Last week, we received a tip. We were told that the Colorado Springs City Council, serving as the Colorado Springs Utilities (CSU) Board, is set to discuss the CSU Chief Executive Officer’s (Travas Deal) employment contract at the next Utilities Board Meeting. The contract change will involve Deal’s salary. We’ve confirmed the details for you.
Our CORA
We filed a Colorado Open Records Act (CORA) request to ask some questions. Colorado Springs Utilities responded to the CORA request this afternoon. According to the final agenda for tomorrow’s meeting, the board will go into executive session to meet with staff from the City Attorney’s Office regarding an unspecified employment contract. In other words, they will lock the public out of discussions and talk amongst themselves with attorneys about a CSU employee’s contract. We suspect the discussions will be about Deal’s salary. Later, in the same meeting, the board will “vote to approve a contract amendment for the Chief Executive Officer…”
The CORA response also provided Deal’s contract and the March 2025 Utilities Board meeting minutes, where the board considered and unanimously awarded Deal his 1st pay raise since his hire date in February 2023. During that meeting, Deal received a $70,000 pay raise, from $480,000 to $550,000.
Now, only 14 months after he last received a sizeable raise, the Utilities Board will make the case for another pay raise. They will vote to increase his pay by another $75,000 immediately and an additional $75,000 in the near future. His pay will jump to $700,000 annually if approved by the board.
CSU Board Chair Dave Donelson’s statement
We reached out to City Councilman and CSU Board Chair Dave Donelson for comment:
“The citizens of Colorado Springs deserve an outstanding CEO to lead Colorado Springs Utilities. And we currently have one – Travas Deal.
At our CSU Board meeting on Wednesday, May 20, the Utilities Board will consider increasing the CEO’s pay to bring him to the 50th percentile (midpoint in pay) for CEO’s of comparable utility companies. Our CEO is currently paid significantly less than that – and this is while he leads a larger organization (roughly 2,000 employees) with a larger budget (roughly 2 billion dollars) than many of those he is compared with in the salary survey. He also leads a four service utility (electric, gas, water, wastewater), while many of those in the survey lead only one or two service utilities.
Most recently, our CEO led the effort to keep the Ray Nixon power plant open for an additional three years. That effort was successful – and it will save CSU millions of dollars, and those savings will be passed on to all of us.
Our CEO is well respected at the local, state, and federal level. He is sought out for advice, and CSU is looked to for best practices – our Large Load Tariff on electric users of 10MW or more is a recent example.
The right thing to do is compensate him at least at the “average” level for CEOs of public utilities similar to CSU”.
Our Take
Utility issues are by far the biggest hot-button topic for our readers, and many people are fed up with rate increases and time-of-day rates. This would be a bad look for the CSU board (The City Council). We have no beef with Deal. He’s head and shoulders above the last CEO, and we’ve at times defended him to readers. We especially liked his hustle during the fight to keep the Ray Nixon Coal Plant open. However, it would be incredibly tone-deaf for the board members to consider a pay raise, given that the utility’s owners (the citizens) are struggling in this economy. If a pay raise is indeed on the table, Deal can be patient and wait for the city as a whole to thrive before he personally thrives more. He should continue to “struggle” on his current $550,000 annual salary. We’re confident he can do it!
Reach out to City Council members in a polite manner before they make their decisions about Deal’s contract, and let them know how you feel.
Ken Casey Ken.Casey@coloradosprings.gov
Lynette Crow-Iverson Lynette.Crow-Iverson@coloradosprings.gov
Dave Donelson Dave.Donelson@coloradosprings.gov
Kimberly Gold Kimberly.Gold@coloradosprings.gov
Nancy Henjum Nancy.Henjum@coloradosprings.gov
David Leinweber David.Leinweber@coloradosprings.gov
Roland Rainey Roland.RaineyJr@coloradosprings.gov
Brian Risley brian.risley@coloradosprings.gov
Brandy Williams Brandy.Williams@coloradosprings.gov
One thought on “Utilities CEO Pay Raise Up for Discussion on May 20th”
NO. No raise.