Bentz Bill Seeks Higher Pay to Attract New BPA Administrator

John Hairston's February retirement announcement left the Bonneville Power Administration searching for a new chief executive to run an agency that generated $4.72 billion in operating revenue in 2022 and controls the wholesale electricity that ultimately shapes what Baker County residents, irrigators, and small businesses pay for power. The federal government posted the replacement job at a salary topping out at $228,000 per year, and Rep. Cliff Bentz of Ontario says that number won't attract the executive the region needs.

Bentz introduced the Bonneville Power Leadership Recruitment Act, HR 8132, on March 27, joined by Rep. Mike Simpson of Idaho and Rep. Mark Amodei of Nevada. The bill would allow the U.S. Department of Energy to offer market-competitive compensation to the BPA administrator, extend similar standards to other senior agency positions, and require annual pay reviews tied to industry benchmarks. It has been referred to the House Committee on Oversight and Government Reform.

"The Northwest's hydropower is one of its greatest assets," Bentz said in introducing the legislation. "It supplies almost four million people with dependable, reasonably priced power. We citizens of the Northwest cannot afford a BPA administrator who lacks deep experience, proven leadership capability, strategic vision, and an understanding of the incredible value of the BPA to many of us in Oregon, Washington, Idaho, Montana, Nevada, [and] Northern California."

The pay gap Bentz identified is steep. The Tennessee Valley Authority, the closest federal analog to BPA, pays its CEO a base salary of roughly $1.2 million. Portland General Electric CEO Maria Pope drew a base salary of more than $1.1 million in 2024. BPA's current recruitment cap sits at less than one-fifth of those benchmarks, yet the position oversees an agency that markets power from 31 federal hydroelectric dams and one nonfederal nuclear plant and operates about three-quarters of the Pacific Northwest's high-voltage transmission grid.

For Baker County, that grid is not a regional abstraction. The lines and substations BPA controls carry power through Eastern Oregon and set the timeline for grid upgrades, wildfire-hardening projects, and transmission improvements this part of the state depends on. Because BPA funds its entire operation through charges to power and transmission customers rather than congressional appropriations, every administrator decision on rate cases and capital investment works its way to bills paid by homes and farms across the region.

The agency was created by Congress in 1937 to market power from the Bonneville Dam on the Columbia River. Today it supplies roughly one-third of all electricity generated across the Pacific Northwest, serving nearly four million customers in Oregon, Washington, Idaho, Montana, Nevada, and Northern California.

Hairston, who became administrator and CEO in January 2021 and logged more than 35 years at BPA before announcing his retirement on February 6, is set to join the Eugene Water and Electric Board as its general manager in May 2026. His departure triggered both the current DOE recruitment process and Bentz's push to ensure the position can compete for experienced utility executives.

Whether HR 8132 advances through committee before DOE selects Hairston's replacement will determine whether the next BPA administrator is chosen from a field drawn by competitive pay, or from a smaller pool willing to oversee a $4.72 billion agency at a federal pay ceiling.