By Chris Hill, SDMEA Director of Municipal Electric Services MUNICIPAL ELECTRIC UTILITIES
As I am at the Capitol during legislative session, I think to myself, what do I want the SDMEA member municipalities and the people that live in those communities to know about their Municipal Electric Services? What do I need to be searching for to make sure that their Electric Utilities are not in any jeopardy of being restricted or challenged by any bills that may be brought forward? I immediately think of our municipalities and think that maybe we need to educate our citizens on what they need to know about our services.
utilities that provide electric services to our citizens. 35 Municipalities have their own electric utilities. There are also 28 Rural Electric Cooperatives, and 6 Investor-owned utilities. I am just going to hit the main points of Municipal Electric Utilities. Municipal utilities have several benefits, but first and foremost, it is to provide reliable power at affordable costs to citizens. Most of the Muni Electrics in South Dakota have a Western Area Power Administration (WAPA) allocation, which is a set amount of power that they provide to the Municipal Utility. WAPA is one of four Power Marketing Administrations within the U.S. Department of Energy. Their allocations are set, and the Municipality must also purchase supplemental power from other power providers. The two main supplemental power providers used in South Dakota Municipalities are Heartland Consumers Power District, and Missouri River Energy Services.
Now that we know where we purchase our power from, we must ask, why Municipal Electric? Well, the short answer is that Municipal Electric Utilities are owned and operated by the citizens of the community. The Municipal Utility reports to and is responsible to the citizens of that community. The citizens have ultimate control over every aspect and that ownership of the utility by the citizens allows the citizens to decide on improvements to the system and set the electrical rates. South Dakota State Capitol Building
For some who are reading this, it may just be boring. For others, it may be a refresher. For a few, you could even stop reading now as this edition of Hometown Power isn’t for those of us who already know about the benefits of Municipal Electric Systems, or Municipal Utilities. This edition and the information within is something that should be passed on to your community members who are unclear of the excellent services that YOU provide to them.
First, in South Dakota, we have three types of electrical 28
SOUTH DAKOTA MUNICIPALITIES
