:00

This morning on Snooze 2 TV the weatherman announced the Triad is beginning to feel the effects of the lack of rain. And the City of Greensboro dam scammers couldn’t be happier! That’s because they need a new excuse for RanDam after their 1995 projections of escalating water demand never came true!

During the last prolonged drought dam scammers like GSO Water Czar Allan Williams took advantage of every opportunity on camera to warn citizens about Greensboro’s “water shortage” and paint RanDam as the obvious solution.

FACT: Greensboro got through its last lengthy drought with relative ease—and without RanDam! Its reservoirs did better than those in other NC cities. Why?—because water use is lower than it was 15 years ago! ...but the city won’t tell you that and neither will the lamestream media!
Instead they showed you photos of RanRez full to the brim (because none of the six communities were drawing water from it.) What they didn’t tell you is that during a drought RanRez will empty much faster than other reservoirs because the Deep River that feeds RanRez is actually a shallow stream.

With low water sales and a 75% expansion of the water works, drought protection is the new excuse for RanDam. Long ago its purpose was because citizens were fed that Greensboro was "running out of water." That was never true—but it's a wonderful fear tactic to get an unnecessary dam approved.

CAUTION: The dam scammers are downright nervous about their fraud becomming exposed so use good discernment whenever Greensboro’s slanted water reports reach you on TV or in print. For a more detailed story about RanRez as phony drought mitigation, click here.

To receive the RanDam Cold Case Files in your inbox, click here and type Randleman Dam Scam.It is so easy a cave person can do it.

Paradigm shift: Greensboro as a water exporter

2010-07-01T09:09:00.000-04:00

The thought of the City of Greensboro exporting water to a far off land like Alamance Elementary School near Pleasant Garden would have been preposterous years ago. But Greensboro has a new problem that it wishes to keep hidden: The city has a huge surplus of H2O and it needs new water customers to consume that surplus.

Remember, Greensboro's water rate is DOUBLE for its water customers living in Guilford County. Maybe the rate should TRIPLE for counties outside of Guilford County? This school will become a cash cow for the water department.

Greensboro has vastly overbuilt it water works while the news media slept. The city now owns 53% of RanRez and has no need for it. Is it any wonder why a distant elementary school will be Greensboro's first foreign water customer? This school will drink from Greensboro's vast water surplus.

Greensboro is exporting water! Ca ching ca ching. It's just too bad that sound will NOT be profit.

Jamestown News- "Greensboro knew by 2003 it did not need Randleman’s water"

2010-06-30T07:12:00.002-04:00

The Jamestown News reports today (see story) that Greensboro knew by 2003 it did not need Randleman’s water.

Jamestown News:

"Work on the dam and lake began in 2001 and was finished in 2003. By then, High Point and Greensboro said they didn't need the water but in 2008 both municipalities agreed to finance their portion. They later pulled out of the proposed bond referendum, selling their own bonds and paying the PTRWA their portion."

Greensboro never needed the Randleman Dam. It was a scam.

Its secret objective was to accelerate growth but it was pitched to citizens and to the feds for survival to get RanDam approved and funded.

Now the RanDam Scam is a cover-up.

RanRez' biggest water customer—the City of Greensboro

2010-06-23T10:16:00.000-04:00

According to yesterday’s News & Record story, half of the PTRWA (RanRez operators) budget will come from purchases made by its biggest water customer—the City of Greensboro. RanRez will earn about $3.7 million dollars annually for just 6 million gallons of water taken by Greensboro every day. The city currently uses about 32 million gallons a day so one-fifth of its water will now be imported from Randleman.

The big question is WHAT WILL GREENSBORO CHARGE ITS CUSTOMERS FOR THE WATER IT IMPORTS FROM RANREZ? The water department is certain to add “shipping and handling charges” and that’s certain to raise the price of water for Greensboro’s customers.

Remember, water chief Allan Williams assured everyone that “RanRez water will be less expensive that Burlington water.” That's a ridiculous statement but you can count on the fact that somehow on paper Greensboro will show that RanRez water is a bargain. And once again Greensboro will not be telling the truth.

But the real question is “How much more expensive is RanRez water than the water produced at Greensboro’s own water plants?” Why?—because the GSO plants must cut production by 6 million gallons a day (mgd) to make room for the 6 mgd imported from RanRez. Even a cave person can do the math.

Greensboro’s dirty little secret is that it has enjoyed a water surplus for more than a decade now. Greensboro never needed Randleman's water but now by contract it must purchase 6 million gallons DAILY from Randleman. And that will drive up the cost of water for everyone.

To suscribe to the Dam Cold Case Files click here and type in Randleman Dam Scam

The day the water stopped flowing—a must read for Greensboro taxpayers

2010-06-14T08:41:00.000-04:00

On Tuesday afternoon, May 24, 1994 after a heat wave and a frenzy of lawn irrigation, water stopped flowing from faucets in northwest Greensboro. Businesses were forced to close. The city and the news media went bonkers over the outage. It was the event the Randleman Dam scammers had been waiting for.
“We knew that this was going to happen sooner or later,” said dam scammer Tom Phillips, former Greensboro City Council member and member of the Piedmont Triad Regional Water Authority (PTRWA). Nobody seemed to know or care that this day's water failure was entirely preventable! With dam fools like Tom Phillips hyping a water shortage Utility Director Ray Shaw was able to take a calculated risk and allow his water works to fail. Phillips’ statement revealed both his ignorance of how a water system works and his marketing savvy for pitching an unnecessary dam. His and other city leaders’ comments insulated Shaw from any blame and paved the way for City Council to advance its dam agenda.
UTILITY DIRECTOR RAY SHAW SHOULD HAVE BEEN FIRED! Why?—because had a fire broken out in northwest Greensboro that day LIVES COULD HAVE BEEN LOST and PROPERTY WOULD HAVE BEEN DESTROYED—all because of the dam fantasy of a few city leaders and developer/profiteers like Robbie Perkins and Dick Grubar who sat on Greensboro’s City Council!
Ray Shaw knew that a small-scale distribution system failure would help him achieve his career dream and theirs too—the Randleman Dam. The Shaw of Utilities survived the water failure without a scratch. And boy did City Council love the result! Can you hear me now citizens of Greensboro? What part of conspiracy do you not understand?
Not a single news reporter or city council member ever asked, “Could this water failure have been prevented?” Instead, city council put on its blinders and forged ahead with a re-action plan that included the start-up of a Water Conservation program—me, and its push for the approval of the Randleman Dam. Years of dishonest propaganda followed before the dam was finally approved. The past decade has revealed the city’s claim about “running out of water” was a fabrication.
This is how Greensboro government conducts business when no checks and balances are in place and spineless local news reporters and their editors refuse to investigate the politics, profits and pride behind every public works project. This forgotten event on May 24, 1994 is what helped secure an unnecessary and astronomically expensive new dam and reservoir for the City of Greensboro.
There were numerous cost-effective alternatives to the Randleman Dam that would have increased Greensboro’s water supply and reduced demand. But thanks to the dam scammers all of them were foolishly jettisoned to secure a new water supply in Randleman. And the result—the Greensboro water works monopoly is now radically overbuilt while real water use is less than it was 15 years ago! And to make matters worse, Randleman Dam has not attracted the industrial customers that were expected to relocate to Greensboro and swallow up the huge surplus of RanRez water that Greensboro has purchased. Residential water users must now pick up the tab for the industries that were supposed to relocate to Greensboro.
Now you know how one preventable water distribution failure in 1994 changed everything. It was the water failure the dam scammers needed to get their project moving.

Only you can help this story get the traction it deserves. Send it to your neighbors and elected officials. Or, just call somebody and tell them to Google two words - dam scam.

To receive the Dam Cold Case Files in your inbox, type Randleman dam scam here.

Former Utility Director Ray Shaw

2010-06-13T09:54:00.000-04:00

When you were a child did you ever break a toy so your parents would buy you a bigger or better one? That’s what former utilities director Ray Shaw did with Greensboro’s water works. I was the department spokesperson and I saw how he did it. Shaw wanted bigger water plants, more pumping horsepower and to see his career dream fulfilled—the construction of the Randleman Dam. He ran the reservoirs and the distribution system into the ground because he knew that failures were the fastest way to get approval for the projects he wanted. If you have read my stories you know how he did it? Feel free to ask questions.

Next from the Dam Cold Case Files: Tuesday, May 24, 1994 was the only day in Greensboro’s history that water stopped flowing from the tap. Businesses were forced to close. Was it an accident? ....or was it allowed to happen for a reason?

To receive Dam Cold Case Files in your inbox type the words Randleman dam scam here.

Dam Scam author to begin new series

2010-06-13T08:45:00.000-04:00

GREENSBORO, NORTH CAROLINA, JUNE 13, 2010, 7:44AM
The Greensboro Water Conservation Truth and Reconciliation Task Force (GWCTRTF)* reports that Dam Scam author Mike J Baron is launching a new series called the Dam Cold Case Files. Each brief post will consist of a single paragraph containing fewer than 100 words of straight-to-the-point reporting that any local journalist can understand.

NO POLYGRAPH TEST YET
Over two years ago Mr. Baron offered to submit to an independent polygraph test to corroborate his eyewitness reporting of Greensboro's $75 million dollar water fraud. To date, none of the Triad's news agencies have offered to arrange one. In fact, none of the Triad's news agencies have even interviewed Mr. Baron a single time or even telephoned Mr. Baron a single time since he began his Randleman Dam Scam exposé on March 28th, 2008. This is most strange because Baron, twice a United States Environmental Protection Agency 1st place award-winner and a Greensboro Chamber of Commerce Environmental Stewardship award-winner was the local news' "go-to person" while he was employed at city hall. Baron was a frequent live guest on WFMY TV 2 and WGHP TV Fox 8 evening newscasts but since he blew the whistle on Greensboro's water fraud both stations and the entire Triad new media refuse to interview him or even report the facts he's posted in his stories.

To quickly find Baron's eyewitness stories simply Google two words—dam scam.

*GWCTRTF—there isn't one yet but there will be someday because the Randleman Dam Scam and cover-up is the largest municipal fraud in the history of Greensboro.

"Get ready to pay a higher water bill" ....by WFMY TV News 2

2010-06-10T11:46:00.000-04:00

Reported last night by WFMY TV News 2. ( Get Ready To Pay A Higher Water Bill)

"Greensboro's water resource director says the city needs the money to pay for system maintenance, and help cover a $200 million dollar bond debt."

"Water Resource Director Alan Williams warns if the city doesn't raise rates now, they* could have to increase them 12 to 13 percent next year."

LOW WATER SALES HAS NOT BEEN REPORTED
Greensboro's water sales have fallen to what they were 2 decades ago! Manufacturing has relocated to Asia and yet the Greensboro water works monopoly is expanding by 75%. To justify its unnecessary investment in RanRes Greensboro now claims that water use will double over the next 40 years! But history shows the city cannot accurately forecast water needs even 3 years into the future and now it is forecasting to 2050. Has the local news media asked Greensboro what would cause water sales to DOUBLE over the next 40 years?—nope.

This is the Randleman Dam Scam and cover-up. It is the largest municipal fraud in the history of Greensboro. WFMY News 2 has never reported Greensboro's 15-year decline in water sales and it refuses to investigate the dam scam.

ECONOMICS 101: As the PRICE of Greensboro water goes UP, the DEMAND for Greensboro water goes DOWN

*Why does Williams use "they" instead of "we?" Isn't it his water department?

City of Greensboro water sales chart tricks

2010-06-07T22:28:00.001-04:00

Today's price of GOLD
Today’s GOLD chart begins at $1,170 an ounce and not zero dollars an ounce. That’s done for a very good reason.

Can you guess why the City of Greensboro begins its water sales chart (below) at zero million gallons per day?

Stay tuned for more City of Greensboro water sales chart tricks.....

This chart begins at 20 million gallons per day and not zero gallons per day like the city's chart. TIP: If the gold chart began at zero dollars an ounce it would appear that the price of gold has stayed the same.

Why extend Greensboro's water to Alamance Elementary School?

2010-06-04T10:04:00.000-04:00

Those who are aware of the 15-year decline in Greensboro's water sales know the real reason why the city wants to extend a water line to Alamance Elementary School. Greensboro needs new water customers! It bought more water than it can ever use! Greensboro has a lock on 53% of Randleman Reservoir! The dam scammers convinced everyone that GSO needed RD water to survive. That was a lie. It was city insiders, developers and Perkinsheads that wanted Randleman's water to profit from new industry. But manufacturing now runs on Asian water instead of Greensboro's water.

Greensboro needs water use to increase so badly that it even ended its own EPA award-winning Water Conservation Program.

Beginning this July the city is under contract to purchase 6 million gallons a day (mgd) from Randleman Reservoir. Greensboro has no use for 6 mgd! None! ZERO! NADA! And yet you would not even know had you not come here to have a drink of the truth. The rest of Greensboro is in the dark thanks to a complicit* news media.

*From Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia: An individual is complicit in a crime if he/she is aware of its occurrence and has the ability to report the crime, but fails to do so. As such the individual effectively allows criminals to carry out a crime despite possibly being able to stop them, either directly or by contacting the authorities, thus making the individual a de-facto accessory to the crime rather than an innocent bystander.

The Greensboro water works has expanded by 75% while water demand has declined over the past 15 years. Only a monopoly can expand during a decline in business.

Greensboro is so dam defensive right now about its water surplus that everything the water works says and does should be seen as a cover-up.

This is the Randleman Dam Scam. And one of its senior dam scammers—Water Director Allan Williams is still at the helm. The Dam Scam is the largest municipal fraud in the history of Greensboro.

