Iola City Council tables rate talks

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November 14, 2017 - 12:00 AM

Iola City Council members tabled once again talk of a potential electric rate increase, opting to wait for a better estimate of how much, if any, of an increase is needed.
Iola City Administrator Sid Fleming told the Council Monday he and energy consultant Scott Shreve no longer believe a rate hike of 6 to 8 percent is needed, thanks to changes in the energy cost adjustments adopted earlier this year by the city.
Waiting until the Council’s Nov. 27 meeting will give Fleming and Shreve additional time to get firmer numbers, Fleming said.
While other utility rates have been increased at various occasions the past few years, Fleming noted Iola’s electric rates have gone largely unchanged after the city instituted the energy cost adjustment (ECA) in 2005. Through Iola’s, ECA, energy price fluctuations were borne by the customer, not the city.
The problem, Fleming explained earlier this year, was that even with the ECA, the city does not earn enough to sustain its electric reserves.
Ideally, Iola would have enough cash in reserve to operate for 90 days without any other revenue, Fleming said, or about $3 million. At the end of October, Iola had about $629,000 in the bank.
The electric rates were unchanged from 2005 until 2015.
Iola adjusted its ECA formula in January to allow the city to recoup more savings from lower energy costs.

FLEMING’S announcement came after the Council heard impassioned pleas from Tracy Keagle and Georgia Masterson of Humanity House, an organization that assists struggling families across Allen County.
Keagle called higher utility rates punitive to the poor, elderly, single-parent families and those with health issues.
She rattled off a list of statistics to illustrate the plight of Allen Countians today: Roughly 18 percent live below the poverty rate, and 40 percent of Allen Countians are within the 200 percent threshold of the poverty line.
Humanity House has paid out $56,000 this year to assist an average of 270 families pay their utility bills already, Masterson added.
Raising utility rates “seems to be the go-to remedy for the city’s financial situation,” Keagle said. “Please think long and hard about the repercussions” for raising utility rates again.
The timing of the discussion was not lost on those in attendance. Humanity House will host a chili feed benefit from 11 a.m. to 7 p.m. Thursday at the New Community Building — the same venue for Monday’s Council meeting — with proceeds going to help with the utility bills fund.

IN OTHER issues, the Council agreed, 7-0, to hire the accounting firm Jarred, Gilmore and Phillips to perform the city’s 2017 financial audit. The $1,900 fee is a $250 increase from what the city paid the accounting firm for the 2016 audit. Councilman Bob Shaughnessy was absent from Monday’s meeting.
Council members also approved the city’s 2018 holiday schedule, which mirrors the one approved earlier this month for Allen County.
Iola employees will have 14 paid holidays next year.
Fleming noted having a different holiday schedule than the county was problematic for the city regarding such things as track pickup, because the county’s landfill would be closed those days.
Along with the holiday schedule, the Council agreed to move four meetings because of various holidays. The May 28, Oct. 8 and Nov. 12 meetings will be pushed back a day because of Memorial Day, Columbus Day and Veterans Day, respectively. The second meeting of December 2018, which would fall on Christmas Eve, is canceled.

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