GUC welcomes new officers, new member

Greenville Utilities Commission started its fiscal year with a new chairman, vice chairman and board member.

The board elected Lindsey Griffin and Mark Garner as its chairman and chairman-elect, respectively, at its July 18 meeting and re-elected Ferrell Blount as its secretary.

Justin Fuller was appointed to the board by the Greenville City Council to a three-year term.

Griffin, a retired construction executive, has served on the board since 2019. Garner, a retired planning and engineering consultant, has served on the board since 2023. Blount, president of Blount Petroleum Corporation, has served on the board since 2021.

Fuller works at Thermo Fisher Scientific in Greenville. He also is the CEO of the nonprofit Youth Business Enterprise, which focuses on youth business development.

“I am looking forward to giving back to the community and being a part of the growth and advancement of the city,” Fuller said.

He is a native of Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania, served in the U.S. Air Force and has lived in Greenville for the past 12 years with his wife and three children.

Greenville Utilities is owned and operated by the citizens of Greenville and is governed by an eight-member Board of Commissioners responsible for approving rates, development plans, the annual budget and setting policy. Board members serve three-year terms, with a maximum of two terms.

Following the election of its new officers, the board approved two projects involving natural gas.

Supply agreement

The board authorized General Manager/CEO Tony Cannon to execute a natural gas prepayment agreement with Gulf States Gas District.

A prepayment agreement allows a provider to purchase natural gas at a discounted rate in return for issuing tax-exempt bonds for the gas company. The provider, in this case GUC, would not have any liability associated with the bonds, according to the board’s agenda materials.

Under the proposed agreement GUC will receive up to 3,000 dekatherms of gas per day over 30 years and receive a discount of 30 cents or more per dekatherm from the applicable first-of-the-month gas index price.

If GUC doesn’t need the all 3,000 dekatherms, Gulf State will remarket the leftover amount for an administrative charge of 5 cents per dekatherm.

It’s estimated GUC will save about $200,400 annually from November 2024 to October 2054 for a total of $6.012 million in natural gas cost savings, depending on total contracted volumes.

GUC already has similar agreements with Gulf States and Black Belt Energy.

Gas main extension

The board awarded a $791,916 contract to Mears Group Inc. to install about 2.8 miles of pipe along N.C. 11 North to extend GUC’s natural gas main.

Eight-inch pipe will be installed along the highway from the Martin Luther King Jr. Highway (U.S. 264) on-ramp to Staton Mill Road. The pipe will then go along Staton Mill Road to approximately 650 feet northeast of Futrell-Robson Road.

The board’s agenda materials said information was provided to 20 potential bidders. An insufficient number of bids were received at first, so the project had to be advertised again. Only one bid was received the second time, but state law allowed GUC to open and review it. The bid was from Mears Group.