San Diego residents were ready to talk about high electricity prices and income-based flat fees for utility bills when California regulators held a hearing in Escondido.
The California Public Utilities Commission (CPUC) proceedings were intended to gather information about how the utility divides the revenue it is allowed to raise from different categories of ratepayers.
Residential, industrial and agricultural users pay a certain percentage of the total revenue the utility is permitted to raise. So do outdoor lighting, small, medium and large commercial operations.
But CPUC commissioner Genevieve Shiroma got an earful about high electricity prices, solar energy, billing and flat income-based utility fees.
“The way that we’ve always paid for energy before is, the more you use, the more you pay. And it’s tiered that way with water, with gasoline, and things like that,” said San Diego County Supervisor Jim Desmond.
The republican lawmaker said regulators are changing the way things have always been done.
“I think it’s unfair,” Desmond said. “Users should have to pay the cost of it, not everyone else.”
San Diego Gas and Electric (SDG&E) officials pushed back on Desmond’s criticism saying the plan under consideration by the CPUC actually helps make electricity more affordable for the state’s poorest residents.
The cost of electricity was a recurring point during the hearing.
“We’re victims,” said Charles Langley of the consumer advocate group Public Watchdog. “We pay the highest electricity rates in the nation. We pay rates that are nearly double what other frost belt, rust belt states pay.”
The California Public Advocates Office says SDG&E electricity rates have more than doubled in the past decade, rising 105% between Jan. 2014 to Sept. 2023.
The rate review concludes wildfire mitigation, transmission, distribution and rooftop solar incentives are to blame for rates that are more than double the national average.
“Let’s be open about it,” said Albert Pacheco, a North County resident. “If they have to have more, maybe they have to make a better case for it.”
He expressed suspicion about high prices as well as a process that is hard for the average resident to understand.
“This is not working for me,” Pacheco said.
The audience clapped loudly.
The utilities also got poor marks from a local solar installer.
“I’ve looked at hundreds upon hundreds and hundreds of utility bills and I cannot understand them,” said Tyler Luguet, a solar industry worker in San Diego County.
He said reading the complicated bills is hard for him, and he’s a professional.
“This is the cost on this page, yeah, okay that makes sense,” Luquet said. “And you try and match that up with the next page, the list of costs. It doesn’t make sense. It doesn’t add up. It’s not clear whatsoever.”
The hearing was not held to specifically take up those issues, but the CPUC commissioner in attendance listened politely to all who came to speak.
“I appreciate hearing the feedback on that, the concerns on that,” Shiroma said. “And I think that there will need to be analysis and explanations as to the various options.”