Williams has recently projected that Greensboro's water use will double by 2050. That unfounded claim is being repeated by others who are still in the business of justifying a dam that Greensboro never needed. Now the fraud is causing water rates to increase annually.

Mike J Baron
The City of Greensboro's only water conservation manager
1994 to 1999

7 5 % E X P A N S I O N

Rhino's Hammer comes down hard on Greensboro water

2010-05-28T06:32:00.001-04:00

From Rhino editor John Hammer in City Budget Designed To Generate Outcry (May 28, 2010)

“City budgets involve a good amount of smoke and mirrors, but for some reason the Greensboro Water Resources Department is in a class by itself. Council member Trudy Wade asked how the repairs to the Townsend Dam were paid for. It is about a $40 million project, so it was a fair question. With Water Resources Director Allan Williams, Finance Director Rick Lusk and Budget and Evaluation Director Larry Davis all sitting right there they couldn't come up with an answer.

Wade was told that the fund balance in the water and sewer fund was about $28 million. The 2009 audit reports a fund balance of $48 million. So it appears the city has spent $20 million from the fund balance this year, but who knows?”

Citizens of Greensboro—Can you hear me now? Greensboro faked its need for the Randleman Dam. A 15-year decline in water sales followed and its being kept a secret by the city. The water department is currently expanding by 75% during this 15-year decline by purchasing 53% of Randleman Reservoir. Beginning in July Greensboro under contract must purchase 6 million gallons per day(mgd) from Randleman Reservoir—water it does not need!....which will raise the price of water to customers.

To further justify its Randleman water grab the City of Greensboro has just come out with a prediction that its water use will DOUBLE over the next 40 years!

This is the Randleman Dam Scam and cover-up. It is the largest municipal fraud in the history of Greensboro.

City of Greensboro finally publishes a NEW WATER FORECAST

2010-05-26T14:44:00.000-04:00

THE WATER CHART WE HAVE BEEN WAITING FOR HAS ARRIVED
After 15 years of silence the City of Greensboro has finally published a new water needs chart (above). If you don't believe this is the city's exact chart, you can find it here on the city's website. Like your auto insurance policy or your credit card interest statement, this chart is intended to confuse you.

MY PREDICTION COMES TRUE
On Wednesday, June 24, 2009 I predicted that if the City of Greensboro ever produces another water forecast chart it will begin the chart's “Y axis” at zero million gallons per day (mgd). You will find my prediction here. That prediction made almost one year ago has now come true. The reason why Greensboro begins its “Y axis” at zero mgd is because it has much to hide.

The city should have begun its “Y axis” around 20 mgd to provide a close-up of what is going on with its declining water sales.

GOLD CHART HAS THE ANSWER
Notice in the chart to the right how the gold market begins its "Y axis" at $880.00 per ounce. If it began the chart at zero dollars per ounce (zero on the Y axis) everthing would be compressed and it would look like the price of gold has not changed! That’s exactly why Greensboro begins at "zero mgd" instead of 20 mgd! Yes, the City of Greensboro has much to hide—its declining water demand and its failed water needs projections that were fabricated to justify the Randleman dam.

WHAT REALLY HAPPENED
If you have not heard what really happened to Greensboro's water sales forecast, see my chart below.....

(click to view full size)

FALSE CLAIM
Right from the beginning the city's new chart makes a false claim. It shows that water use increased between 1990 and 2000. Will anybody question the city's misrepresentation of fact?

The city's new chart is also wrong between 2006 and 2010 where it shows a steady increase in water use.

DRUM ROLL....AND NOW FOR THE CITY'S NEWEST WATER FORECAST
Water demand has declined ever since 1994 and the city has cleverly concealed this fact for 15 years! Now, beginning this year the city is predicting that water sales will steadily and dramatically increase ......until 2050. That's how it plans to justify three more expansions of the Randleman water treatment plant (see arrows).

THE DAM SCAM CONTINUES
Do you really think that water demand will increase given that manufacturing has departed, migration from the north has slowed and the price of water is rising? Do you want even more water purchased from Randleman in 2022, 2030 and 2040 when the city has such a poor track record of predicting its future water needs? Beware, because this is what your city is planning to do.

Why have you not seen the city's new water forecast chart in the local news? Why hasn't any local reporter brought it to your attention? There's a cover-up going on, that's why. Greensboro purchased 53% of Randleman Reservoir and it is about to expand its water resources by 75%...after a 15 year decline in water sales. This is the Randleman Dam Scam and cover-up. It is the largest municipal fraud in the history of Greensboro.

Snooze 2 cannot put 2 and 2 together and come up with a WATER FRAUD

2010-05-15T06:53:00.000-04:00

WFMY TV 2 reported yesterday that “Greensboro Water Resources Director Allan Williams said the city needs the money for purchasing water from Randleman Reservoir.”

Hold on a second.

Why does the city need money to purchase water from RR? The water it purchases is turned around and sold at a profit to Greensboro's water customers. Therefore the sale of RR water pays for the purchase of RR water.

QUESTION: So why is Williams saying the city needs money to purchase RR water?

ANSWER: It’s because the city does not need water from RR—but by contract it must take it anyway! That means production at Greensboro’s two water plants must be cut back by 6 mgd to accept the 6 mgd of water from RR. And, you can count on the fact that RR water will be more expensive that Lake Townsend water!

When PTRWA sets its price for exported RR water don't expect the City of Greensboro to disclose it. And then don't forget Greensboro has to suck RR water uphill 15 miles and then "mark it up" to its customers to net some profit.

Remember, GSO Water Czar Williams said that "RR water will be cheaper than Burlington water." LOL

FORECAST A FAILURE
The City of Greensboro bought a whopping 55% of RR despite the fact that its water needs are lower now than they were 15 years ago and nobody but me is reporting this fact.

The dam scammers overestimated Greensboro's need for water (see chart) and now the citizens must pay for the dam scammers lies, arrogance and pride.

The Randleman Dam scam is the biggest municipal fraud in the history of Greensboro! It’s too bad that Snooze 2 cannot put 2 and 2 together and come up with answers like these for its viewers.

WATER SALES are so low that WATER RATES must increase

2010-05-06T08:35:00.000-04:00

City of Greensboro cannot tell the truth behind the 9% water rate increase

2010-05-03T09:15:00.000-04:00

The real reason for the 9% water rate increase is that Greensboro's water sales are in a 19-year slump. Not enough profit is being generated form the sale of water to pay for water works operations, water works improvements and the Randleman Dam projects.

The City predicted it would sell 43 million gallons a day in 2009—it only sold 31 mgd. It overestimated by 4.4 billion gallons.

Why won't the local news media tell you about the City's bogus future water needs projections that never materialized?

The media is covering its tracks so it does not look dam foolish for failing to investigate the greatest municipal scam in the history of Greensboro—the Randleman Dam Scam.

When citizens learn that water sales have fallen to the same level as in 1991 they realize the City's future water needs predictions were a complete failure. The City of Greensboro was never running out of water. It operated a scam to get the Randleman Dam so it could compete with the growth of Raleigh and Charlotte. A new water supply was supposed to attract industry and jobs.

Now the City water works is in a real financial bind. It needs more CASH to run the operation and it cannot give the real reason for the need. When citizens discover the decline in water sales they will begin asking, “What the heck did we build the Randleman Dam for?"

FACT: After a 9% water rate increase, less water will be sold in 2011 and more water will be conserved in 2011. The more expensive Greensboro water becomes, the less it will be used.

FACT: Greensboro uses less water in 2010 than it did in 1995! The chart below contains real numbers obtained from the City of Greensboro Water Resources Department.

If you appreciate having abundant water delivered to your tap, please read this....

2010-03-22T10:39:00.000-04:00

One of the greatest threats to our United States water supply is the fact that municipalities like Greensboro sell water for profit. The average water works is a sales organization disguised as a municipal service.

LIFE LESSON: A government that funds itself through the sale of water will always SELL all the water it can. When in front of a camera that government will vociferously encourage the practice of water conservation to appear green, but its policies will aim to maximize water consumption (sales).

PTRWA’s Randlemnan Reservoir is a perfect case study for municipal water inefficiency. PTRWA will sell all the water it can treat—every gallon of it! And the more water it treats the more water it will sell. PTRWA will never encourage water conservation until Randleman Reservoir is near empty and it PTRWA is running out of water to sell.

Eventually PTRWA will have the most expensive water warden uniforms, the best high-tech communications systems, the fastest patrol boats and the most plush office chairs….all because it is a water-selling monoploy that sets its own water rates. Of course PTRWA will encourage water conservation…but it will never be serious about it. Just watch.

Sadly, Greensboro no longer operates a water conservation program. Years ago when it did, the water department discovered that successful water conservation hurt water sales. For example, consider the 35,000 leaking toilets spread across the City of Greensboro. About 2 million gallons a day of drinking water is purchased by the owners of those leaking toilets! Why would a water department whose objective it is to sell water want to encourge their customers to fix those leaking toilets? Those toilets represent a guaranteed daily sale of 2 million gallons!

Likewise, the City of Greensboro always ridicules the operation of lawn irrigation systems when it is raining—but it has done nothing to prevent their operation. I proposed an ordinance like they use out West in arid communities. It would require the installation of a $30 “rain switch” that automatically cuts “off” irrigation systems during rain events. It is so simple. Can you guess why GSO never adopted the "rain switch?" It’s because Greensboro is desperate to sell all the water it can, and sprinkler systems operating when it is raining represent sales.

The story behind the dam scam is much bigger than me being fired for reducing water sales and Greensboro tricking its citizens into an unnecessary dam. It’s about government selling water when it should be conserving water. If you want more of my observations about the City of Greensboro read my story “Water Economics 101.”

Today is World Water Day, a promotion of the United Nations. This is a good day for you to understand the profit motives that drive the City of Greensboro water department. I would appreciate your feedback. Please post a comment.

A quick review of my water sales CHART explains why Greensboro is out to sell all the water it can.

The folks down in Willmington wish that all the upstream municipalities like Greensboro would sell as little water as they can—because it would mean cleaner drinking water for Willmington. Unfortunately every municipality upstream uses (sells) all the water it can to make money. And now you know how water is wasted and polluted whenever government sells water for profit.

Rhino changes its tune and now projects a "water surplus"

2010-03-12T08:51:00.000-05:00

The Rhinoceros Times has been almost as bad as the News & Record when it comes to cheerleading for the Randleman Dam. Rhino editor John Hammer and Rhino reporter Scott Yost are both on record claiming Greensboro is in serious need of Randleman Reservoir water.

It's been Hammer's contention that Greensboro could and should have been on Randleman water years ago. He was dumbfounded that Greensboro did not begin its pipeline connection to Randleman sooner because the city needed the water so bad.

It didn't. Greensboro didn't need the water it has contracted to purchase 4 years ago...and it does not need Randleman water today. That's the real reason why the dam took so long to complete. Greensboro is secretly having buyer remorse over expanding its water works by 75% during a 15 year decline in water sales. It would be like your spouse buying a ocean freighter of toilet paper because you said, "Make sure you get some extra!"

High Point is looking almost as silly as Greensboro. It does not need Randleman water for 20 years! It is no wonder why the dam took so long to build once it was approved and funded. And Greensboro cannot refuse the 6 million gallons it is under contract to purchase every day. There goes your water bill!

"E X C E S S W A T E R "
But in yesterday’s paper (see story) John Hammer suddenly changed his tune. He wrote, “It is possible when Randleman comes online that Greensboro will actually have excess water to sell.”

You learned it from the dam scam pages!

Whoa John Hammer! What happened to your many years of "water shortage" talk? How can there suddenly be a surplus? And John, why is it in yesterday's 900 word story you make absolutely no mention of Greensboro’s 15-year decline in water sales?

Why must Rhino readers come here to the dam scam pages to learn the truth about what’s really happened to public water sales in Greensboro? I have offered my CHART to the Rhino and it has refused to print it! Why? Is it not news? Or is it too embarrassing to your newspaper's support of the dam?
This is Hammer's first mention of a possible water surplus when Greensboro begins drawing only 6 million gallons a day (mgd) from Randleman. Hey folks, Greensboro is licensed to draw 28mgd! If it will have a surplus with only 6mgd, imagine how much that surplus will grow when it jumps to 12 and then 28mgd!

Greensboro purchased a wopping 53% of Randleman Reservoir because the dam scammers took full advantage of everyone's fear of Greensboro running out of water? That was never true! Greensboro was never running out of water. The dam scammers used every trick in the book to fake a water shortage to get the dam! I was there. I saw exactly how they did it. Now go back and begin reading all my stories you skipped ....because you thought I was a lunatic claiming that Greensboro has a water surplus. How did a lunatic win so many awards?

Greensboro never needed the Randleman Dam

There were numerous smarter and far more cost effective methods of developing new water for Greensboro than the construction of Randleman Dam and Randleman Reservoir. I offered at least 6 of them. But the dam scammers rejected all alternatives and hailed the dam as the only solution for Greensboro.

The dam was a scam then and the dam is a scam now. Remember, you heard it here first. Greensboro has had a water surplus for 15 years. It is all an illusion except for dry reservoirs

I was fired because I refused to participate in this fraud. My boss actually had me saying on camera, "We have to have the Randleman Dam by the year 2000!" That was baloney! And I was toast when I stopped repeating his fraudulent claim!

Water Chief Allan Williams must be fired for his full participation in the dam scam against the citizens of Greensboro. Former City Manager Ed Kitchen's name must be stripped from the J. Edward Kitchen Operations Center for lying about the water shortage and leading the city into a dam it never needed....and skyrocketing water bills for years to come.

