NYSEG Requests 23% Rate Increase; Leaves Bedford Out in the Cold

Social media frequently buzzes with complaints of lost power, trees down and inadequate answers from NYSEG about service restoration, just about whenever a storm hits Bedford.

NYSEG, a subsidiary of publicly traded Avangrid, Inc., part of Spain’s Iberdrola Group, has over 880,000 electricity and 263,000 gas customers and their services cover over 40 percent of Upstate NY. More than one million people are affected by their frequent outages and slow response times, and we deserve action. Following NYSEG’s poor response to Tropical Storm Phillipe in 2017, when 55,000 customers were without power, Assemblyman David Buchwald requested a formal review of the utility company by the Public Service Commission (PSC). This past April, the PSC found NYSEG to be among the poorest performers of all the utility companies.

Despite this poor performance, NYSEG has applied to the PSC to increase rates by 23.7 percent! May 2020 is the target implementation date, if approved. Elected officials are calling foul, and so am I. We should not be expected to pay more for a service that doesn’t reliably deliver. Public hearings for the rate increase were originally scheduled only for locations in NYSEG’s upstate and Southern Tier service regions, giving Hudson Valley customers the cold shoulder. However, after pressure from Yorktown Town Supervisor Ilan Gilbert, we had an opportunity to voice our opinions to the PSC in Yorktown last week. I attended the hearing, along with elected officials and exasperated residents, and voiced my opposition to the requested rate increase.

The NYS Public Service Law states that people must be provided with ‘safe and adequate’ service, and that NYSEG is tasked with ensuring that the public is charged ‘just and reasonable’ rates. These terms are subjective and we can debate whether this rate increase is ‘just and reasonable,’ or whether it was adequate, and all people felt safe, but many of us think that until substantial measures are taken by NYSEG to improve its infrastructure in and around Bedford, it falls short of being just and reasonable, nor is the current service adequate enough to justify raising the rates to the extent requested.

In the filing NYSEG says the increase will cover employee-related expenses and vegetation management. I don’t dispute the need for the funds. We need trees to be cut back, employees deserve good pay and benefits and there is likely a need to hire more people. However, I don’t believe passing those costs to the customers is appropriate when there is no demonstrable commitment to improved service. In any other business, customers don’t take a leap of faith after poor service and pay more than they pay for substandard service. However, utilities are monopolies. There is no free market in the usual sense. NYSEG has been charged with protecting the customers’ interest. And that’s what I’m asking them to do.

Climate change is bringing more radical weather patterns with unexpected consequences. NYSEG needs to make substantial improvements to the grid and modernize their systems. Once we routinely ‘safely and adequately’ get through entire winter seasons, only then will it be acceptable to impose a ‘just and reasonable’ rate increase to customers who have already incurred costs of backup generators, spoiled food and lost days of work and school.