From the by M.D. Fletcher |
February 2009 |
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When I was a kid I wanted to be a cowboy. Specifically, I wanted to be Roy Rogers. Roy was cool, right down to his twin pearl-handle six-shooters. He had a cool horse named Trigger who was smarter than any other horse in the world and most people, too. If Roy was hanging off a cliff, ol' Trigger would rappel right down that cliff, grab Roy by the nape of the neck and pull both of them to safety. Then they'd ride off into the sunset. I could see me riding ol' Trigger off into the sunset, spurs a'jinglin', waving adios to the blond-headed damsel me and Trigger just rescued from Black Bart and his evil henchmen. Roy and Trigger always preferred blond-headed damsels, at least until they met up with Dale Evans, and that right there was the beginning of the end for me. She had a horse named Buttermilk and, as if that wasn't bad enough, she later took to riding around in a Jeep, for crying out loud. Me and Roy finally just had to call it quits and I'm pretty sure Trigger would have felt the same way but then he was probably under some kind of contract or whatnot. Speaking of life's little disappointments, it looks like we're going to have to adjust our rates in the near future. The last adjustment was in 2000, and at that time our rates took a big decrease. The last rate increase Columbus Electric had was in 1988. So we've had a good run. Most other electric utilities have had one, two and even three rate increases since 2000 and frankly I'm darn proud of what we've accomplished over the years without having gone deeper into your pocket to do it. Now before you start dragging out your torches and pitchforks, let me tell you it's not going to be that bad. The plan is to leave our energy prices where they are and fold the increase into our monthly customer charges. That seems to be the fairest, most straightforward and least painful way to go about it. We're talking about two, maybe three bucks a month for the residential class. Not good, but really not too bad either, considering what's been going on in every other commodity in the country. |
Things like this have to be approved by the regulators; in our case both the New Mexico Public Regulation Commission and the Arizona Corporation Commission. So you'll be hearing more about it as soon as our proposal firms up and we know exactly what the numbers are. Still love me? Good. Fortunately, there is no shortage of villains around these days. Instead of wanting to be a cowboy, I should have set my sights on a cushy job on Wall Street where all I'd have to do is cook the books of other people's money. And when the book-cooking business turned sour I could use taxpayer's money to prop the whole stinking mess up long enough to pay me and my felonious pals $18 billion in hard-earned bonuses. Is this a great country or what? But no, I wanted to be a cowboy. I could have made a killing selling mansions to dishwashers and financing them through Fanny Mae and Freddie Mac, two of the friendliest (and, evidently, stupidest) mortgage bankers in history. I could have made millions covering vast stretches of barren desert with thousands of red-tiled roofs, comfortable in the knowledge that money was free and the good times would never end. But no, I wanted to be a cowboy. I could have been a politician, raking in millions in campaign contributions from huge corporations (like Fanny and Freddie) and working "up on the hill" and having 15 secretaries (14 under the age of 25 and one to do the actual work) and making an occasional speech here and there for $10K a pop beer money. I could have had my feet up on my antique desk while people with serious dough were lined up outside waiting for their chance to try to find a dry spot on me to kiss. I could be flying around in private jets making jokes about the suckers at the airports getting the once-over-heavy from my employees at TSA. Sweet! But no, I wanted to be a cowboy. |