Then I want my job back with back pay to 1999. Okay, in lieu of back pay I would gladly accept just one penny per gallon for all the Greensboro water my conservation efforts saved.

DAM SCAM EXCLUSIVE: Adams Farm will drink its own waste water!

2010-03-11T10:59:00.000-05:00

Here’s something really unusual about the City of Greensboro's water service to Adams Farm that impacts all Greensboro citizens. Greensboro residents and politicians don’t know this. Adams Farm residents don’t know this. Ed Cone does not even know this. It’s another one of Greensboro’s dirty little water secrets.

IMPROPERLY ANNEXED
When Greensboro annexed the Adams Farm community two decades ago it could not provide sewer service to the area. Adams Farm was simply too far away. So the City of Greensboro worked out an agreement with the City of Jamestown to accept Adams Farm’s waste water—for a premium, of course.

However, because the City of Jamestown has no waste water treatment plant of its own, Jamestown then sends Adams Farm’s waste water on to the City of High Point for treatment at its Eastside Waste Water Treatment Plant—for a premium, of course.

Adams Farm's customers are billed by the City of Greensboro like every other water customer. But the City of Jamestown bills Greensboro for Adams Farm's waste water. Then Jamestown pays the City of High Point to treat Adams Farm's waste water. So Adams Farm's waste water is marked up twice! You see, when it comes to annexation, the City of Greensboro does whatever it takes! The same "by hook or crook" applied to the Randleman Dam!

Because Adams Farm customers pay the same waste water fee that other Greensboro residents pay, it means that all City of Greensboro water customers subsidize the extra costs of sending Adams Farm waste water thru Jamestown and then on to High Point.

ADAMS FARM WILL DRINK ITS OWN WASTEWATER!
In Greensboro’s scam to get the dam, because citizens feared the city was "running out of water" (Now proven to be false) they paid very little attention to the quality of the water that would flow into Randleman Reservoir (RR). Not many realize that just upstream from RR is High Point’s Eastside Waste Water Treatment Plant. It discharges into RR. They once considered bypassing RR and discharging the effluent below the dam, but folks below the dam said "NO!" Besides, if the discharge was sent below the dam, RR would have taken forever to fill up. RR needs that discharge to replentish the water it will sell.

That means when Randleman Reservoir opens for business this summer, the 12 million gallons it sells each day will be replaced by discharge from High Point’s EASTSIDE Wastewater Treatment Plant just upstream. In fact, 8 out of every 10 gallons that replaces the daily take will be effluent from the sewer plant. He’s a diagram that explains the Adams Farm cycle:

All Greensboro water customers will be drinking effluent (treated waste water) from the Eastside Plant, and Adams Farm residents will actually be drinking some of their own waste water!

Lee Spencer of the N.C. Division of Water Quality, Division of Environmental Health (see July 7, 1997 meeting minutes) also mentioned that "there are better water supply alternatives available to High Point and Greensboro, and these should be evaluated in great detail before settling on Randleman Lake as the only choice.”

Lee Spencer also stated that he has “grave concerns with the proposed dam and water supply.” He was concerned that the water quality in the lake would not be adequate to protect environmental concerns and public health.

It was asked if the limits for the Eastside WWTP will protect water quality standards. Jay Sauber (Division of Water Quality, Environmental Sciences Branch) requested that when DWQ permits the Eastside WWTP, "we make it clear that the water quality predicted for the lake violates water quality standards, so that we are not blamed for the condition of the lake and we are not asked to try to fix it once it is impounded."

Greensboro not only scammed (committed fraud) to get the dam, but the scam also impounded a new low-quality water supply that is basically the "product" of the Eastside Sewer Plant.

Another dam silly News & Record story

2010-03-11T08:27:00.000-05:00

Once again the News & Record is carrying water for the City of Greensboro and the Randleman Dam. In yesterday’s story (see Randleman Regional Reservoir's water quality passes test) it has reported that the water quality in Randleman Reservoir (RR) is just fine and not polluted by the discharge from High Point’s Eastside Sewer Plant like many warned it would be.

Of course the lake water tests just fine. It's been sitting still for a couple of years! Taft, your water quality story is not valid until the Randleman Reservoir goes into production and 12 million gallons has to be replaced every day by the discharge from the sewer plant. This is a bogus report from the PTRWA.
8 out of every 10 gallons feeding Randleman Reservoir will be treated waste water (effluent).
Yes, all City of Greensboro water customers will be drinking High Point's treated waste water. Yummy.

Greensboro's newest water customer complaint may be, "Hey, I don't taste enough chlorine in my tap water!"

News & Record lets city’s BIG FISH get away—again!

2010-03-03T07:06:00.000-05:00

Once again News & Record reporter Amanda Lehmert could have landed Greensboro water's big fish Allan Williams (see N&R Sunday story)…..but she failed to set the hook.

How could she have let Williams go without grilling him about declining water sales? Some reporter she is! Williams knows the day is coming when a microphone is shoved under his chin and he's asked to account for the 15-year decline in water sales. Williams better hope he's retired before that day arrives.

N&R "CATCH AND RELEASE" interviewing....
Lehmert also let Williams off the hook last year on Feb. 9th (see graphic). Nobody at the daily newspaper dares to reel in Williams using the water history facts that I have published in my stories.

Lehmert knows from my CHART that Greensboro is secretly suffering from declining water sales over the past 15 years. At the same time Greensboro has been spending many millions of dam dollars to expand its water works by 75%! Only a government run monopoly can expand its business during a 15-year decline in sales. Did Lehmert bring up any of this with Williams? Nope.

The city is doing a great job keeping the decline a secret—and so is the News & Record. Once again Lehmert allowed Water Czar Williams to give every reason but the real one for the coming rate increases. And for sure Williams was not about to introduce the real reason on his own.

FACT: Greensboro is selling less water today in 2010 than it did 15 years ago in 1995 when it was begging for the dam. Water rates must now go UP because consumption (sales) has gone DOWN.

FACT: When the water rate INCREASES, water usage DECREASES. The larger the rate hike, the less water people will use.

FACT: Each time Greensboro hikes the water rates the net effect is its own 3 reservoirs grow L-A-R-G-E-R!

FACT: The less water people purchase, the more the city will have to charge for it.....resulting in less water being purchased.

Greensboro could have solved its fabricated "water shortage" in the 90's if it had simply charged what other NC cities charge for water. The city deliberately kept its artificially low prices, discounts and other incentives until AFTER the dam was approved. Extremely low prices meant extremely high consumption and running the water works and at full capacity and draining the reservoirs.

BREAKING NEWS: Water department updates its water CHART

2010-02-22T14:48:00.001-05:00

The Greensboro Water Resources Department has updated its web page CHART (above) to include the current year 2010. The department placed it here in the Greensboro City Government pages.

Aren’t you glad the city is providing detailed water information? This is the only water CHART that's available from the water department.

Below is my CHART revealing the decline in Greensboro water sales since 1995 and Greensboro's failed projections of its future water needs.

QUESTION: Why doesn't the Water Resources Department publish its history of water sales?

ANSWER: Because it does not want you to know that it has expanded by 75% during a 15-year decline in water sales.

Robinson, Johnson, Wireback, Green, Hammer, Cone, Fec and Roch

2010-02-19T09:44:00.001-05:00

Two years ago I offered to take a polygraph test to substantiate my testimony in the Randleman Dam scam. That would have made some lively copy for an ambitious investigative reporter. But I discovered there are no ambitious investigative reporters covering the Triad. All that remains on the news beat are overworked “He said—she said” reporters who are carefully controlled by timid editors who print everything the city feeds them.

Just when it seemed hopeless for the dam scam I read this Schopenhauer quote in Dr. J’s post. It was like oxygen to my lungs.

All truth passes through 3 stages:

First, it is ridiculed.
Second, it is violently opposed.
Third, it is accepted as being self-evident.

Arthur Schopenhauer
German philosopher (1788 - 1860)

DAM SCAM LIKE GLOBAL WARMING
At first, only idiots challenged man-made global warming. The issue was clear. Everybody knew global warming was true. Teachers taught it in their classrooms. Challengers were ridiculed. But it appears we are now entering stage three. Soon it will be self-evident that man-made global warming was a fraud. Years from now the News & Record will say, "We knew that."
Someday it will be universally understood that the City of Greensboro lied, cheated, falsified reports, manipulated its water supply into near failure and scuttled its water conservation manager and program to get the approval and funding for the Randleman Dam.

Have you noticed that the ridiculers are now keeping a distance from the dam scam? Robinson, Johnson, Wireback, Green, Hammer, Cone, Fec and Roch have had 2 years to take my "criminally insane" claims to the City of Greensboro so it could disprove them. They haven't. That's because they are afraid I am right. They don’t wish to appear like fools for missing a giant public works fraud when the truth becomes known.
I would not be surprised if one of them actually emailed my water sales CHART to the city and asked, "Are Baron's numbers correct?" That effort would have required several mouse clicks.
And I wouldn't be surprised if one of them actually did email my CHART to the city and got the answer, "Yes, the numbers are correct" ....and never bothered to report the city's response. It sounds like the global warming fraud to me.

Greensboro requires residents to waste water and then pay for it

2010-02-15T18:03:00.000-05:00

In the mid-nineties the City of Greensboro Environmental Services Department began its world class Recycling Program. I tried to change it and I got in big trouble. You see, the new Recycling Program required the rinsing (washing) of cans, bottles and jars before they are put out for collection. I asked, “How much water does it take to wash recyclables?” Nobody knew.

I did some measuring. I also observed my wife and my kids rinsing out our family’s recyclables. I found the practice to be an enormous waste of water. Ever try and “rinse out” a peanut butter jar ...or a mayonnaise jar? My kids wasted 1 liter of Greensboro water each time they rinsed out a 2 liter soda bottle.

Water Director Ray Shaw had absolutely no complaints about Greensboro’s new Recycling Program that would waste Greensboro’s precious water. Can you guess why? Shaw sold Greensboro water for a living. Recycling meant that citizens would now begin purchasing more water.

Shaw’s career dream was to build the Randleman Dam. The faster Greensboro’s water ran out, the sooner he could get his Randleman Dam approved and funded. He was already lowering the reservoirs by offering discounts and incentives to use (buy) more water. Shaw's water prices were the lowest in North Carolina and yet Greensboro was claiming water scarcity. DUH. Recycling’s “rinsing” requirement was a big bonus for Shaw and the dam scammers.

Greensboro’s Recycling Program wastes Greensboro water…but it increases water sales. When you are washing your cans, bottles and jars have you ever thought about all the water you are wasting (purchasing)?

See how much fun it is being a Water Conservation manager.

Ed Cone gets it right with "Led by the nose" story

2010-02-09T17:39:00.001-05:00

In today's post called LED BY THE NOSE, Ed Cone gets it right! Cone identified "Greensboro's developer-driven growth policy."

It's that policy which explains the need for acquiring a vast amount of new water to support future development...but without the developers having to pay for it. Instead they LED BY THE NOSE an entire city in a scheme to get new water while tricking the citizens into paying for it. The dam scammers created an artificial water shortage to demonstrate that new water was needed for survival ....because no citizen in his right mind was going to willfully pay for new water to support future development. But for survival?..Yes, citizens will pony up.

It worked. The Randleman Dam Scam was a success.

And still being LED BY THE NOSE, Greensboro's citizens believe water use is increasing and Randleman's water is needed for the city's survival. The folks have no idea that water use (water sales) has declined since 1995 and Greensboro's future water needs projections were a total failure.

Cone's "developer-driven growth policy" explains why the city would lie and cheat to get the Randleman Dam. The extra water was supposed to support huge commercial real estate development projects and line the pockets of people like Robbie Perkins. It's too bad for the taxpayers that in this new economy there are no huge commercial real estate development deals being struck that could begin purchasing (paying for) all the new water the city bought. With Randleman Reservoir Greensboro expands its water supply by 75%. What private sector enterprise would expand by 75% after a 15 year decline in sales? Only a government monopoly can do that.

The "developer-driven growth policy" purchased 53% of Randleman Reservoir without any need for the water. Greensboro cannot use it but Greensboro is now under contract to buy it—daily! How fortunate for the developers that they don't have to pay for it.

EXCLUSIVE: Greensboro water rate increase coming

2010-02-05T08:59:00.000-05:00

The City of Greensboro owns two plants that manufacture drinking water for profit. One is out at Lake Townsend and the other, the Mitchell plant is on Battleground Avenue. But beginning late this summer Greensboro will own a third water treatment plant in Randleman—well, 53% of it to be exact.

HOW MUCH?
My guess is a rate increase of 10% only because Council won't dare permit anything higher in this economy. But 10% isn't enough. Another increase will be needed later in the year.

Greensboro projected it would be selling much more water by the time Randleman Dam came on line. Those projections failed miserably (see CHART). The local news refuses to report them. Water use is lower now than 15 years ago in 1995 when the dam was being justified. The only people who know are those of you who read my report.

It costs more to run 3 plants than it does 2. And there is not enough revenue (profit) from GSO water sales to pay for the operation of a third plant. Therefore Greensboro will be forced to raise its water rates to offset declining water sales and the addition of a third plant.

To the best of my knowledge PTRWA has not yet established the price of R-water. When it does I will be sure to let you know. I expect it will be higher than anyone imagined. Can you guess why?

