Thus, after returning from the hospital, I went and talked with one representative of the Downtown Merchants' Ass'n (sadly, not a vibrant organization), and he helped me get in touch with some others; I have a meeting set up with the Town Mgr., and we think it is fortunate that the Mayor is an electrician - used to be the Town's Inspector. The consensus is that APS, who was the entity directly discussing with TMInc, did them an injustice. What became apparent during the meeting - fide the Town Manager - APS told TMInc that in the whole downtown, there were only two sites that both had parking slots and 3-phase power. And this is just plain incorrect! The Mayor was close to visibly perplexed to have heard that (and he a very taciturn chap); and the businessman I conferred with today told me the same.
Regardless, there IS a big concern with the proposed parking lot: it contains 2 x 9 spots, and the proposed contract is for TMInc. to have 8. In other words, effectively all of one side of quite a small parking lot. It was the immediate impression Jenny and I had when we scoped out the situation much earlier during the day. So....we had to wonder: was APS sandbagging Tesla, secretly hoping for resistance? We don't know, but after that utility's fierce opposition to residential PVs, most visibly opposed by Solar City, six weeks ago, it is easy to start thinking conspiracy here....
The upshot of the Council Meeting was that the council did NOT put the Resolution to a vote, but requested Town Mgr. to go back and suggest a re-negotiation; as reported in an earlier post, with the possibility of "starting" with potentially as few as two SpC slots. As I am sure forum members and other vehicle owners would agree, I think TMInc. would have little interest in that. Thus, I will continue to bring to the attention of the Town Mgr. and to other downtown merchants the positive aspects of having the SpCs here - and hoping all parties can find another heart-of-downtown location that appropriately can host eight or so charge slots.
Sure wish I had had the opportunity to address the Council first, rather than having to play clean-up.
