The Rhode Island Public Utilities Commission has set a date for a public hearing on the Block Island Power Company’s request for an increase to its standard offer rate of 2.2 cents per kwh. The request was filed on June 1 in hopes that the increase could go into effect on July 1. For the average customer using 500 kwh per month, 2.2 cents will result in an increase of $11.00.
The amount requested was the result of the Block Island Utility District Board of Commissioners’ and BIPCo President Jeffery Wright’s best guess at to the impact of the Covid19 pandemic on the economy of Block Island. At the end of May, when electric deliveries were down 23 percent the same month from last year, things looked particularly gloomy, and the board predicated their rate increase on the expectation that future revenues would be down 30 percent for June, 20 percent for July, and 18 percent for August and September.
But by the next meeting, which took place on Saturday June 13, by Zoom, Wright was pleased to announce that deliveries for June, thus far, were only down 16.5 percent.
Commissioner Mary Jane Balser said: “That might be