Once PTRWA recognizes it is a monopoly it will do what every other municipal water works monopoly does—make a hefty profit! Eventually PTRWA will sport the best trucks, the most comfortable office chairs, the best computers, the fanciest water warden uniforms and the fastest patrol boats your money can buy.

What's more dangerous than government? —a government-run water-selling monopoly! Do you think PTRWA will ever operate a water conservation (sales reduction) program? Go ahead and LOL!

Greensboro must purchase 6 million gallons of R-water every day when PTRWA opens for business in late summer whether it needs the water or not.

Once PTRWA sets the price of R-water I doubt it will be made public. GSO will then secretly add "shipping and handling" charges to import R-water 20 miles uphill.

You can expect the City of Greensboro to give every reason but the real one for raising its water rates.

ECONOMICS 101
And guess what happens after a 10% water rate increase? People will use less water. Get the picture? So keep your wallets wide open because Greensboro's water-selling monopoly is suffering from declining sales. Tell somebody.

YES! WEAKLY’s Jordan Green made me LOL

2010-02-02T07:26:00.000-05:00

YES! WEAKLY’s news editor Jordan Green made the following comment is his blog Sunday regarding alleged black corruption in the City of Greensboro:

"If there was evidence of corruption then YES! WEEKLY would be running lengthy articles about it and demanding accountability."

My reply that I posted to YES! WEAKLY's blog:

Jordan:

Your description of just how energetic YES! is to investigate and report corruption made me LOL!

Why has YES! WEAKLY failed to publish the evidence of fraud and deceit contained in my CHART that shows declining water sales since 1995 and the city's bogus water needs projections that justified the Randleman Dam? I have given you evidence that citizens are grossly misinformed and yet you refuse to publish the powder keg of FACTS that would set them straight.

Greensboro lied all the way to the Randleman Dam and you have not done your job to tell it. You have time to research Badin Lake's water 50 miles away from the Triad and publish several pages on it but you cannot find any time for the Randleman Dam scam that has enough smoking guns to melt the polar ice caps.

###

BACKGROUND: On June 17, 2009 Green wrote that dam scam was a "top ten best story" that he did not have time to get to that week. Six months have passed and YES! has yet to publish any dam scam facts. (click to read fine text)

Jordan, citizens are shocked when they see the information in this CHART! Why won't YES! WEAKLY publish it?

The price-per-gallon of Randleman water

2010-01-27T08:58:00.001-05:00

Greensboro Water Director Allan Williams reported to Council that he plans to begin importing Randleman water late this summer. He made it sound like it is a choice, but unfortunately it is a requirement by contract. The day PTRWA opens for business Greensboro must come to the well. GSO must take its six-million-gallon-per-day (mgd) share of Randleman's output whether it needs it or not. Therefore, in order to conceal the decline in water use (water sales) since 1995 you can be sure the City will claim that it needs Randleman's water.

What the GSO water works will likely do is trim the output from its own two water plants by 6 mgd to make room for the water imported from Randleman (R-water). The City will claim this is good for our reservoirs and a misinformed public will buy it (No pun intended). But those of you who have seen my water use history CHART know that Greensboro does not need the R-water it is under contract to purchase from PTRWA.

How much will R-water cost? PTRWA has not announced its price yet but I am almost certain it will be more expensive than treated water from Greensboro's two plants.

PTRWA will see a golden opportunity to profit from the sale of R-water just like the Greensboro monopoly profits from the sale of G-water. If that is the case then City water customers can expect to pay more for the resource. TRANSLATION: RATE HIKES.

When PTRWA does establish its price it will be the price at the pump. That means Greensboro will have to transport 6 million gallons 20 miles uphill every day and add the energy cost to the price at the pump. So Greensboro will need to factor in a shipping and handling fee and hide it somewhere inside the price.

I am not surprised that the local news media has failed to question PTRWA about the price of R-water. The N&R reported that Water Director Allan Williams stated "R-water will be cheaper than Burlington's water." Williams' claim is absurd. That's like buying a $100 million dollar car to get 3 more miles a gallon and claim you are saving money. No reporters have challenged Williams to back up his claim that R-water will be cheaper than B-water.

The bottom line is this—Greensboro water customers will be paying more for their water because Greensboro does not need R-water but it is under contract to take R-water. And this is just the beginning. Eventually R-plant production will increase and Greensboro will have to accept 12mgd whether it needs it or not. None of this can become public knowledge because Greensboro is carefully concealing its Randleman Dam scam. City power brokers wanted plenty of extra water for big commercial real estate deals without having to pay the development costs for more water. Instead they falsely claimed Greensboro was running out of water and they tricked the citizens into funding the Randleman Dam to save the city.

News & Record reports yesterday's water sales

2010-01-22T16:10:00.000-05:00

The News & Record calls it water "usage" but it is really water purchased. You get a WATER BILL because you bought the water and you have to pay for it. The city manufactures and sells water for a profit. That's why you never hear the word "conservation" unless we are in a drought.

For 12 years now the N&R has reported yesterday's water use compared to the same day a year ago. It is a lame and useless report. Nothing can or should be concluded from it no matter how hard you try.

For example, yesterday Greensboro sold 29.1 million gallons. A year ago on that day it sold 31.5 million gallons. Should we conclude that water sales are declining in 2010? Nope.

You cannot conclude anything from a bogus single day comparison. LOOK - the N&R also reports yesterday's temperature and yesterday's precipitation but it does not show them on the same day one year ago. Why not? It would be useless, that's why. Yesterday it was 68 degrees and a year ago it may have been 18 degrees or 75 degrees. It's like comparing what you ate for dinner yesterday to your meal on the same day one year ago.

The one-day water comparison report got started because someone in the water resources department thought it was clever and meaningful. DUH. Apparently the News & Record thinks so too. DUH.

The real reason behind the one-day report is that it permits the city to appear it is "reporting" without actually having to provide useful and damaging information.

You see, the city is involved in a water fraud and a cover-up. That's why the City of Greensboro never shows you its history of water sales. But I do and here it is...

News & Record front page story not newsworthy

2010-01-22T00:19:00.000-05:00

T I N Y D E C R E A S E

Today the Greensboro News & Record decided 2009’s tiny decrease in bus riders was important enough to put on its front page above the fold. That's today’s BIG STORY. I wouldn’t be surprised if you don’t even care.

A N O T H E R T I N Y D E C R E A S E

Last week the Greensboro News & Record reported a another tiny decrease in 2009’s crime statistics. Everybody is interested in crime but the report wasn’t really big news because there was no noticeable change in crime. We still got too much of it.

E N O R M O U S D E C R E A S E

What’s interesting is that for many years Greensboro declared water its most serious issue. But the News & Record refuses to inform its readers that public water use (water sales) is at a 15-year low. Now that’s a HUGE DECREASE and it is BIG NEWS! Agree?

Water use was projected to climb steeply and that’s why the Randleman Dam was needed. The steep climb never happened but an inept News & Record has yet to inform its readers about Greensboro's failed projections.

Greensboro’s daily newspaper is not the only agency concealing the lengthy decline in water use. The City of Greensboro is equally negligent for failing to inform citizens that water use (water sales) are lower now in 2010 than what was needed (sold to customers) in 1995 when the Randleman Dam was being justified. The implications are serious. The Greensboro water works is not selling enough water to pay for operations and finish paying for the Randleman Dam. That’s means either water rates or taxes (or both) must increase.

Thanks to the complete silence of the News & Record and the City of Greensboro, residents are in the dark about the city's shocking water history. My 2009 telephone survey revealed that 97% of citizens believe water use has increased since 1995 and that’s why we need the new dam and reservoir. They are seriously misinformed.

“Front page top of the fold” is reserved for BIG NEWS STORIES like the one in this vending machine that beconds to be published. 2009’s bus-riding- stays-the-same and 2009’s crime-stays-the-same are not big stories, but a 15-year water decline certainly is! Agree?

Last year I reported the News & Record's announcement that food prices increased. DUH. Everybody who grocery shops already knew food increased without having to buy a paper. The food increase was much like how water was supposed to increase (See red arrow). I asked the N&R why it was refusing to report that water use did not increase. The N&R did not reply. And two months ago I asked again in a letter to the editor of the News & Record. My letter was not selected for publication.

Unfortunately the News & Record is now in a real bind. It cannot report the BIG WATER DECLINE because it has been cheerleading for the Randleman Dam for 15 years now. Its reporting has been compromised by its cheers for Greensboro and its praise for the dam. If the newspaper decided to come clean now and report the truth about Greensboro water, its few remaining readers would likely cancel their subscriptions for having had the truth withheld from them all these years.

In the news business, integrity is everything…unless you have an agenda. And you know the N&R does.

And don't forget that the Rhinocensor Times and YES! WEAKLY are also failing to publish the 15-year water decline and the city's bogus water projections. Hammer claims Greensboro needs more water and YES! just did a full-page on fish in Badin Lake but it cannot find room to cover the water decline.

You might ask, “What the heck is going on here?” Now that’s a good question. Could the fraud and cover-up conspiracy be so powerful and far reaching that the local news won't dare report a 15-year water decline?

The Greensboro Aquatics Center in 2025 AD — A ONE ACT PLAY

2010-01-15T09:24:00.003-05:00

It is the year 2025. It’s now been 15 years since the Aquatics Center opened for business at the Greensboro Coliseum. The City of Greensboro has been spinning stories for a decade now that swimming is bigger than football.

Coliseum Director Matt Brown is proposing a 75% expansion of the Aquatics Center. The City Council fully supports the 75% expansion. Brown claims that the 75% expansion will attract world-class competitors and fill Greensboro’s hotels. The citizens are eager to fund the expansion of the pool because they believe it is vital for the economy.

The News & Record, a bi-weekly 8.5 x 11 single sheet printed on both sides endorses the pool expansion and looks forward to selling even more Aquatics Center advertising and newspapers to foreign English-speaking swimmers.

A local blogger begins reporting an Aquatics Center fraud and cover-up. He publishes a CHART that looks nothing like the City of Greensboro’s swimming claims and nothing like the News & Record’s stories about how Greensboro desperately needs more swimming.

The blogger’s CHART contradicts the city’s propaganda and reveals the Aquatics Center is bringing in less revenue than 15 years ago when it opened. The CHART says the pool is not living up to the projections that promised to fill Greensboro’s hotels and bolster the local economy.

Here is the blogger’s CHART:

Greensboro’s bloggers under the influence of 15 years of propaganda, news media cheerleading and photos of indigent swimmers standing on street corners with no place to swim immediately reject his CHART and claim he has no credibility. They write, “Everybody knows that Greensboro is running out of swimming.” They think, “What a fool he is to think swimming is declining!” The bloggers call him "criminally insane" and they refuse to list his Pool Scam among Greensboro's blogs. They won't even post comments to his stories.

T W O Y E A R S L A T E R . . .

The local blogger has now churned out 78 stories and added two additional years of damaging pool data to his CHART. This past year -2024- $42 million was projected but the swim center only netted $31 million—not enough to pay its costs!

Swimming proceeds are still below what they were 15 years ago! The Aquatics Center is only half-paid and current ticket sales are not generating enough money to finish paying for the pool. In fact, the coliseum is raising swim ticket prices because revenue is decreasing and more money is needed.

The pool scam blogger conducts a swimming awareness survey and discovers that virtually all of Greensboro’s residents incorrectly believe Greensboro’s swimming business is thriving and revenue is increasing. The swim tax went up 10% and residents paid it because they think it is going toward the 75% expansion of the pool facility. The blogger reports that Greensboro’s citizens are grossly misinformed about the 15-year decline in revenue but no local media outlets will run with the story that citizens are totally misinformed.

All the bad news about swim center continues to be suppressed and the city is moving ahead with the 75% expansion of the pool.

Let's review the facts of this 2025 pool expansion scenario?

—Pool revenue is less than it was 15 years ago. There has been no growth in revenue for 15 years! Current pool sales cannot pay the bills.

—The City of Greensboro is keeping the 15-year decline in pool revenue a secret. Its Aquatics web page shows no history of pool revenue.

—The only pool report the city makes is yesterday’s pool ticket sales compared to receipts on the same day one year ago. The News & Record prints that foolish daily report from which nothing can be concluded.

—The pool projections that warned Greensboro was “running out of swimming” never materialized. The public is totally unaware and thinks swimming is growing.

—The city is expanding the Aquatics Center by 75% to attract more events. A kept-in-the-dark public agrees to fund the expansion believing that Greensboro is “running out of swimming.”

—The city is not earning enough pool money to pay for the 75% expansion so it is levying pool tax increases.

—The press refuses to report the decline in revenue and the city’s failed projections. It continues to support the merits of the Aquatics Center expansion.

—The 75% expansion of the pool is scheduled to open this summer.

Filed by water proof reporter Mike J Baron on Jan. 15, 2025 AD

2009 added to the DAM SCAM CHART...and BREAKING NEWS.......

2010-01-14T11:20:00.000-05:00

Breaking story......

Yesterday the Piedmont Triad Regional Water Authority(PTRWA-the Dam Authority)refused to release the 50-year water needs projections I requested under the Freedom of Information Act. PTRWA directed me to the six partners for their individual projections. I informed PTRWA that according to the NC General Statute it is the "custodian" of the 50-year projections and I am entitled to them. (Ed, could it be that the 50-year water needs projections you referenced do not even exist?)

Greensboro is looking pretty dam foolish for its failure to accurately project future water needs (But only to those who have read my stories. Most citizens know nothing thanks to the local news media). Everyone knows when the price of anything goes up, use goes down. And everyone knows a service economy needs much less water than a manufacturing economy. Why couldn't Greensboro apply those two factors and forecast a decline in its water needs? (Because it was faking a shortage and justi-lying the Randleman Dam, that's why!) Maybe PTRWA does not want to appear equally foolish by showing its 50-year projections. Stay tuned for more news about PTRWA's refusal to release the document.

