Penticton residents jolted by sky-high power bills

Penticton resident Sarah Olivier was jolted when she opened this month’s electricity bill to see how much it had skyrocketed.

“It is hard to afford when you are used to a certain bill every month and all of a sudden it is almost triple what it usually is,” Olivier said.

“We were actually thinking ahead for our bill and we turned all of our heat down, we were wearing sweaters and warm socks, but it didn’t seem to make a difference at all.”

The mother of two is not alone.

All over Penticton sparks are flying over unusually high power bills.

“It’s concerning because I’m retired. I hope this isn’t going to be a regular amount,” one resident said.

“I think they may be a little bit too high. I guess it’s the cold weather,” said another.

The city purchases power from FortisBC and runs its own power distribution system.

Manager of Electrical Utility, Shawn Filice, said it’s not just the unusually cold winter to blame.

“Many homes in the city of Penticton are an older vintage that have electric heating and may not be as efficient as new home construction. Compounding that issue is the last billing cycle was 35 days when typically it is a 28-30 day billing cycle.”

Penticton mayor Andrew Jakubeit addressed the issue in his latest blog post entitled ‘powering through the weather.’

“The demand for electricity to power our daily lives is ever-increasing and the costs associated with generating and delivering electricity continue to climb. Rather than focus on lowering costs, we need to shift our focus to conservation,” he wrote.

But housing advocates say the sky-high bills are unacceptable.

“It poses a serious threat to housing to low-income individuals and really to the middle-class as well,” said David Desautels with the Penticton and Area Access Society.

He fears the increase could even lead to a hike in evictions.

“That added pressure of increased utilities will definitely pose a risk to their housing and we will see a lot more notices to end (tenancy) for non-payment of rent and utilities,” Desautels said.

While warmer temperatures may bring a reprieve, electricity rates are going up more than 3%, or an average $5 per month during the next billing cycle.

“As Fortis rates increase those rate increases get passed on to our rate paying customers here in the City of Penticton,” added Filice.

For those who can’t afford their bills, the city says it will work with customers on a case by case basis to find a solution.