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TECO’s proposed price hike faces backlash

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Updated  October 24, 2024 9:54am EDT
TECO
FOX 13 News

TECO's proposed rate hikes face pushback

Two weeks after Hurricane Milton, TECO proposed a rate hike. FOX 13's Evan Axelbank reports.

TAMPA, Fla. - Two weeks after it began restoring power to hundreds of thousands of customers, Tampa Electric is facing new criticism of its plan to raise rates.

The latest proposal would see rates go up by more than 20 percent over the next three years.

But consumer advocates are crying foul in new court filings.

During Hurricane Milton, Paul Paduano's power didn't go out, but his beef with TECO goes back a few years anyway. 

The streetlights in his Apollo Beach neighborhood are hit-and-miss.

READ: Florida residents planning to sell homes, leave the state after hurricane season: 'We're done'

"They're not there for aesthetics, they're also there for safety," he said.

He wrote an email to the public service commission, hoping to convince them not to adopt TECO's requests to raise rates on typical consumers from $136 a month to $165 a month by 2027. 

TECO workers at a staging area in Tampa.

TECO workers at a staging area in Tampa.

TECO has said it needs the increases to pay for new solar projects, a company headquarters, improve shareholder return and automate responses to some outages.

"My pay is not keeping up with the inflation and all the increases," he said. "And I'm the sole income earner for my household."

In filings this week, lawyers advocating for people like Paul said TECO's push to raise $445 million over three years is unfair because TECO's parent company, Emera, of Nova Scotia, is relying on TECO customers for 54 percent of their revenue even though their 840,000 customers are only 34 percent of their customer base. 

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The Sierra Club also says TECO inflated its needs three times over and that it could save money by weaning off coal.

"We're not taking issue with every aspect of its cost allocation," said Sari Amiel of the Sierra Club, "but this specifically is a really glaring issue that we think TECO can and should address."

The Sierra Club says TECO customers pay the third-highest bills in the nation, and says the PSC should not rubberstamp the new request.

But TECO says this isn't a reflexive increase, that they have dropped costs twice this year, by about $25 per month. 

TECO's CEO, Archie Collins, said last week that investments have been efficient.

"The strength of this grid relative to other electrical grids that I have worked with in my 35-year career... this is a strong grid."

Florida's public council warns that if history is any guide, there could be a new storm surcharge added on top of the requested rate hike.

The decision by the PSC will be made at the end of this year.

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