North Carolina General Statute

§ 132‑6. Inspection and examination of records.
(a) Every custodian of public records shall permit any record in the custodian's custody to be inspected and examined at reasonable times and under reasonable supervision by any person, and shall, as promptly as possible, furnish copies thereof upon payment of any fees as
Applicable to State agencies after June 30, 1996;

Political subdivisions and their agencies that are not otherwise covered by this schedule, after June 30, 1998.

YES! WEEKLY, the Rhinoceros Times and the News & Record refuse to print my letter

2010-01-13T16:17:00.000-05:00

I sent the following Letter to the Editor to Greensboro's three newspapers on 10-28-09. My letter was not published by YES! WEEKLY, not published by the Rhinoceros Times and not published by the Greensboro News & Record.

Letter to the Editor:

The City of Greensboro is expanding its water supply by 75% despite the fact that public water use has declined since 1995. You know and I know that nobody else knows Greensboro’s dirty little secrets — that water use has declined and Greensboro grossly exaggerated its future water needs.

According to my recent telephone survey, 97% of Greensboro residents think that water use has increased since 1995. It hasn’t. Greensboro uses less water today than it did 15 years ago when the justification for the Randleman Dam was being made.

If 97% of citizens believe incorrectly about their city’s water needs, doesn’t your publication have an obligation to correct its readers’ error and inform them that water use has decreased since 1995?

When people search two words — dam scam in Google they find the Randleman Dam Scam is number one atop 800,000 other pages. Why hasn’t your publication investigated the incriminating evidence offered in the stories I have posted? Why hasn’t your publication verified the numbers in my water chart with the water department and then published the shocking truth for all to see?

Mike J Baron

Water trapped behind Randleman Dam officially named

2010-01-13T08:51:00.001-05:00

It’s official. The body of water trapped behind the Randleman Dam has a new name—the Randleman Regional Reservoir (RRR). The Piedmont Triad Regional Water Authority (PTRWA) selected the name yesterday.

The PTRWA RRR opens March 1st for fishing and recreation. Drinking water will be exported to the six community partners beginning in June or July pending the completition of the RRR water treatment plant and the partner's distribution lines.

The City of Greensboro owns the biggest slice of the RRR pie—53%. With the RRR purchase Greensboro is expanding its water works by 75%.

WATER FLOWS UPHILL

This just goes to show you, if you have enough money and enough influence and you are willing to falsify reports and conceal data you can cause water to flow uphill.

Deep River water purchased by Greensboro will not be returned to the Deep River. It will be sold to GSO water customers, collected by GSO sewer plants and then discharged into the Haw River (see my illustration below).

Greensboro's initial share of Randleman water will be 6 million gallons a day (mgd) and can legally rise to 28mgd. Currently Greensboro citizens and businesses purchase 31mgd from the city's own reservoirs.The decline in water sales since 1995 is being kept a secret by the City of Greensboro to protect its interests in the Randleman Dam and conceal the city's overstated water needs.

PROJECTED FOR 2009 43mgd
SOLD IN 2009 31mgd
Greensboro projected it would sell 43mgd in 2009. It only sold 31.3mgd in 2009. The city overestimated its 2009 water needs by 4.4 billion gallons.

FACT: Greensboro sells less water today in 2010 than it did in 1995 when it was discounting the price of water to drive up demand and lower its reservoirs to justify the Randleman Dam.

Citizens are completely unaware of the decline in water sales since 1995. The Randleman Dam Scam is the largest scam in the history of Greensboro.

A Dam Scam EXCLUSIVE: Greensboro Water Sales for 2009!

2010-01-08T10:52:00.005-05:00

I have obtained 2009’s water sales from the City of Greensboro. Public water use was 31.3 million gallons per day (mgd). That means Greensboro sold 31.3 mgd to its water customers. The water use report is really a sales report but the city does not want you to think of it that way. You might wonder if sales are up or down.

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N O ? O K A Y, H E R E ' S V I N C E . . . .

I suspect you quickly noticed that something is missing from my 2009 report. You are right! Unless you are given something to compare 31.3 mgd to, the report is useless. It needs a comparison.

Neither the City of Greensboro nor the local media will dare to publish last year’s water use. If you are new to the DAM SCAM REPORT let me explain why. The city and the media won’t release a 2009 report because they know that if they do, the first thing you will want is something to compare it to. The city does not want you to know its water sales have declined since 1995. It is being kept a secret by everyone but me.

CAUTION: If the city DOES report water use for 2009 you can be sure it will not show a history of water use.

There is a fraud and a cover-up under way. The city and the news media refuse to show you a comparison like my CHART because my CHART is "EXHIBIT A" for the municipal fraud and the cover-up.

Now, an even more illuminating report about 2009:

The City and the news media refuse to show you what the City projected for its 2009 water sales. Let's call those bogus projections "EXHIBIT B" in this fraud and cover-up.

Remember, you saw it here first! In fact, you will not see 2009’s water sales anywhere else but here at the Randleman Dam Scam! Do you think the City includes this information on its water web page? ROTFLOL

U p F O U R - T E N T H S f r o m 2 0 0 8
And about that comparison? Below is "EXHIBIT A" (my CHART). I will add 2009 shortly. Remember that 2009 was 31.3mgd. That's "up" four-tenths of an mgd from 2008.

Psssst! Guess what! The City of Greensboro is not selling enough water to pay for the Randleman Dam. Guess what that means.

Do you think the public deserves to know what's in my report? Is this information newsworthy?

New Record you will never see in the News & Record

2010-01-07T08:51:00.001-05:00

High Point Enterprise DEAD WRONG about Greensboro growth increasing water needs

2010-01-06T12:28:00.003-05:00

Yesterday’s editorial places the HIGH POINT ENTERPRISE right up there with the News & Record in the "cheerleading competition" for the Randleman Dam.

In its story “OUR VIEW: The rains come, and the rains go” the newspaper made the following false claim:

“Growth in the region, particularly in Greensboro, outran municipal/regional moves to assure sufficient supplies of water.”

HPE, what growth? Growth in population? Growth in industry? Please explain! I am measuring the growth in propaganda and you just added to it. Thanks to you and the lamestream media for feeding this dam crap to citizens to keep their wallets wide open for the dam! It is no wonder the public is 100% misinformed and thinks water use is escalating. (SOURCE: My 2009 water survey of Greensboro residents)

What are you smoking down there at the HIGH POINT ENTERPRISE? Have you never read the Dam Scam report? (Simply Google two words - dam scam) Have you never seen this CHART?

What part of declining water use do you not understand? Are you trying to help me win a pulitzer?

Bad enough that the N&R has spiked Greensboro's water decline story for more than a decade and continues to carry water for Greensboro…..but even John Hammer writes, “Greensboro needs the water.” Is this one of the few Greensboro scandals Hammer has missed? I am afraid so! I offered him an "exclusive" 2 years ago and never heard from him. Not even the Rhino Times would publish my CHART and correct the citizens' false beliefs. Go figure.

And the Carolina Journal story inferred that Greensboro’s water demand is "escalating." And the head DENR honchos down in Raleigh also write that Greensboro’s water use is increasing. And now the HIGH POINT ENTERLIES joins the dam cult.

Did the HPE story mention that the City of High Point now claims it does not need Randleman water for 20 years?—NO!

You see, it only seems logical that water use would always increase, so sloppy journalists communicate that "logic" to their readers are paying for the Randleman Dam.

If Greensboro's citizens knew that water use was declining since 1995 and not escalating, do you think they would be so eager to pay for the Randleman Dam? Just like national journalism, local journalism has also reached new lows.

How about you? When will you become fed up enough to pick up the torch and run with my story about Greensboro’s 15-year decline in water use?

I have published 77 fact-filled stories over the past 2 years I have yet to be contacted by any local news agency.

When I was Greensboro's WC manager the N&R, Fox 8 and WFMY TV 2 did dozens and dozens of interviews with me. I often sat next to the anchor at the Fox 8 TV and WFMY 2 TV newsdesks and made live reports . How could I have been such a water expert back then and be so untouchable now?

That makes no sense until you catch on that there is a very effective Randleman Dam fraud and cover-up underway. I'm afraid many of you underestimate its depth and its power.

Mike J Baron reporting because nobody else will. Nobody knows the truth but you. Please join the dam scam effort.

PTRWA's 50-year crystal ball — Watch this one very closely!

2009-12-30T10:25:00.001-05:00

Greensboro's water surplus

2009-12-26T10:33:00.001-05:00

Greensboro has a surplus of water to sell. Nobody knows. The surplus must be kept a secret so nobody catches on to the dam scam.

QUESTION: Would the City of Greensboro ever purchase water from Burlington just to make it appear that its own reservoirs are inadequate?

Of course it would! There is a scam and a cover-up underway. That scam and cover-up must be protected and fortified. One of the first things my naysayers site to refute my dam scam is this:
"...but Greensboro has to buy water from Burlington and Reidsville!"

Oh yeah? According to who? According to the dam scammers, that's who! It is time that you naysayers begin putting 2 and 2 together. When a department head wants a new copier...or a new truck.....or a bigger budget he has to make the current copier or truck or budget appear inadequate. And sometimes those needs are faked. Buying water from neighboring cities when it is not needed is a Greensboro TRICK. It also adds cost. Everybody falls for it because they read it in the News & Record so it must be true. C'mon dam scam naysayers, wise up!

Are you influenced by COMMERCIALS? - NO-O-O, NOT ME-E-E!
Don't you snicker whenever you hear someone boast that they are not affected by commercials and advertising? You have been affected by two decades of water propaganda and yet you claim that you haven't? Sorry, that won't fly. Dry reservoirs by design have left an impression on you.

Greensboro is currently selling 3 million gallons of water a day LESS than it was selling back in 1995 when the dam was being justi-lied. Admit it - without my report you would not even know this shocking fact. When Randleman Lake opens for BUSINESS Greensboro will have expanded its water works by 75% after 15 years of declining water sales. Does that information seem newsworthy to you? Have you ever seen it reported anywhere but here?

Greensboro's dismal water sales are unable to finance its water works operations and pay for the dam. Keep your wallets wide open for annual rate hikes. To gain the proper perspective you must understand that the City is in the water-selling-for-profit BUSINESS. It's not a water-conserving society. You only hear about conservation from Greensboro when it has no water to sell. Now it has plenty. You will never hear the word conservation again because Randleman water is coming on line in 2010. Greensboro is under contract to take its share from Randleman Lake whether it needs it or not. Do you know what that means? Guess.

I have yet to hear the News & Record ask, "How much will Randleman water cost Greensboro's water customers?" Hmmmm. What if Greensboro does not approve of PTRWA's price for Randleman water? What then? And Greensboro will be sucking Randleman water 15 miles uphill. Water is heavy and it takes lots of energy to move it. How much cost will that add?

The Randleman Dam is Greensboro's scam of the century. The citizens have been molded into "believers" by dishonest dam scammers and a participating news media that refuses to publish my CHART. The folks are convinced that water use is CLIMBING. It isn't. It has declined since 1995! And the shocking numbers are NOT "news" according to local reporters and news editors. If you tell a resident that water use is LESS today than 15 years ago he won't believe you! Try it! - I dare you! You won't be taken seriously. That's how effective the propaganda has been. Admit it. Without my reporting you would have never known.

COMING SOON!....water use results for 2009! A DAM SCAM EXCLUSIVE! You won't find it anywhere but here! What will it be? See my CHART sometime after January 3rd.

Stegosaurus crap

2009-12-20T19:13:00.001-05:00

Mike's declining water use CHART:

The City of Greensboro's CHART found on its water web page....

Dear Dam Scam Readers:
The shocking information contained in my CHART is being kept secret by the City of Greensboro to cover up the fraudulent Randleman Dam project. The local news agencies are aware of Greensboro's failed water forecast and they have refused to report this as news. If you think the public needs to know that Greensboro is using less water today than it did 15 years ago, please join my effort to spread the truth and expose this cover-up. Tell your neighbors to Goggle just 2 words - dam scam - and learn the truth about the City of Greensboro.

A DAM SCAM EXCLUSIVE!
Return the first week of January and you'll see that I have added 2009's daily water use to my CHART. You won't find 2009's results published by the City of Greensboro and you won't find 2009 covered by the local news! It is a DAM SCAM EXCLUSIVE and you will only find it here!

Ed Cone tries to dismiss the Randleman Dam Scam — Read my reply....

2009-12-10T21:17:00.001-05:00

Ed Cone attempted to dismiss the entire Randleman Dam Scam in a few short paragraphs entitled Water Works published on December 4, 2009. His conclusion: “Baron is wrong about the dam.”

Below is my reply.

Mr. Cone:

Thank you for finally giving the dam scam some attention. The news blackout that's been keeping the decline in water use a secret has been quite remarkable. Let's get started....

Your summation is exactly what I would expect from someone affiliated with the Greensboro News & Record, a long-time dam proponent and apologist. I have introduced a mountain of incriminating evidence that reveals a municipal fraud and cover-up. How strange that the N&R has failed to find one single item in my collection newsworthy. The daily paper has been a veteran cheerleader for the dam while failing to publish the history of declining water use and the failed water forecast that helped win approval for the Randleman Dam. Anyone reading the N&R would never know that anything is wrong with Greensboro water.

