[ad_1]
OHIO — The holidays are around the corner with Christmas songs on radio and movies decorated in red and green shiny colors, and while it’s a joyous time for many people, for others the holidays may be jarring.
Julia Orban is a community advocate who said, this holiday season, there’s a problem brewing.
“People are really struggling right now. I work with a lot of families that are having to choose between whether or not they pay their rent or their utilities or food for their kids,” Orban said. “There’s a woman who was on oxygen, she requires, to live and she had her power turned off.”
Orban said that woman couldn’t afford to pay her electric bill, and she’s not the only one.
“It’s been an unprecedented amount of people coming to me with disconnect notices really struggling,” Orban said. “And I’ve been trying to help them get connected to assistance, but a lot of the assistance programs that were out for different things are starting to go away.”
In the meantime, there’s another threat to higher bills lurking around the corner.
The American Electric Power or AEP has filed a request with the state to increase its distribution base rates.
The company told Spectrum News 1 they would not provide an interview but they sent a statement as a response to the story.
“AEP Ohio has requested the PUCO approve a 2.14% increase in distribution base rates,” according to AEP Ohio Media Relations. “Those rates cover the costs of equipment like power poles, lines and transformers, and pay the salaries of the line workers who restore power after storms and other outages and of those people who manage the electric grid to keep the lights on. AEP Ohio’s distribution rates have been essentially flat for the last 10 years — distribution rates like the one before the commission now are not the reason energy costs have been increasing for our customers. If this rate increase is approved, an average customer using 1,000 kilowatt hours of electricity a month would see their monthly bill increase by $3.95.”
Morgan Harper is the co-founder of grassroots organization Columbus Stand Up, and she said they’re fighting back.
They have a petition and are knocking on doors asking people to attend the public hearing to testify against the increase.
“So, we launched a campaign called lights out on AEP to prevent the public utilities commission of Ohio from allowing AEP to raise electricity prices,” Harper said. “Even for people who are making decent money, they’re noticing that their price, their bills are getting up to $600, $700 a month they’re like, ‘I don’t know that I can continue to take this.”
Harper said there’s also another concern regarding the request for the increase.
“Look at the public utilities commission of Ohio staff report,” Harper said. “They’re also asking for more money to be able to improve the fitness center and the executive compensation retirement packages.”
AEP Media Relations explained how customers get billed within their statement:
“AEP Ohio customers’ bills are made up of three parts: generation, transmission and distribution. Ohioans are seeing increased energy costs for two primary reasons: generation costs and transmission costs. Generation costs are those that cover electricity generation to meet a person’s energy needs — the power plants, wind farms and other generation sources that provide electricity to the system. Transmission costs are the costs of building and maintaining high-voltage lines that move energy over large distances, from generation sources to communities. Simply put, there is not enough electricity being generated in Ohio to meet our state’s electricity needs, creating an imbalance in the supply of energy and the demand for it. That imbalance is now forcing Ohio to import electricity from other states through high-voltage transmission lines. As generation supply has decreased, both generation and transmission costs have increased. AEP Ohio shares our customers’ concerns about the imbalance between the supply of energy and demand for it, and we are frustrated, too. In Ohio, utilities like AEP Ohio are legally prohibited from building new generation sources. We sincerely hope the market will respond soon with additional generation sources in Ohio to help alleviate this burden for our customers.”
“We serve Ohioans in 61 counties, and we care about them and their communities — we live in these communities, too. If customers are struggling with their electric bills, AEP Ohio can help. We offer programs to spread out the costs of electricity over multiple months, which can help families budget, and we can connect customers with programs that cover parts of their electric bill, depending on their income. Our energy dashboard can help customers understand how much energy they are using, and find ways to use less energy, which can help them save money. Customers can learn more about those programs or log in to view their personalized dashboard at AEPOhio.com/Savings/Home, or they can call us at 800-672-2231 for more information.”
“Finally, we wanted to mention that we know energy bills can be complicated, and we hope to clarify those for our customers by providing more transparent and easier to understand information on bills. We have started sending weekly emails to customers to help them track their electricity usage, and we have filed a separate request with the PUCO to create a more transparent and easy-to-understand bill. We hope that request will be approved to help our customers better understand their bills.”
But Orban said the assistance programs that are meant to help are often really hard to get.
And while the holidays are supposed to be a time of hope, Orban said her hope is for the state to hear their testimonies at public hearings, starting on Dec. 3
“There was a woman that I was just working with a couple weeks ago, she’s a single mom, she has a five-year-old son, she’s fighting breast cancer and works full time at a school. She makes like $50 more, too much to qualify for the assistance programs,” Orban said. “I’m planning and just sharing just how hard it is for people right now.”
[ad_2]
Chrissa Loukas
Source link