Commentary:
In April, the City of Las Cruces approved a natural gas rate-hike. The backstory is a small example of how community involvement should work.
The city is strongly committed to sustainability. Natural gas is a fading energy source. The city council has made clear that it will get out of that business over time.
Las Cruces Utilities had spent years trying to grow its operation, serving more customers. Expansion was a major goal. Changing directions in one’s life’s work can be challenging.
The original rate-hike proposal would have upped monthly small business gas bills 75% to pay for largely questionable expenses. These included building new gas lines that would violate City environmental policy and were obviously a poor business idea.
LCU is expanding into Talavera, where evidence indicates few residents will hook up. (Why would they, knowing natural gas is on the way out?) Further, many of the parcels LCU counted on are vacant. They could stay vacant, or builders might avoid natural gas. (See my 29 August 2021 column.) LCU wanted to extend lines to other outlying areas. Using more natural gas would release more greenhouse gases. The extensions would also create annualized debt service that would cost existing customers, often folks without much money, an extra $935,000 annually for twenty years. With time, as builders and more prosperous homeowners choose renewable energy sources, the imbalance will grow ugly.
The increase would have come on top of a significant Winter Storm Uri surcharge, just when pandemic and pandemic precautions had weakened small businesses.
The Las Cruces Green Chamber of Commerce hired consultant Phil Simpson, who reported much of this and articulated it at LCU Board meetings. Simpson, the Green Chamber, the Las Cruces Chamber of Commerce, and a few citizens argued strenuously against the plan. Utility Board meetings were a cultural collision, with gas-utility folks coming to face the inevitability of cutting, rather than expanding, service.
LCU wanted to go forward, but soon agreed to abandon line extension and the costly debt-service increase, lowering the total by about a third. Green Chamber pressure also obtained a delay, so the increase would start after the winter storm rider ended. That would be far less disruptive to small businesses. Further, Simpson successfully argued that if rates had to jump, it should be done more gradually. That’ll happen in three phases, over three years. Ultimately, the proposed rate increase shrunk from a $2.4 million total to $1.5 million. The 9.2% (residential) and $42.76% (small businesses) increases became 3.76% and $33%, respectively.
Eventually, LCU gave City Council a much more reasonable proposal, backed by more realistic figures. As one observer put it, “LCU really upped its game once there was real scrutiny.” (“Real scrutiny” used to be an automatic part of the process, under consumer-watchdog procedures the City abandoned in 2016.)
We’re fortunate the Green Chamber got Simpson involved to crunch the numbers and show that LCU’s plans were economically unwise as well as environmentally harmful. They saved many of you money, and helped bring LCU into line with the Mayor’s and City Council’s expressed commitment. The folks who opposed the increase are determined that the City’s Energy Transition Plan and Roadmap will be robust enough to move us meaningfully toward decarbonization, and not be mere greenwashing.
Now, if we can only get LCPD to follow the public records law regarding police shootings of civilians. There’s no sense in compounding those tragedies.