xtremrun wrote:
windywave wrote:
No one mentioning the Sierra Club being st the negotiating table for some fucking reason? The utility not being able to raise rates to pay to make it a cleaner plant? No one? Just skipping that part are we?
Why should the utilities get to raise rates? For their investors? That's just like the consumers being taxed. Being a republican I know you hate taxes. Why do you hate America. Why should Americans pay for the company to clean up their mess?
You probably didn't finish high school yet when I was an auditor with a very large municipal run utility. Would it surprise you to learn that unlike for profit utilities, municipal ones in Florida and it turns out Arizona do not need permission from state utility commissions to raise rates? Nor were we subject to the same consumer protection mandates that for profit utilities were. You know why? Because in theory, we were beholden to a commission that has political appointees or elected officials on it. So unlike blood sucking for profit utilities the rights of the citizenry are protected by the commission and there is no need for a silly state run middleman to protect the interest of the consumer. But would it also surprise you to know that our rates were second only to one other utility in the state? That's right, we had the second highest rates by a long shot. So much so we made 400 million in profits after operating costs for a utility that only supplied power to 300,000 customers after capital and operating reserves about 75,000. So that is basically 475 million in profit after operating expense. You know where that profit went? We sent on average 350-450 million a year back to the city of Orlando so they could do whatever they wanted with it. Often to offset deficiencies that could only be met by raising property taxes, even though there were customers in orange county and St Cloud that paid our higher rates than they paid before we acquired their power lines.
Did you know that Orlando is one of the few cities in Florida run by democrats? And certainly the largest. In fairness, most Cities in Florida on non-partisan, but not Orlando. So not only do you have gov't, but a gov't run by democrats sticking it to customers far worse than evil for profit companies.
"In the world I see you are stalking elk through the damp canyon forests around the ruins of Rockefeller Center. You'll wear leather clothes that will last you the rest of your life. You'll climb the wrist-thick kudzu vines that wrap the Sears Towers. And when you look down, you'll see tiny figures pounding corn, laying stripes of venison on the empty car pool lane of some abandoned superhighway." T Durden