Jun. 7—With the only notice to members coming a week before in a magazine, Joe Wheeler EMC increased its electric rate by 6.2% effective June 1.

The latest increase comes less than a year after a 4.3% increase, which took effect Aug. 1.

Joe Wheeler spokesman Michael Cornelison said the cost of everything has gone up for the utility, necessitating the increase.

“It’s not just materials, it’s interest rates, everything like that. All of that comes back as cost,” he said. “Just inflation costs in general, higher interest rates, inflation causing the cost of materials to go up. Whether it’s poles or transformers or wire or nuts and bolts. Generally, it’s gone up higher than 6%; some things go up as high as 40%.”

Joe Wheeler customer Alicia Carpenter is disturbed by both the increase and the lack of notice.

“All of my children are on Joe Wheeler, and all have kids in day care and responsibilities — 6.2% is going to be a lot for them,” Carpenter said. “It’s going to hit my kids hard because they’re raising families and trying to feed them when groceries are four times as high. … They have to cool the house for a lot more people.

“I hate for them to have another financial hardship.”

Carpenter, 54, has been a Joe Wheeler customer since she moved to unincorporated Lawrence County between Danville and Moulton 19 years ago. She lives with her husband, Rob Carpenter, and has four children and 12 grandchildren that have Joe Wheeler power.

Cornelison said Joe Wheeler EMC must be able to pay for everything it needs to provide power to homes and businesses.

“It costs us a considerable amount more to just do day-to-day business than it did even just three or four years ago,” he said. “We know everybody’s kind of in the same place, but just basic materials and fuel costs went up, and just day-to-day cost of doing business has gone up so much that we’re in a position now where we have to raise rates in order to keep up with that to make sure we can still deliver electricity and service quality that our members are used to.”

Labor costs have also increased, Cornelison said.

“In the position we’re in right now, this is what we have to do,” he said. “We’ve got to be able to pay for everything.”

Joe Wheeler has 25,573 meters in Morgan County and 17,445 meters in Lawrence County.

Cornelison said the Tennessee Valley Authority, Joe Wheeler’s regulating authority, approved the amount of the increase.

“They look at what we’re looking at for our next budget year,” Cornelison said. “They decide on the amount that we can increase, or if we can, our rates. This was approved by TVA.”

Ray Long, Joe Wheeler EMC Board of Trustees president and Morgan County Commission chairman, said the board voted to approve the increase.

“All of our costs have gone up dramatically just like everybody else’s at home,” he said. “The board had no choice but to raise rates and generate a little revenue to help offset some of the expenses that we incur.”

Long said he realizes there are customers who already struggle to pay their bill, but that the board has not raised rates many times in the years he has been on it.

“We definitely took into consideration the needs and the struggles that our citizens are already having,” he said. “But I know that they want to make sure the power stays on, and the only way we can do that is to have funds to operate. … It’s just hard times for everybody right now.”

The board, Long said, did not raise the rates any more than it had to. — Notice

The only announcement about the 6.2% electric rate increase was in the monthly magazine, “Alabama Living,” which was published May 24.

“At Joe Wheeler EMC, we prioritize transparency and accountability in all our decisions,” the announcement in the magazine said.

No other notice was on customer bills, social media platforms or Joe Wheeler’s website, which includes a section titled “news releases.”

“We put it in our magazine. That’s our primary form of communication with our members,” Cornelison said. “It goes to just our members, so I think that’s a very transparent way. We’re not hiding it; it’s not our intention to hide it by putting it in our magazine.”

Cornelison said the magazine is how they always relay information to their customers.

“I don’t know that we’ve ever posted this kind of information to social media,” he said. “We have a pretty good readership for the magazine. As a matter of fact, we just got some surveys back that said the primary way that our members want to get information is through the magazine.”

An announcement of the 4.3% increase in August was posted on their website.

Carpenter, who said she was unaware of the most recent rate increase, said Joe Wheeler should have been more transparent in notifying customers that it was happening.

“They have no problem sending our bill every month; they should have put it in a letter to let us know,” she said. “It should have been written at the bottom of the bill or somewhere. You don’t have a choice in reading your bill; you definitely have a choice in reading that magazine.”

Carpenter said she reads the magazine occasionally.

“I may or may not have time to even open the magazine some months,” she said. “… I’ve always thought that the magazine that comes is a waste of members’ money.”

Long said the increase was announced in a board meeting when it received a vote.

“All of our meetings are open. Anybody can come and sit through the meetings and know what’s going on,” he said. “We’re definitely not trying to hide something. I think the general population knows prices have gone up everywhere. The last three years have just been terrible, especially after COVID; things went up.”

Carpenter said Joe Wheeler claims it has members, not customers.

“Like, we’re all in this together,” she said. “But it doesn’t seem that way anymore.”

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—erica.smith@decaturdaily.com or 256-340-2460.