Consumers invited to comment on Aquila rate increase

[Bubba]

Consumers invited to comment on Aquila rate increase

By Eric Swanson
Dodge City Daily Globe

The Kansas Corporation Commission wants to hear what people have to say before it decides whether to grant Aquila's request for a $7.24 million rate increase for natural gas services.
The commission conducted a public hearing on the issue Thursday in Wichita and will host another hearing at 7 p.m. Tuesday in the VIP Room of the Dodge City Civic Center.

Aquila is seeking a 21 percent increase in delivery fees from its residential customers and a 32 percent increase from its small commercial customers. If the full increase is approved, customers would pay an additional $52 to $76 a year on their gas bills, depending on whether the current rate structure changes.

full story- REGISTER USER ACCOUNT

Here is some info that everybody needs to know about Aquila. Aquila is in negotiation to sell it's Colorado and Kansas gas operations to Black Hills Power, also to sell it's Missouri electric operations to Great Plains Energy, the parent of Kansas City Power & Light. After the sales go through Aquila will cease to exist. At which time Aquila CEO will receive $4.3 million dollars, also when he reaches retirement age he will receive $920,000/yr in pension benefits from the Aquila pension plan fund.

This is in addition to the bonuses he received in 2002 for selling of all international assets when the company first started failing after Enron. At that time the top 5 executives of the company received $30 million. Then President and COO Robert (Bob) Green left the company and received a $7.6 million severence package.

More recently, COO Kieth Stamm left the company and received a $1.5 million severence package. Also, after only working for the company for one year, Senior VP of communications Norma Dunn, left the company and received a $600,000 severence package.

In addition, now that the sale of the Kansas elecric operations to MKEC is complete, Rick Green will receive a $742,500 bonus for the completion of the sale. Norma Dunn, who no longer works for Aquila but works in HR for the City of Houston, will receive a $187,500 bonus for the sale to MKEC.


The source of the information in the last 3 paragraphs of my post can be found here- Kansas City Star | 03/23/2007 | Aquila VP gets $600,000 severance

Why should we give a company that is going out of business, more money? If history repeats itself, they will just use that money to pay executives huge bonuses. Maybe if Aquila needs more money they should go to current and former employees and ask for some of that big bonus money back.

[lurker]

Good Post Bubba,

Mebets Norma was Dunn in the good old fashioned way.

[Bubba]

Let's all show up at the civic center to let the KCC know that Aquila doesn't need a rate increase. Let them sell it to Black Hills Power and then let Black Hills decide if a rate increse is necessary.

[PowerUp]

If you have ever worked as a contractor for a gas company! You would see why the cost of things are so high. They waste money on the stupid stuff and stupid rules.
Good post Bubba
Everyone should be againt a hike.

[Bubba]

Reminder for as many people as possible to go to the civic center tonight at 7pm to let the KCC (Kansas Corporation Commission) know that they shouldn't approve the requested Aquila gas rat hike.

[Army_of_One]

Being KCP & L would be a good thing...they haven't raised their rates in years.....How come they can do it and Aquila can't?

[Bubba]

We'll never know, as of April 1st, your electric company in Dodge City is Victory Electric. The rate hike is being proposed by the gas side of Aquila. The gas properties owned by Aquila in Kansas and Colorado are in sale negotiations with Black Hills Power out of South Dakota.

[Made in the USA]

Originally Posted by Army_of_One

Being KCP & L would be a good thing...they haven't raised their rates in years.....How come they can do it and Aquila can't?

I have noticed that alot of times Army! KP&L was always lower than everyone else.

[Bubba]

I went to the meeting tonight and it looked like there were at least a dozen or more people there representing Aquila. There appeared to be only 5 or 6 local citizens there including myself and Eric Swanson in those numbers. Two people in addition to myself were sworn in and gave testimony to the KCC commissioners.

I gave a statement that basically reflected the facts that I stated in the first post of this thread and then gave the source material for those facts to the commissioners.

Since Eric was there, I would expect something in the globe either tomorrow or the next day about the meeting.