Laserfiche WebLink
77. The City is an "affected municipal electric utility" subject to the requirements of <br /> Section 366.04(7). <br /> 78. Prior to passage of Section 366.04(7), consistent with established electric utility <br /> industry practice, the City counted its retail customers by quantifying the number of separate <br /> meter accounts. The City utilized this customer count methodology in preparing its 2007 audited <br /> financial statement which expressly notified the public that the City had 33,442 retail electric <br /> customers as of September 30, 2007. <br /> 79. After Section 366.04(7) became law, the City has apparently disavowed its prior <br /> customer counts set forth in its audited financial statements, and has now refused to comply with <br /> the referendum requirements in Section 366.04(7) because it claims that it had less than 30,000 <br /> customers on September 30, 2007. <br /> 80. In regulatory filings with the PSC in 2011, the City directly asserted that it is not <br /> subject to Section 366.04(7) based on an erroneous interpretation of Section 366.04(7) that <br /> would count individuals with multiple meter accounts as a single "customer" for purposes of the <br /> statute. The City's erroneous interpretation of Section 366.04(7) is nothing more than a contrived <br /> scheme to artificially lower the City's customer count below the statutory threshold to avoid the <br /> referendum election requirements in Section 366.04(7). That scheme is contrary to established <br /> utility practice for counting utility customers, and differs radically from the method of counting <br /> customers which the City uses for purposes of its own audited financial report, and its other <br /> filings with the PSC and the credit rating agencies. <br /> 81. In reliance on this erroneous legal interpretation, the City continues to refuse to <br /> comply with the directives of Section 366.04(7), and has not conducted the referendum election <br /> 18 <br /> Q3 <br />