Dive Brief:
- Xcel Energy "inadvertently" asked to recover $460,000 in costs related to lobbying against the efforts of the city of Boulder, Colorado, to form a municipal utility, according to documents filed with the Colorado Public Utilities Commission (PUC) and secured by the Boulder Daily Camera.
- The PUC asked Xcel on August 4 to "admit or deny" whether expenses incurred while campaigning against the municipalization of Boulder were included in any of the utility's rate hike requests.
- Xcel Energy CFO Janet Schmidt-Petree replied on August 20 to notify the PUC that the $460,000 was mistakenly included in the utility's cost-of-service formula. The error will be rectified "at the appropriate time in the procedural schedule," she said.
Dive Insight:
The city of Boulder has been trying for years to form a municipal utility and the fight has moved into both the courts of law and public opinion. The city and Xcel are fighting over which assets Boulder will take over and Xcel has filed a lawsuit challenging the formation of a municipal utility as premature.
Critics of Xcel Energy asked the company and the Colorado PUC for assurances that the utility was not attempting to recover costs related to the public information campaign. The company indicated they were not. But the Daily Camera obtained documents showing Xcel had placed a payment of almost a half million dollars to InterMountain Public Affairs into an account for which it requested recovery. The agency has worked on the anti-municipalization campaign.
On the flip side, critics of the city's plan note that it has spent almost $200,000 of taxpayer funds on "communication and outreach," which Boulder officials say is needed to disseminate accurate information.
The two sides are locked in a protracted battle that could extend into 2016 and beyond. Xcel earns about $30 million annually serving Boulder residents and is not likely to give up on that prize so easily.