I have shown how the City of Greensboro allowed the ends to justify the illegal means it used to secure the approval and funding for the dam. It does not surprise me that you and the entire Greensboro’s news media dismiss every bit of evidence I have provided. To admit anything now would be an admission of failure to have done your jobs.

Just one look at my CHART is all the cityfolk need to begin asking questions. Citizens deserve to see this CHART and the news media and the City of Greensboro is keeping the water history hidden from them.

I am pleased that you chose to comment because given the success of the city's propaganda and the success of the cover-up there is no such thing as bad publicity regarding my efforts. More people will now hear of the scam for the very first time simply by having attached your name to it. Everybody seems to know who Ed Cone is so my page views will soar and my message will spread.

I was fired for reducing Greensboro’s water demand—the job that I was hired to do. Does that sound good for you taxpayers? I was an unemployed family man trying to support a wife and kids when I accepted this entry-level assignment. At 47 I needed a secure job and I liked the challenge—to educate and change the water-using behavior of 215,000 citizens. I didn't know if I would succeed. Never did I dream that I would interfere with a $150 million dollar project.

When water use began to decline under the programs I initiated, my workplace became even more hostile. That's right, my workplace was unfriendly from day #1. Water Director Ray Shaw was ordered by city council to begin water conservation (WC) against his will. I did not know that. So I worked 3 years under Shaw without ever attending his weekly water department meeting. I was not invited.

Shaw did not care what I was doing as long as I stayed out of the way. Of course on camera he sang praises about WC. Then WC began producing “new water” for Greensboro at a lower cost than Shaw's plants could produce water. That got his attention. Shaw ridiculed WC to his subordinate managers so you can imagine how little help they were to me. I was the entire WC program.

Water use began declining in 1996. The more successful WC became, the greater its threat was to the Randleman Dam approval process. I won US Environmental Protection Agency 1st place awards awards and the city hated them because they drew attention to the fact that water use was declining. Twice I was not allowed to attend receptions in Atlanta to receive my 1st place 1996 and 1997 awards.

The city council and Mayor Allen got the message that Greensboro's award-winning WC manager had to be “taken out” for the sake of the dam. They remained silent and thus joined the dam scammers.

My controversial termination was never investigated or reported. Not a single council member phoned me. The News & Record sent a reporter to cover my post-termination news conference at Adams Farm who was on her last day of work and beginning a new job the following week with a Texas newspaper. That’s how little the N&R cared about my news conference on the water fraud.

I was hired under false pretenses. I was asked to reduce water use by 4% but the city was not serious. Ray Shaw never expected anything from me. Had I failed in my mission I would probably still be employed today.

The city realized it could not justify its argument for the Randleman Dam without a WC program in place. So I was hired to develop the program "for show."—and given every opportunity to fail. The city expected that my WC effort would not save a single drop.

Most municipal WC programs run school tours, print fancy brochures and never save any water. Wanna know why? It’s because their bosses are water-selling engineers who hope to sell more. Whenever an engineer is in charge of WC you have the fox guarding the hen house. WC is used for good public relations and nothing more. Most municipal WC managers and coordinators complain that their bosses won't let them do anything that saves water.

I was never expected to make a difference in water use. Then my efforts saved 2 billion gallons over the first 3 years. That meant 2 billion gallons went unsold! The water department began losing income as well as its arguement for the dam.

I was fired in 1999, given 2 weeks severance pay and I was never replaced. I lost everything I had after being jobless and unable to find work. Next my health failed.

First I was necessary for the dam ....and then I became expendable in the grand scheme to get Randleman Dam. Don’t you and the rest of your journalist colleagues find it odd that Greensboro fired its WC manager and never replaced him? That sure was dumb! It's one of the many smoking guns of the water fraud.

You wrote, “But the ten-year usage projections brandished by Baron as evidence of a scam were not the impetus for the new reservoir.” That’s absurd! Of course they were! If we were warned that an asteroid is going to take out Earth, don’t you want to know WHEN? Is it in 10 years …..or 10,000 years? Those bogus water projections told everyone the dam was needed ASAP. They were false. Nobody but my readers know!

Do you think if Greensboro had projected a steady decline in water use the dam would have been funded? DUH. The water projections and a bunch of hype were used to sell a dam bill of goods to the state, the feds and Greensboro’s citizens. Those water use projections missed by a mile! Now they are so carefully hidden in the bowels of the water works that had I not introduced them, nobody would know!

You accused me of “brandishing” those projections. Ha! That’s so funny. Of course I “brandish” them just like the adversaries of those climate change scientists are “brandishing” those hidden emails. Yes, Mr. Cone, I am the chief "brandisher" of the Dam Scam CHART because everyone deserves to know its contents!

You wrote, “Nor is there evidence that the projections were made in bad faith.” That’s absurd too! I have provided plenty of evidence that Greensboro acted in bad faith! Ray Shaw made those projections in the same year that WC began. His numbers reveal that nothing was ever expected from WC. And Shaw knew his projections were bogus! They were for the moment and designed to justify the dam.

You wrote, “Even modest growth over the decades ahead will greatly overburden today's water supply.” How do you know that? When gold runs out in a mining town and miners start leaving, does that town need more resources? …or fewer resources? The gold is leaving Greensboro for Asia. And migration to Greensboro has slowed. Nobody can accurately predict even a few years out and you are speaking of “decades ahead.” After missing the boat on the dam scam you and others have no other option but to dismiss every shred of evidence I have introduced.

Greensboro's citizens are so brainwashed by city propaganda that you are simply responding according to plan. Sure it seems logical that population growth will increase water demand, but a water conservation program would decrease demand—and Greensboro does not have one! It did for 7 years and it was dismantled without any challenge! Does that not make you suspect of Greensboro? And with manufacturing leaving, that more than offsets population growth. If Greensboro returned to WC it would further reduce water use. I will let you in on a little secret. Greensboro is out to sell all the water it can to increase revenue. You cannot have the objective to sell all the water you can and run an award-winning WC program at the same time! That's what's wrong with WC programs across the country.

Once the dam was approved, Greensboro did away with its WC program around 2004. The elimination of WC during the period the city was claiming water scarcity was never investigated or reported by the News & Record. Why all the silence?

In 1999 the city was reporting that water use was increasing when in fact it had decreased 4 years in a row. This dishonesty was never investigated or reported. If it did not “brandish” my CHART nobody would know what has happened!

FACT: Greensboro deliberately sold water for lawns below cost and gave additional incentives for lawn watering like free water meters and no off-season billing. That’s what lowered the reservoirs annually and induced the fear that won support for the Randleman Dam.

The equivalent would be a fire department that set fires to win public support for more fire stations. It was a scam and it worked. Ray Shaw set fire to his own water works. It has never been investigated or reported.

Lawn watering overstressed the distribution system and that’s how the water department got its $9 million dollar expansion of its treatment and pumping plant approved. Imagine how Greensboro’s poor people would feel if they learned that lawn watering caused $9 million to be invested. Low income people actually were subsidizing lawn watering in affluent neighborhoods. Why?—because irrigation water was sold below cost. I am the ONLY person to report it. Nobody else knew that irrigation water was sold below cost. The Shaw of Utilities knew how to get a dam approval.

The water works had plenty of horsepower to push water across the city—except during lawn watering —a practice which was being encouraged through incentives! So the $9 million dollar expansion was gotten by incentivising citizens to water their lawns. That’s how many municipal projects get done using fakery of all kinds. You have to be an insider to know this stuff.

Director Ray Shaw allowed his water distribution system to fail (no water in NW Greensboro) on Tuesday, May 24, 1994 to win support for that $9 mil project and for the Randleman Dam. It was criminal what he had done. If a large fire broke out during his stunt there was no water in the hydrants to fight it. Shaw took the 24-hour risk and it worked!…and it was never investigated or reported. This is how you get a dam approval.

You had no idea what was behind the May 24, 1994 water outage. I do, and that’s why you should listen rather than type. I doubt that city council even knew. If council was intelligent about water it would have known that Shaw allowed the system to fail to win support for the dam. It worked!

City council reacted exactly how Shaw hoped it would. A water-knowledgeable city council would have FIRED Ray Shaw for allowing the distribution system to fail. On the other hand, council may have liked that May 24 failure because it greased the skids for the Randleman Dam.

While it said it was “running out of water” Greensboro had the lowest priced water among North Carolina cities. Greensboro’s price was 47% lower than the NC average. I thought, “Well how dumb is that?” We are running out of water and we practically give it away! Low price is an incentive to use more of the resource and that’s what Greensboro wanted—to get the dam. This stuff is so simple even a cave man could get it.

Shaw was a water-seller and a water-profiteer. All other city departments depend on the General Fund for a budget. Water gets its money from water sales. Shaw wanted no water to slip over the top of the dams. He made sure every drop of it was sold.

Incentives were given to maximize water use (sales) while Greensboro was warning that it was “running out.” Price and incentives and lawn watering were the reasons for the low reservoirs. These issues have never been investigated or reported. It was a highly effective trick.

I had lunch with a water engineering consultant I met during a national conference. I told him about Greensboro's fake water shortage. He said he knew about faked problems. Then he explained how he designed and built a water treatment plant for another major US city that used the same trick! He said he was able to put his son through 4 years of college on what he earned from that unnecessary project.

It's just like if Greensboro builds that Aquatics Center and nobody comes to use it. Taxes would need to go up because ticket sales would not be producing the revenue the city anticipated. Randleman was built because water use was supposed to go up! Sorry but now it is time to pay for bad decisionmaking by the dam scammers.

So much less water is being sold today than was projected that the water department cannot pay for its operations plus the dam. Waste water treatment (sewer) sales are also insufficient. The bogus reasons the city is giving for rate increases are not being investigated or reported.

The real reason for the Randleman Dam was to attract industry with plenty of surplus water. However, city insiders—the dam scammers—knew the public would not fund such a project for growth and development. So Greensboro pitched the Randleman Dam for “survival” knowing it would be funded.

The water department caused its own reservoirs and distribution system to fail to gain support for expanding the water works. I saw how they did it with my own two eyes. I was there and you were not there. I was expected to go along with the fraud and I could not participate. Fortunately for Greensboro's taxpayers my business ethics are derived from my Christian faith. I was on TV and radio frequently but I would not repeat the false statements my bosses were making. In good conscience I became a whistleblower. I just happen to be a licensed Baptist minister if that helps your understanding of what I had to do.

Greensboro eliminated all other sensible alternatives to pitch the dam as the only solution to a faked water shortage. The city could have had a long-range contract to purchase Burlington’s surplus water but water director Ray Shaw would have nothing to do with Burlington….or with water conservation.

Shaw’s career dream was to build the Randleman Dam. It may have even been an obsession. He actually believed his water department would build it and operate it. That’s what engineers do—they design and build for a living. And Greensboro’s water engineers have kept right on designing and building even when water use has declined for 14 years! Private sector companies downsize when sales are bad but the government water works expands when sales are bad. Think about it…because nobody else is.

Have you ever heard of a department head wanting to grow his department? Shaw had his finger on the scale for the dam for most of his career. Some of the council members probably knew that. No doubt some were all for Shaw’s tricks because they were so effective.

Ray Shaw refused all best management practices and far less expensive alternatives to the Randleman Dam. Shaw’s foolish choices have never been investigated or reported.

The reason for the news media’s silence about the dam scam is that the news media is looking dam foolish right now for failing to scrutinize such an expensive public works project. Nobody wants to jump in at this late stage because the water is too hot. You Mr. Cone gave it your best shot as if your explanation was the final chapter on the dam scam and the dam scam need not be mentioned again.

I am not a journalist like you, but I have the truth and I have witnessed the inner workings of this scam. I am reporting and you are only repeating what you have read. For example, in your post you have repeated what others have claimed—that Randleman Dam will meet the Triad’s water needs for the next 50 years. That’s hilarious! Greensboro cannot accurately forecast even 5 years into the future and yet you are repeating that Randleman is good for 50 years! According to who?—according to the propaganda. If I was John Hammer my Rhino headline would be, “Greensboro wants us to believe Randleman will meet water demand for 50 years when Greensboro could not predict its water needs for 5 years.” The emperor is naked.

Please show me the "study" that supports the claim for 50 years of water. I say there isn’t one. Only a fool would "sign off" on a 50-year projection these days. You read "50 years" in the News & Record and other in reports and you believe it and you repeat it. I say 50 years is laughable. It is made for the camera and you bought it.

Your mention of the 50-year projection demonstrates the problem with the news media today. Reporters don't investigate any longer. They simply repeat what somebody else says. It took just 2 freelance reporters to expose ACORN! It took just one hacker to discover the climate scientist's hiding data. And if I was not reporting Greensboro's water fraud you would never have seen the shocking numbers and all the evidence that makes the dam a scam.

You and others are hopelessly infected by 15 years of Greensboro's lies, false reports, propaganda and photos of dry reservoirs. People’s take on the Randleman Dam is not their own. My 2009 telephone survey proved it. 100% of Greensboro believes that water use has increased since 1995 and they are all wrong thanks to media like the News & Record.

Anyone with a brain knew in 1995 that manufacturing was departing for Asia. Shaw knew that a "service economy" was our future when he made his water forecast. Greensboro was so worried about losing Cone Mills as a water customer that it actually thought cheap water was the glue that would keep it here. Goodbye Greensboro! Now that Cone Mills and other industries like it have departed, Greensboro’s residential customers must make up for the huge loss in revenue.
The current reasons being given for water rate increases are not the real reasons. Read the news and watch each explanation Director Allan Williams provided. Every one of them is a diversion from the truth. You see, the city cannot be truthful about the rate increases because the real reasons would reveal the dam scam.

