Small Towns Face Power Hike
Pacific Power & Light warns that if rates are cut in North Yakima, rural communities will bear the cost burden.
Local Manager G. D. Longmuir of the Pacific Power & Light company was in the city today from Pasco. When asked about progress on the pending valuation case before the state public service commission, Longmuir stated: 'At the recent hearing in North Yakima, it developed the company is not earning a fair return on its investment as a whole. If the contention of North Yakima for lower rates is sustained, the commission will be forced to increase rates in the smaller cities and rural districts served by the company. It is not considered fair, but the law of averages pertains much like the railroad business. If every station had to stand on its own record of earnings, many places would be without service.'
“If every station on the N. P. and O-W. R. N. had to stand on its own record of earnings, many places would be without railroad facilities.”
This 1914 debate over utility 'valuation' and the 'law of averages' mirrors modern debates in the Pacific Northwest about whether urban ratepayers should subsidize the infrastructure costs of rural electrification. The tension between utility monopolies and the smaller communities they serve remains a core feature of regional civic politics.
From readers
No comments yet. If you know something about this story — a correction, a family memory, a source — it belongs here.