Sen. Harding, GOP press for substantial relief for ratepayers

Lamont exploring energy price aid

Governor may dip into leftover COVID funds

BY PAUL HUGHES
REPUBLICAN-AMERICAN front page

HARTFORD — Gov. Ned Lamont agreed to explore using unspent federal COVID-19 relief funds to partially offset recent increases in electricity rates during a meeting Wednesday with top Democratic and Republican legislators.

Lamont told reporters after the meeting any rate relief likely would not amount to much, but his administration would have an accounting of how much American Rescue Plan Act funding would be available for this purpose in the next 10 days.

“It is not enough to make a big difference, but it is enough to make a small difference,” he said.

But Senate Minority Leader Stephen G. Harding Jr., R-Brookfield, and Sen. Ryan Fazio, R-Greenwich, the ranking Senate Republican on the Energy and Technology Committee, insisted after the meeting that substantial relief is possible.

Harding noted representatives of the state Office of Policy and Management advised there is $700 million in available ARPA funding.

ENERGY: Monthly fees have skyrocketed

Lamont invited the top leaders of the four legislative caucuses and the bipartisan leadership of the Energy and Technology Committee to meet to discuss electricity costs, and short- and long-term measures for managing them. In addition to Harding and Fazio, Sen. Norman Needleman, D-Essex, and Rep. Jonathan Steinberg, D-Westport, the co-chairmen of the Energy and Technology Committee and Rep. Bill Buckbee, the ranking House Republican on the Energy and Technology Committee, attended.

REPUBLICANS CONTINUED to press the GOP’s case for recalling the General Assembly in special session to take immediate actions to mitigate electric costs.

Lamont and Democrats remained unpersuaded by Republican arguments, and maintained nothing on the proposed Republican agenda would make much of a difference to electric bills now.

“We were candid with each other,” Steinberg said. “I think we all would have loved to come up with some immediate solution that would address the real pain people are feeling. However, most of the things we can really do to benefit ratepayers, and our reliability of energy, are longer term solutions.

The Republicans continue to push for a special session. I’m just not sure there is enough ‘there’ there to justify it.”

In a gesture of good faith, Lamont said he left the door open to using remaining ARPA funds to partially offset a portion of an increase in so-called “public benefit charges” related to a pandemic-era moratorium on electricity shutoffs for hardship cases that lasted four years.

“I wouldn’t say we totally agreed on that, but let’s just say there is still some work yet to be done by the governor’s people to see if we can discover something that would move the needle at all,” Steinberg said. “Right now, I’m still skeptical.”

MUCH OF MONTHLY ELECTRIC BILLS cover the costs of making electricity and delivering it to customers, but bills also include public benefit charges that represent costs mandated by the state and federal governments, including state-approved energy programs, policies and initiatives.

Public policy charges represent roughly 28% of the costs charged to Eversource Energy customers who use an average of 700 kilowatts of electricity per month, and 18% to United Illuminating customers who use the same amount of electricity. Eversource customers saw a big jump in electric bills following rate changes that took effect July 1, and increases in usage due to the hot and humid summer weather. A public outcry ensued, as well as political jockeying in an election year.

While the standard service rate dropped July 1, public benefit charges increased because the Public Utilities Regulatory Authority authorized Eversource to recoup the $184 million cost of pandemic-era moratorium and the $605 million cost of a state mandate to buy electricity from the Millstone nuclear power plant in Waterford over a 10-month period.

Harding and Fazio said the legislature needs to meet in special session before Oct. 1 to reallocate some of the $373.5 million in ARPA funding that Lamont and Democrats agreed to use to supplement the previously adopted $26 billion state budget.

But Lamont said he will have unilateral authority after Oct. 15 to spend any unallocated ARPA funds, and he would be able to direct funds to cover a portion of the pandemic-era moratorium charges without legislative approval.