Translation: WATER RATE HIKES are necessary because big industrial water accounts have departed. Are you going to tell me that Greensboro couldn't see this coming?
I suspect your summation will accomplish the exact opposite of what you and the N&R and the City of Greensboro hope to accomplish.

Through one blog that's up against a decade of propaganda the citizens can learn the truth about how major municipal capital improvement programs are often justified, funded and completed. Every large-scale public project deserves the highest scrutiny because pride and profit are strong motivators of insiders who use other people’s money to develop what THEY want. Unfortunately the axiom seems to be that the more expensive and complex something is, the faster it is approved and the less it is scrutinized. Look at Cap and Trade. Look at the healthcare bill.

The Randleman Dam is the most successful scam in the history of Greensboro. However, once the truth gets out it may remain the biggest scam in the history of Greensboro—but it will no longer be successful because the folks will know they were had. Maybe the next time they will ask more question and demand more from the mainstream news media—whatever’s left of it.

Mr. Cone concluded, “Baron is wrong about the dam.” What do you think?

The Spag Report: Climate Change scientists and media hiding data. Speaking of hiding data…..

2009-12-08T07:58:00.000-05:00

From the 12-4-09 Spag Report:
"For the fourteenth straight DAY, the three broadcast networks have failed to report on the great and growing ClimateGate scandal."

And now for the local news.....
For the fourteenth straight YEAR the local news media continues to hide Greensboro's declining water demand and Greensboro's failed water forecast that justified the Randleman Dam.

Spag and Baron wonder what it will take for a public uproar over data that is being deliberately hidden to advance a cause and secure the funding for it.

It took just 2 freelance reporters to expose ACORN! It took just one hacker to discover the climate scientist's hiding data. And if I was not reporting Greensboro's water fraud you would never have seen the shocking numbers that point to the dam scam. It's a cover-up.

When truths like these surface, news reporters and editors with secret agendas look like self-serving morons. It's no wonder they are going out of business.

How much water did Greensboro pump in 2009?

2009-12-06T20:07:00.003-05:00

During the first week of January the Water Resources Department will tabulate the total amount of water it pumped during 2009.

You would think the Water Resources Department would publish the 2009 results on its web page. It won’t. It never has. If the total was published, citizens would immediately want to compare it to previous years. Heaven forbid!

Greensboro conceals the history of its water use. Can you guess why? Shouldn’t that make you suspicious?

The only statement Greensboro makes about water use on its web page is this useless report called "yesterday’s water use compared to one year ago." It is a way of reporting without having to provide any real information.

Every day Greensboro sends the single day report to the News & Record for publication. Apparently the N&R believes it is newsworthy because it has been printing the useless daily report for 12 years!

FACT: A single day of water use compared to the same day last year is as useless as yesterday's temperature compared to the same day one year ago. Nothing can or should be concluded from a single-day report.

Last year during the first week of January, I requested total water use for 2008 from the water department under the Freedom of Information Act. The water department replied that 2008’s water use was 30.9 million gallons a day (MGD). Unless you read my dam scam report you would never have learned that figure.

When I was managing water conservation in 1995, water use was 34.6 MGD. Last year's water use was less than what Greensboro pumped 13 years ago! Do you think citizens deserve to know?

1995 34.6 MGD

2008 30.9 MGD

Do these totals grab your attention? They should. There is a City of Greensboro cover-up underway. The news media is refusing to investigate it. The public deserves to know the truth.

Water use in 2008 was 30.9 MGD. What was the water use for the previous year? Are you curious? Nobody knows that 2007’s water use was 33.7MGD. From 2007 to 2008 water use declined by 2.8 million gallons a day.

2007                       33.7 MGD
2008                       30.9 MGD
Forecasted for 2008   42.4 MGD

Greensboro never mentions the future water needs forecast because water use went down when it was supposed to go up.

The cover-up is necessary to keep citizens minds and wallets wide open for the Randleman Dam.
Visit my dam scam web page the first week of January and you'll see 2009's water use added to the CHART below.

My guess is that 2009's water use will be about the same as 2008's water use.

Climate-gate same as Gate City's water-gate

2009-12-03T13:38:00.006-05:00

The University of East Anglia's Climatic Research Unit has just been caught hiding data about the Earth's declining temperature. Why would they scuttle that data? Well DUH!—Billions of dollars in funding for climate change remedies are at stake. And so are people’s prides, reputations and jobs! Even entire companies expecting work could fold!

How is this any different than the City of Greensboro fabricating a water shortage to justify building the Randleman Dam …..and then conducting a 15-year cover-up of data that shows water use is decreasing when Greensboro predicted it would be increasing? Hmmmmmmmmm?

The City of Greensboro and its media accomplices are deliberately concealing a 15-year decline in public water use that blows their whole dam argument right out of Randleman’s water! Why? Well double DUH! It’s being done to protect the dam scammers’ pride, reputations and jobs. Nobody wants their name attached to this fraud.

How do you think the state and the feds will feel about being scammed? The dam scammers must continue to pitch their false claim of water scarcity to keep citizens’ wallets wide open and minds made up for the completion of the Randleman Dam—and not get caught in this scam!

QUESTION: Why is there no public outcry for having been tricked into financially supporting an unnecessary 75% expansion of Greensboro’s waterworks!

ANSWER: Because 97% of citizens don’t have the facts and have fallen for the propaganda! Virtually all of Greensboro’s residents falsely believe that water use is steadily INCREASING (SOURCE: My 2009 Telephone Survey).

Citizens still believe the Randleman Dam is a necessity. They have been misguided.

That’s not surprising given the water-shortage hype they have been fed since 1995.

Even after seeing the numbers my pastor believes water use must be increasing! He said, "Those numbers can't be right."

It only seems logical to the folks that water use will always increase. That "logic" is faulty but it works to the dam scammers advantage. Now you know why the water department only publishes "yesterday's water use" and does not publish water use over the past 13 years the way my CHART has it. They are not stupid.

Here's a novel idea for all reporters, news editors and doubting bloggers - why don't you verify the numbers in my CHART by sending an email with the CHART attached to Greensboro water supply manager Steve Drew at steve.drew@greensboro-nc.gov

Ask Mr. Drew if the daily water use amounts I have published from 1995 to 2008 are correct. How hard is that? After all, many of you have written several times in your blogs, "Well, if Baron's numbers are correct....." Does anyone think I am making them up?

Citizens, state officials and federal officials have been deliberately misled so Randleman’s abundant water would enable Greensboro to compete with Raleigh and Charlotte. The “surplus water” was supposed to attract manufacturers —but the window of opportunity to attract industry has been missed. So a new justification for the Randleman Dam has surfaced—drought. Drought is a dam poor excuse to purchase 53% of Randleman Lake!

(Click on graphic to view fill size)

The Randleman Dam is the scam of the century. Once the citizens learn the naked truth and review my documentation they will understand why the dam was a scam. It was the last thing Greensboro should have done....but the scammers made it the first and only choice.

The Randleman Dam is the scam of the century. Remember Project Homestead? The same officials and politicians running the dam scam were creating the Homestead fiasco. Project Homestead was tiddleywinks compared to Randleman!

Greensboro's citizens are using less water today than 15 years ago! Hello-o-o? And not a single Greensboro news reporter or news editor dares to walk on Randleman water!

If global warming scientists are committing fraud by concealing declining temperatures, then the City of Greensboro is committing fraud for hiding the 15-year decline in water use …and hiding its failed water forecast that justified the Randleman Dam.

Al Gore and his band of "scientists" are proving to be climate scammers. Dozens of Greensboro managers, officials and politicians are dam scammers for having secretly secured the Randleman Dam using lies, deception and false reports while concealing the truth about declining water use and the complete failure of the water needs forecast that justified the dam.

Does anyone have any questions?

Climate Change scandal and Randleman Dam scandal receiving same treatment

2009-11-27T18:19:00.002-05:00

Very damaging insider emails have recently surfaced exposing the fraud of man-made climate change. Billions of dollars about to be invested in global warming are now at risk. So are the reputations of experts and politicians who were about to take us down the wrong path. Does it surprise you that the climate fraud story is not being covered by the mainstream news?

Dam scammers took us down the wrong path
My CHART showing the history of public water use since 1995 and Greensboro's faulty forecast of future water needs is all you need to recognize that a fraud and a cover-up are underway. This CHART contains irrefutable damaging information but like the climate change fraud, the news media refuses to acknowledge the CHART's existence. Too much is at stake. And then there is the embarrassment of being wrong or having been fooled.

There is no question about my CHART's newsworthiness if my numbers are true. And when you add the fact that my 2009 telephone survey revealed that 97% of citizens are terribly misinformed about public water use, the CHART deserves a spot on the front page. Citizens want the facts contained in the CHART and citizens deserve the facts contained in the CHART. The local news is ignoring the CHART. Pretty soon it won't have a choice.

Since 2007...
My well-documented stories and my public water use CHART began appearing at this site one and one-half years ago. Then in 2008 water use went down by 3 million gallons a day! Imagine that. Nobody but me reported the 3 million gallon a day decline from 2007 to 2008.

So far nobody has dared to challenge the data in my CHART! It is easy to confirm my numbers by simply calling the water department. Why hasn't the News & Record done that? You would think the N&R would be the first to dispute my claims because it has the most to lose if I am right. I AM right and I have the truth on my side.

The local news media has not contacted me a single time regarding my claims of fraud and cover-up by the City of Greensboro. The longer the reporters avoid the data in the CHART the stronger the case for fraud becomes.

The City of Greensboro, the News & Record, YES! WEEKLY and the Rhinoceros Times are losing credibility by avoiding my dam scam reports. The evidence I have provided is overwhelming. Reputations are in jeopardy. Heads could roll. A public uproar is likely. These dam ignorant news reporters and editors will be viewed as accomplices for their failure to investigate and report this fraud. They will look like fools when the public catches on to the dam scam.

Dam about to burst

Hopefully this dam fraud story will burst wide open before I assume room temperature. That's why I installed a direct phone line for the local news to contact me.

You can help speed things up by simply telling your neighbors and colleagues to Google just two words - dam scam. It's Google's #1 story atop one million pages appearing in a search for "dam scam." But like the climate change scandal, you would not know it by reading or watching the mainstream local news.

My reply to Greensboro News & Record editor John Robinson's Sunday blog

2009-11-22T19:59:00.001-05:00

Today in his blog (above), News & Record editor John Robinson postulates journalism's decline in a story called "What's happened to newspapers" (To read it click on story)

I posted the following comment to his blog:

To: John Robinson, Editor Greensboro News & Record

Nice try at exempting the News & Record from “all of the above” …..but the Greensboro daily continues to conceal the 15-year decline in public water use and the failed water needs forecast that "justified" the Randleman Dam project. The forecast was bogus but you would never know that from reading the Greensboro News & Record.

My 2009 Telephone Survey demonstrated that 97% of Greensboro’s citizens are misinformed about fundamental Greensboro water facts and yet your paper is unwilling to set them straight.

Here's to you Mister Robinson:
I informed you personally in 1997 and 1998 that water demand was declining and that city managers were concealing the decline. You did nothing with my reports. Now it’s a decade later and the proof is in that everything Greensboro said about its future water needs and the Randleman Dam was false. And the News & Record remains silent.

Greensboro eliminated its US Environmental Protection Agency 1st place award-winning highly cost-effective water conservation program because it became a threat to the Randleman Dam and your paper has yet to investigate it or report it.

Citizens are using less water today than when the justification for the dam was made in 1995 and your paper refuses to report it as fact. Water use has declined since 1995 and nobody knows thanks to your newspaper's silence.

And you wonder why your newspaper circulation is declining.

Mike J Baron

The Randleman Dam has already failed its mission and the first drop of water has yet to be delivered

2009-11-20T09:14:00.000-05:00

Greensboro’s tax payers and water customers never knew that city officials had two (2) separate sets of objectives for the Randleman Dam.

You only heard the stated objective that was fed to the media, citizens and state officials. The stated objective claimed that Greensboro was "running out of water" and the Randleman Dam was needed for Greensboro's survival.

That claim was false ...but packaged to appear true. I saw how it was done. To pull it off the city manipulated its reservoirs, underpriced its water, gave incentives for lawn watering, sold irrigation water below cost, concealed information, ended its water conservation program and falsified reports to rally citizen support and funding for the Randleman project. That’s fraud. The media refuses to investigate the charges documented here and I am the only one reporting the scam for the Randleman Dam.

There was another objective—the secret objective! The secret intent of the dam scammers was to secure a huge surplus of water that would permit northern manufacturers to relocate to Greensboro and help the city grow.

This secret objective was hidden from the public because citizens would reject a dam project for growth and development. Most people (and city council members not connected to real estate in any way) believe that development should pay its own expenses.

So the dam scammers tricked the citizens into believing that Greensboro was running out of water and a new reservoir was needed for survival. That's something the scammers believed that citizens would support financially. And they did. And they continue to do so. And they have been kept it the dark about what has happened.

A Decade later...
Enough years have now become history to demonstrate that the stated objective for the Randleman Dam has failed. That objective was bogus. Greensboro has more water now than it did when the dam was being justified in the mid-nineties.

The city is using less water now than when the dam was being justified. The city never ran out of water.

And the projected future water needs that justified Randleman Dam never materialized(see dotted line in CHART). These embarrassing projections have been concealed along with the decline in water use. The local news media is participating in the cover-up. Where is the outrage? There is no outrage because the citizens are uninformed.

