Greer CPW customers will be paying more for electricity and water and sewer facility charges to raise more than $2 million in 2014 revenue.
• increase electricity rates 7 percent.
• raise monthly water and sewer facility charge to $2.75
• keep natural gas rates the same
• pass $73.7 million operating budget
• give merit pay increases up to 3 percent
Typically, customers using 1,000-kilowatt hours of electricity per month will see their monthly bill increase $7.47. The increases will result in more than additional $2 million in revenue.
CPW Interim General Manager Randy Olson said the increases reflect the commission’s resolve to keep pace with rate increases it had absorbed in purchasing electricity from the Piedmont Municipal Power Agency (PMPA) in the past. “In 2008, 2009 and 2010 the increases we paid PMPA were not passed on to our customers,” Olson said. “Everybody was in tough situations then but we (CPW) is catching up now.”
CPW provides gas (20,000 customers), electricity (17,000), water and sewer (est. 14,000) to its Greer customers.
Olson said there were no sewer and water increases passed on to CPW customers from 2009-2011. The sewer fee was increased in 2012.
Olson said the utility took a hit in 2010 and 2011 when increases, above CPW’s charge, from PMPA were not passed on to CPW customers. PMPA typically announces rate increases after CPW’s fiscal budget is approved. PMPA raised electricity rates six percent in 2011 and 11.7 percent in 2012. CPW absorbed the 2011 increase and did not pass along the additional seven percent charge from PMPA in 2012.
CPW began to recoup electricity charges in 2013 when it raised customers’ rates seven percent against a 6.8 percent PMPA increase.