When the New Orleans city council held a public meeting last fall to get comments on a controversial $210 million power plant Entergy Corp. wants to build, some 50 demonstrators clad in orange T-shirts and carrying professionally-printed signs showed up in support. Local plant opponents also attended, but the plant supporters outnumbered them. The same thing occurred at later public meetings. The city council voted a green light for the plant.
But The Lens, a local online news publication, was curious about the orchestrated campaign of support and did some digging. The publication tracked down and interviewed some of the plant supporters and discovered they were local actors, hired to attend the meetings. They were paid $60 to appear and $200 to give speeches in favor of the plant. They were told to not reveal they were paid to appear and they signed non-disclosure agreements.
The natural reaction was that Entergy had hired the pro-plant demonstrators in order to give the appearance of grassroots support. But it turned into astroturf, fake grassroots.
New Orleans-based Entergy denied it had hired the crowd. The Lens was able to track down a Los Angeles firm, Crowds on Demand, as the source of the fake plant supporters. The company’s web site makes clear what it does: “Hire demonstrators. Your home for protests, rallies, advocacy, audiences, PR stunts and political events. Services available nationwide.”
As the controversy grew, Entergy conducted what it called an “investigation,” and issued a statement that it had hired a Virginia-based public relations firm, The Hawthorn Group, to help it win approval for the gas-fired generating plant. According to Entergy, Hawthorn then hired Crowds on Demand, which was not part of its contract with Entergy.
Entergy said it has terminated the contract with Hawthorn and put the firm, and Crowds on Demand, on a “do not hire list.” Marcus Brown, Entergy general counsel, issued a statement: “These kinds of activities run directly counter to the way we conduct our business. We apologize to the council, the community, and to the many supporters of the New Orleans power station project who took their own time to attend those public hearings and express their support for this important project.”
Members of the city council have said they plan to revisit their approval of the plant.
Entergy’s stumble on astroturf prompted Montana Public Service Commission member Travis Kavulla to tweet, “The pay-for-public-comment scandal in New Orleans should make every economic regulator consider that their duty isn’t to do what is popular (or what appears to be popular).”
— Kennedy Maize