On January 4, Rep. Jim McDermott (D-WA), a member of the House Ways and Means Committee, sent a letter to U.S. Department of Treasury Secretary Paulson requesting additional information on the recent Clean Renewable Energy Bond (CREB) allocations.
Specifically, the Congressman requests that Treasury provide him a complete list of successful applicants who received CREB allocations and whether the applicants were governmental or cooperative borrowers; the type and size of projects that received allocations and the average expected energy production for the projects; the dollar amount of each allocation for each project; and list of applicants and projects that did not receive allocations.
The IRS maintains that it cannot release certain information about how the $800 million in allocations were awarded because of "confidentiality" rules. McDermott is hopeful, however, that the Treasury Department will be responsive to his request.
The letter is the result of a meeting with APPA and Morgan Meguire to discuss how the Congressman can be helpful with regard to renewable tax incentives for public power and, specifically, the CREB program. On behalf of NEPPA, Morgan Meguire has also met with Rep. Richard Neal's (D-Springfield) energy staff to discuss the program and also solicit his help in extending (as well as modifying) the program in the 110th Congress. Rep. Neal is in line to possibly chair the Select Revenue Subcommittee of the House Ways and Means Committee. Another New England member on the House tax writing committee is Rep. John Larson (D-CT), and Morgan Meguire is working to secure a meeting with his office to discuss this program, as well.