Electric bills: Looks like deja vu all over again

NYSEG employees demonstrate outside Bedford’s Town House while a press conference was held inside calling for the state to reject a rate request. JEFF MORRIS PHOTO

By JEFF MORRIS

Last month, county officials and state representatives held a press conference in Mount Kisco to announce their opposition to proposed Con Edison rate hikes. They urged the Public Service Commission to freeze delivery rates, accusing the utility of exorbitant increase requests while households struggle to pay bills.

Despite those efforts, on Jan. 22 the PSC approved Con Ed’s rate hike.

On Monday, it was NYSEG’s turn. State Sen. Pete Harckham, D-40, held a press conference at Bedford Town Hall, joined by Assemblymember Chris Burdick, D-93, County Legislator Erika Pierce, D-2, and Bedford Town Board member Stephanie McCaine, and urged the commission to rein in the utility’s proposed rate increases. 

While Con Ed supplies electricity to a portion of Bedford, most of the town, along with all of Lewisboro and Pound Ridge, receive their power from NYSEG. 

The rate request was filed June 30, 2025. NYSEG is asking for an increase in annual electric revenues of approximately $464.4 million — a 35% increase to delivery revenues, or 18.4% increase to total revenues, for the rate year ending April 30, 2027. 

It estimates that the requested increase in delivery revenues will result in a monthly bill increase of $33.12, or a 23.7% increase to the total bill, for a typical residential customer using 600 kWh.

Most of the press conference was devoted to the testimony of a number of area customers who were angry about the size of their recent utility bills, and outraged that NYSEG is now proposing to raise them even more. 

“It’s ridiculous to pay $867 more a month,” said Janet Pearlmutter of Somers. “No one can basically afford that. This is totally crazy. I beg you, Public Service Commission, do whatever you can to help us. We really can’t afford this.” Jackie Silkowitz agreed, saying, “My neighbors have $1,300 and $1,400 bills. NYSEG should not be allowed to pass along the cost of supply. It’s absolutely outrageous.” 

Similar sentiments were expressed by others, including one person who said for a one-bedroom condo from which she’s away all day, she has had recent bills of $950 and $1,100. Additional speakers attested to bills that have gone from several hundred dollars to over $1,000. 

“New Yorkers are facing a cost-of-living crisis,” Harckham said. “At a time when families are struggling to pay rent, buy groceries, and afford medicine, imposing dramatic utility rate hikes is not the answer. The PSC must stand with consumers — not approve massive increases that most households simply cannot afford.” 

Burdick agreed. 

“Our constituents have seen their utility bills double and even triple in recent years,” he said. “People who have lived within their means are now struggling to make ends meet because of soaring utility rates.” He urged customers to submit a public comment to the PSC, letting them know that NYSEG’s proposed hikes are unconscionable. 

According to Harckham, new statewide data shows more than 1.3 million customers are over two months behind on bills, with total unpaid balances exceeding $2 billion — and tens of thousands of households have been disconnected in 2025 alone. 

“Utilities operate as regulated monopolies with guaranteed returns,” Harckham said. “Shareholders should share in the risk too. They should not be insulated from economic realities while families make impossible choices between heating their homes and feeding their children.”

Pierce was critical of more than just NYSEG’s rates.

“For years, I have been working with individual constituents and the Public Utility Project on a myriad of issues related to NYSEG and its billing practices,” she said. “It is bad enough when the bills are too high, which they currently are, but it is even worse when the bills are also frequently incomprehensible or just downright wrong, and connecting with customer service is an impossibility. For so many reasons, the PSC must say no to this rate request, and further, must demand more accountability and

 better customer service from NYSEG.”

Meanwhile, a group of NYSEG employees held signs outside the Town House, with messages such as “Don’t Block Investment” and “Reliable Energy = Reliable Jobs.” Asked whether they were rank and file or management, they said they were a mixture of both. 

The utility also pushed back by issuing a press statement of its own. “Unfortunately, the Senator’s and his colleagues attempts to grab quick headlines by calling on the rejection of the rate plan completely misses the mark and intentionally ignores the skyrocketing unregulated supply costs, taxes and state mandates pushed through by New York legislature that combined make up the vast majority of customer utility bill charges, which NYSEG has zero control over,” it began. “We urge the Senator and his colleagues to tell the whole story of what’s in customer bills and include the facts of our rate plan, which will fund critical investments needed for local union members to upgrade aging poles and wires to strengthen the grid, increase capacity to lessen outages, and attract new economic development and jobs to communities.”

In addition, The Recorder was copied on a letter sent to Harckham, co-signed by multiple unions and building trades organizations, that said while they “share the urgency around rising energy bills” and many of their members “understand the affordability crisis in New York,” they are at the same time “highly concerned about a blanket call to reject the rate case.” 

The letter went on to say, “We need to make the critical investments in the grid that will unlock opportunities to bring new generations online quickly.” A rejection of the proposed plan, it said, “could put the entire rate framework in jeopardy, increase outages and create uncertainty for communities and employers across the region.”

It bears repeating that the only portion of a NYSEG bill that would be subject to a rate increase is the delivery charge. The price of the electricity supply that NYSEG delivers is determined by market forces out of the utility’s control.