TAMPA, Fla. – Tampa Electric Company’s (TECO’s) rising utility bills are forcing Tampa families to choose between essentials like food, rent, and medicine and access to power. In response, TECO customers have written letters to the utility’s Board of Directors detailing their personal experiences with increasingly unaffordable energy bills. Sierra Club has published a collection of community-submitted letters today titled, “Letters on Rate Increases and Unaffordable Energy Bills.” Sierra Club has sent the letters to TECO on behalf of the writers. READ THE COMMUNITY LETTERS HERE. As Tampa residents wrestle with rate increases, TECO continues to operate its uneconomical coal unit, Big Bend Unit 4, and plans to build new gas at the site of a former coal unit. Both of those projects will result in additional high costs being passed on to Tampa families and small businesses. Motivated by mounting financial and health pressures, Sierra Club members and supporters have written personal letters addressed to individual or all of TECO Board’s seven members. Twelve of the personal messages have been included in today’s report. Quotes from the community letters are listed below, with permission from the authors: “I have to decide each month what medicines or food to hold on to survive as the price of electricity is continuing to rise and I have to pay this bill,” said Brittany Panton, Tampa. “Before the recent rate hike was approved, Emera’s own website for stockholders informed us that a dividend increase was in the works. These narratives are at odds and cause a reasonable investor to question the integrity of TECO and Emera. Either Emera is not as financially sound as advertising or TECO is misrepresenting TECO’s finances when requesting rate hikes,” said Carl Bailey, an Emera stock holder from Tampa. “I am now seeing a large pile of coal over at the TECO Big Bend power plant and can see the smoke from burning coal coming from the last standing smoke stack. I know many community members who have dealt with cancer and COPD. I am a cancer survivor myself,” said Nina Tatlock, Apollo Beach. “I live in a community of retirees, and I hear these complaints constantly; you don’t! Unfair price gouging by TECO will not stand the test of time. Nor will ignoring solar energy as a source of clean energy over ‘natural’ gas,” said David Sinclair, Tampa. “As a veteran on fixed income, my bill eats up a portion of my income. I have to budget everything out carefully,” said Don Lee, Tampa. “As someone who was also required to pay a fairly high deposit, I was disheartened by the unexplained and unjustifiable increase in energy costs. Further, the unexplained costs have not amounted to environmental sustainable practices that protect our climate, contradicting what, as a proponent of economic vitality, might be expected of you,” said Janine Quarles Adkins, Tampa. “I am fortunate enough to have solar, those who are not fortunate enough to have that option (i.e. renters, lower income residents) have experienced significant increases in their TECO bill, while mine has decreased,” said Todd Randolph, Tampa. “The Florida Public Service Commission has allowed TECO to charge the highest profits on expansions not needed to support residential customers. Meanwhile low and middle income renters and rate payers are subject to eviction and having their children taken by Child Protection Services. These injustices are the result of TECO management making bad decisions, with low income users subsidizing large energy users like data centers, and expansion of generators using gas instead of lower cost renewable sources,” said Jim Shirk, Tampa. Walter Smith, Sierra Club’s lead organizer collecting letters, is available to further discuss the project and impacts of high electric bills. About the Sierra Club The Sierra Club is America’s largest and most influential grassroots environmental organization, with millions of members and supporters. In addition to protecting every person’s right to get outdoors and access the healing power of nature, the Sierra Club works to promote clean energy, safeguard the health of our communities, protect wildlife, and preserve our remaining wild places through grassroots activism, public education, lobbying, and legal action. For more information, visit www.sierraclub.org.
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