Nearly 100% of citizens are completely unaware of the facts (SOURCE: 2009 Telephone Survey). Randleman Dam was unnecessary. It's pursuit will raise people's water bills for decades to come.

The "secret" objective was the dam scammers real motivation and it has also failed. I know of no manufacturers that were recruited because Randleman water is coming on line. In fact, Greensboro has lost several industrial water users (lost sales)—the best customers it had.

Water is no longer needed to attract new industry because manufacturing is in decline (see red line in chart). The manufacturing economy is being replaced by a service economy and service industries like FED EX do not require the vast amounts of water that Greensboro has in Randleman Lake.

Both failed...
Since both the public objective and the secret objective have failed without a single drop of water arriving from Randleman, the dam scammers are now substituting a new stated objective for the Randleman Dam—drought protection. It's not much, but it is all the dam scammers have.

Greensboro got through the last drought very well but nevertheless it took full advantage of the drought to keep citizens' wallets open and minds fixed on the Randleman Dam as the solution—for drought. People are now being taught to fear that drought will destroy Greensboro ...and that's what Randleman Dam is for—drought mitigation.

City insiders and the dam scammers have been in panic mode for a decade now because nothing the city predicted would happen has happened! Water use has steadily declined and the city with the media's cooperation is concealing the facts. This issue is a powder keg. The longer news people like YES! WEEKLY's Jordan Green sit on this story the better it becomes. Everyone asks, "Why isn't John Hammer on this?" Maybe it's more like a land mine than a powder keg...and no reporter wants to poke around it out of fear.

Water sales are suffering. Waste water treatment sales are suffering. And the city cannot tell the truth about why water rates are going up else the citizens will realize that Randleman was never needed. The dam scammers fear if the truth gets out, citizens will revolt and heads will roll. Fortunately, so far it is only me reporting on the water fraud and the cover-up ....and anybody you tell.

Drought protection is a poor reason to expand by 75%
Purchasing 53% of Randleman Lake for “drought protection” is grossly irresponsible. That’s a 75% increase of Greensboro’s water supply (SOURCE: Water Director Allan Williams).

Water use has declined since 1995! We have more water now than we did back then! Yet the City of Greensboro continues to carefully craft its interviews and press releases to lead people to believe that water is scarce and the Randleman Dam is the only solution. It's a cover-up. And if you are in the news media you are an accomplice.

Even a state official quoted in the Carolina Journal falsely believes "Greensboro water use is escalating!"

NO-O-O! Water use has DECREASED!

What part of decrease do you not understand?

And all of Greensboro's citizens believe it is still increasing because newspapers like the Rhino and the N&R are reporting that water is "badly needed" in Greensboro. That is false!

Are you citizens getting this? Are you environmentalists getting this? Do you now see how Randleman was achieved using deceit? Citizens were tricked into supporting the Randleman Dam so manufacturers would relocate here—and they didn't! Now Greensboro's citizens must pay for the dam scammers' poor judgment and dishonesty.

FACT: Randleman Lake will become M T in a drought ....just like every other reservoir empties during a drought. Dought is the newest justification for a $150 million dollar investment and it won't fly. But it's all the dam scammers can come up with after having failed in their secret mission to attract industry and keep Greensboro competitive with Raleigh and Charlotte.

More Rain on the Randleman Dam Parade...
And last but not least, Greensboro's water rates will keep going up to pay for this fiasco. Industry has left, water sales are in a slump and the only source of cash besides President Obama's stimulus package is the wallets of Greensboro's citizens.

And the more the city raises the water rates, the less the resource will be used (needed)(sold) because people will be more careful how they use it! If water bills jumped to $200 a month imagine how short your shower would become and how brown your lawn would become. All the leaking toilets in Greensboro would finally get the repairs they've been needing.....and water use will decline.

The dam scammers responsible for this fraud are certain city council members, mayors, city managers, assistant city managers, water resources directors, news reporters, editors, and TV newscasters.

The Queen of the Dam Scammers
Former Mayor Carolyn Allen will always be my least favorite dam scammer. She was the environmentalist mayor who loved the recycling program but abandoned the water conservation program when it became a threat to the Randleman Dam. Yes, she was all about consensus...even when consensus results in fraud.

Rhinoceros Times misinforms readers

2009-11-13T11:37:00.009-05:00

Where has Rhino reporter Paul C. Clark been for the past year and a half?

Has he not read the “Randleman Dam Scam” story by me—a city hall insider who blew the whistle about a water fraud? Does Clark not know that Greensboro’s water use has been declining ever since 1995?

In today’s Rhino Times story “High Point Manager Says No Dam Fishing” Clark wrote:

“Half of the 12 million gallons a day of water from the new lake will go to Greensboro, which badly needs the water.”

THAT IS FALSE!

Clark needs to do some serious fact checking. Greensboro does not "badly need the water" as Clark claims. Greensboro has more water NOW than it's had over the past 20 years! CLICK on CHART

Greensboro has MORE storage tanks, MORE distribution pipes, MORE treatment capacity and MORE water resources with connections to Reidsville, Burlington and High Point and yet it is currently using LESS WATER than it did during the mid-nineties when it was falsly justifying a need for the Randleman Dam.

Try and figure this—Greensboro is currently expanding its water resources by 75% while water use has been declining 27% ever since 1995. Only a monopoly with great propaganda and news media accomplices can get away with something like this! Government never seems to downsize. It expands and it increases taxes....and in this case, taxes and the water rates.

The waterworks profits TWICE
And forgive me for neglecting to inform my readers that Greensboro's waste water treatment business is suffering, too! Sales are bad on the collection end as well as the distribution end. The waterworks bills you twice so it can profit twice. Greensboro needs more sewage revenue because in-flow to the sewer plants has declined. The local news media has not told you about this decline either. Perhaps under the FOI Act I will request the waste water numbers from Greensboro and make a second CHART.

Water distribution is a profit center and waste water treatment is a profit center. Both are suffering because we are switching from a manufacturing economy to a service economy. Service industries like FED EX don't use much water and they don't polute much water.

Unfortunately, when industry departs and the waterworks loses their best customers, residential water customers must make up the difference. Are you getting this? Now you know the REAL REASON why water and sewer rates are going up.

Greensboro’s water sales and waste water treatment sales are suffering. You would never know this had you not read my report!

The waterworks has lost revenue because Greensboro never has been able to sell all the water it projected it would sell (see CHART). Why is reporter Clark telling his readers that "Greensboro badly needs water?"

FACT: Greensboro badly needs to sell more water! That's why Greensboro eliminated its EPA award-winning water conservation program! When you badly need to sell water you don't run a program that saves water!

Of course the City of Greensboro cannot/will not admit its water sales are suffering ...else its citizens will begin asking, "Why?"….and then the cat would come popping out of the bag.

I can understand the News & Record keeping the cat in the bag all these years…but the Rhino Times???? John Hammer, what's gotten into you?

It’s no wonder that 97% of Greensboro’s residents are misinformed about water use (SOURCE: 2009 Telephone Survey) with false statements like today's in the Rhinoceros Times. Greensboro has plenty of water and this is being kept a secret to conceal a water fraud and to protect the dam scammers who lied and made false reports believing the ends justified their means.

Okay Paul C. Clark and the rest of Greensboro's impotent news media who refuse to investigate the Dam Scam, let me make this real easy for you. I've installed a special telephone line to my one window basement apartment just for the lamestream media!

When you need to check the facts and avoid embarrassing errors like "Greensboro badly needs the water," just call me and I'll be glad to set you straight.

COMMENTS WELCOME
Please feel free to add your comment below. No registration is required. Comments are not moderated. Anonymous comments are permitted.

You are invited to COMMENT

2009-11-11T16:14:00.004-05:00

97% of Greensboro’s citizens believe that public water use has increased since 1995 (Source: 2009 Telephone Survey). They are wrong. According to the Greensboro water department's own numbers anyone can easily see that public water use has decreased since 1995.

Is this newsworthy?
What is your comment?

Water Director Ray Shaw had me publish his future water needs forecast in 1995 to justify the $150 million Randleman Dam project.

The CHART reveals that Greensboro's water forecast never materialized. The telephone survey reveals that citizens are completely unaware that Greensboro’s water needs forecast was a fabrication.

Is this newsworthy?
What is your comment?

The local news media and the City of Greensboro are concealing the contents of this CHART from the public.
Is this newsworthy?
What is your comment?

Please feel free to add your comment below. No registration is required. Comments are not moderated. Anonymous comments are permitted.

(Click on this CHART to view it FULL SIZE)

POST YOUR COMMENT BELOW:

Proof that the News & Record’s dam cheerleaders have misled citizens about water use

2009-11-06T07:33:00.001-05:00

12 years ago...
Twelve years ago as a city hall whistleblower I informed the Greensboro News & Record numerous times that public water use was declining. And, to make the story even more newsworthy I added, "The news of the decline is being suppressed by the city's managers."

Two years later I told the N&R I was certain that the decline would continue. This information was important to the citizens because I discovered the city's case for the Randleman Dam was a fraud. I took the risk of blowing the whistle because the city was being terribly dishonest about its claim of water scarcity and the Randleman Dam being the only solution. I felt that taxpayers deserved to know that water use was declining so they could make informed decisions about the Randleman Dam.

It would not surprise me if the N&R called my bosses at city hall and told them what I was reporting. I was between a rock and a hard place. I was hired to reduce water demand—I was succeeding—I was winning awards—and yet I could sense that my bosses, the dam scammers, wanted nobody to know. While calling for conservation they actually wanted water use to increase sharply to justify the dam. I was ruining their secret plan.

I authored several press releases announcing the decline. They didn't go very far.
Editor John Robinson wasn’t interested in them. He didn’t think a decline was news. Robinson said, “Well, we have a water conservation program now, so water use should decline.”

But John, the City of Greensboro projected that future water use would skyrocket even with my water conservation program in place. The CHART proves it!

The decline in water use began during a booming economy. It baffled the water department. The News & Record was not interested. I was fired in 1999 after two years of high tension caused by the success of my program.

Two billion gallons of Greensboro water was saved. Translation: 2 billion gallons went unsold. The water department was losing revenue due to water conservation. The argument for the Randleman Dam was in danger so word of the decline was suppressed. Are you getting this?

False Statement in video
In 1999, the year I was fired, the city made a false statement in a water video it released. Water use had declined 4 years in a row. However, the city's new video approved by City Manager Ed Kitchen stated that "water demand was increasing." The water department and Ed Kitchen lied to support the case for the Randleman Dam.

Now fast forward 12 years...

Click on CHART to view full size

Public water use has declined since 1995 (Blue trend line). It never did skyrocket like the dam scammers projected (Dotted line) The Greensboro News & Record has never reported the city's gross over-estimation of its water needs!

The Greensboro News & Record has never reported the city's gross over-estimation of its future water needs!

Citizens completely unaware

I remained convinced that Greensboro’s citizens are completely unaware of the decline in water use since 1995. So a few days ago I conducted a random telephone survey of 30 residents age 21 or older. Participants completed the statement shown above by choosing one of three possible answers.

Here are the results......

97% of citizens are misinformed

I was not at all surprised to discover that 97% of citizens incorrectly believe that water use has increased since 1995. That’s exactly what the City of Greensboro and the News & Record wants them to think! The brainwashing has been successful and it's no wonder why citizens continue to support the Randleman Dam.

You tell me. If 97% of citizens think water use has gone up since 1995 ...and 97% of citizens are wrong, is that NEWS? Where do they get their ideas from?

Of course this is news! Why won't any area news agencies report this story?

ANSWER: There is a powerful conspiracy that does not want citizens to know because of where it could lead. When a $150 million dollar project is being built lots of money gets passed around. There was plenty of pressure on city staffers, city council and the news media to pitch the Randleman Dam as Greensboro's only solution. Nobody dared to speak against it. Nobody but me.

Citizens would never suspect a water fraud because they have been kept in the dark for so long by both the City and the Greensboro News & Record. However, the instant someone sees my water history CHART they immediately begin to smell the huge water rat. And that's why the city and the press won't show my CHART!

FACT: Greensboro had the lowest priced water among NC cities while its reservoirs were running dry. Its water price was 47% lower than the average for North Carolina cities!

FACT: Greensboro kept its water rates very low for several years so water use would remain high and the reservoirs would appear as inadequate.

FACT: As soon as Randleman Dam was approved, Greensboro raised the price of its water. The summertime peak demand problem caused by irrigation was solved.

Only those like you who have found their way to my blog know that Greensboro is using less water today than it did 15 years ago.

Randleman Dam is the City of Greensboro's greatest scam. Do you believe that taxpayers have a right to know all that is being concealed from them? Will you join me in this fight? Will you take action to see that the truth gets out? Will you write a letter to the editor? Will you distribute my CHART to residents of Greensboro?

I poured my heart into my job in Greensboro. I received national awards for my unanticipated success. Citizens saved 2 billion gallons of Greensboro water following the programs I instituted. Then I discovered an enormous fraud in the making—the Randleman Dam.

As the city's water spokesman I was expected to participate in this fraud. I refused because my faith leaves no room for such dishonesty. I was fired and never replaced. I am Greensboro's only water conservation manager.

Nobody came to my aid in 1999 because nobody believed my predictions that water use would go down and that he Randleman Dam was not necessary. I paid a price higher than you can ever imagine. None of the numerous water-saving programs I began are in place today. Greensboro downsized its water conservation program after my termination in 1999 and then ended the WC program around 2004.

Do you care if the dam scammers win? Do you care if water rates rise annually to pay for 53% of the Randleman Lake? Do you care if this fraud is never uncovered?

What will you do to help?