By Terry Witt – Spotlight Senior Reporter
Williston City Council members Tuesday unanimously approved the first reading of an ordinance that will raise the average 1,000-kilowatt residential electric bill by $31.54 per month but the council’s agenda didn’t give the public much warning of what was coming.
Approval came in a public hearing. A second reading of the ordinance will take place in two weeks at the next city council meeting.
When the council sends out its meeting agenda twice a month, support documents are attached to the bottom of the agenda. The support information this time around gave a somewhat confusing notice of a proposal to increase electric bills, but the agenda itself was silent on the issue.
The missing information was mentioned to Manager Terry Bovaird before the meeting began. He read through the paragraph with the missing information.
“It won’t happen again,” Bovaird said.
The same thing happened more than once when former City Manager Jackie Gorman was the chief administrator but she made no effort to correct the problem. It angered some residents.
City Council President Debra Jones overheard Spotlight telling Bovaird before the meeting that there was no mention of a rate increase in the agenda itself. Many Williston residents read the agenda but not the support documents. Jones noted that there was information in the support documents.
But the support documents and the presentation by Utilities Supervisor Donald Barber confused Jones and other council members for about 20 minutes. Barber finally clarified how the increase in electric bills would be achieved after he was questioned at length by the council.
The increase includes a $2.81 rise in the fixed cost per electric meter from $8.71 to $11.52. The remainder of the increase would be assessed through the higher cost of kilowatt hours.
The agenda item itself said:
“1st reading of ordinance 2023-711: an ordinance of Williston, Florida; making certain findings and determinations; amending sections 40-142 and 40-144, and creating Section 40-149 of the code of ordinances, City of Williston, Florida; repealing all ordinances in conflict; providing for severability; and providing an effective date. Public Works Supervisor Donald Barber.”
Power bills will increase the most in the coming fiscal year. The cost of kilowatt hours will rise by 32.6 percent and then by 9.25 percent, 7.5 percent, 3.2 percent, and 2.75 percent in the four years that follow.
Jones tried to negotiate a slightly lower increase this year but Barber said the city was falling behind on its ability to pay for the electric system’s maintenance and operation costs. He suggested other ways to spread out the impact but didn’t think the Florida Public Service Commission would like the alternatives.
The increases for the coming year are expected to generate about $750,000 of additional revenue. Barber said the city currently has one lineman for the entire city, but residential growth is expected and an additional lineman and groundman are needed. The growth includes 98 approved new homes, 248 homes proposed, and 55 townhomes proposed.
He said adding a lineman and a groundman would cost the city an additional $250,000 annually in salaries and benefits. He said the city had been relying on the federal American Rescue Plan Act (ARPA) to prop up the electric system in the past couple of years, but the ARPA money has been spent. The $400,000 to $500,000 of ARPA funds will have to be replaced by local money.
City Finance Director Steven Bloom said raising the electric system revenues wasn’t a matter of wanting to do something, it was a necessity. He said the ARPA funds have been used up. ARPA money was intended to help cities recover from the effects of the COVID-19 economic shutdown.
“You really need to do what you’re doing now. I mean it isn’t a matter of should you – you just have to because you’re going to use up all of your reserves way too quickly,” Bloom said by internet connection. “It is an issue. You cannot keep using up your reserves.”
The city-owned Williston electric utility has long been a cash cow for the city council at budget time. The budget process for next fiscal year is beginning now. In the current city budget, which ends on Sept. 30, the city transferred $1.1 million out of the utilities budget to the general operating fund to pay for city operations in other departments like police, fire, parks, and recreation. The council also used $325,000 of utilities reserve money for the operation of the city-owned utilities.
Transferring money from the utilities fund to general operations isn’t something new. The city’s been doing it for years, but the size of the transfers has been growing. For years, the transfer was around $650,000. Last year may have set a record with a $1.1 million transfer. The council says it has always used utility fund transfers to avoid raising property taxes. Such transfers are allowable with city-owned utilities.
Williston operates its own electric utility, gas utility, water, and sewer utilities. All the utilities show up on the same bill every month and there were some eye-popping bills when natural gas prices tripled about a year ago. The city buys natural gas from a cooperative. Natural gas prices have dropped since then.
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City of Williston Regular Meeting June 6, 2023; Posted June 7, 2023
