After more than four months of discussions, the Florence City Council approved two new Electricity Franchise agreements at a Wednesday evening special meeting. The city awarded Duke Energy and Owen Electric Cooperative 20-year contracts to do.
The Wednesday meeting was the seventh time the council had considered the agreements since August. It was a long process with lots of reviews. It began last summer when City Administrator Joshua Hunt briefed the council in August on the need to open a bidding process for the agreements.
In September, the city began the bidding process, and Duke Energy and Owen Electric, the city’s only electricity utilities, submitted bids.
“These agreements give Duke Energy and Owen Electric the legal authority to operate within the public right-of-way,” Hunt explained at the Dec. 9 business meeting. Work covered in the agreements includes building and maintaining facilities for the transmission, distribution and sale of electricity within public rights-of-way.
Both utilities already operate within the city’s rights-of-way. Because they are the only utilities serving Florence, the two companies were the only bidders once Florence began accepting proposals.
“Not that there’s a lot of startup electric companies popping up everywhere, but they are non-exclusive. We’re not granting any utility or monopoly,” Hunt explained.
Commissioner Angie Cable confirmed that the latest vote was simply a “housekeeping measure” similar to the earlier votes. She also raised a question posed by a constituent who has a contract with Duke Energy for solar energy. Cable wanted to confirm that people would not be required to switch utilities as a result of the new franchise agreements.
“They’re non-exclusive franchises,” Mayor Julie Aubuchon assured her.
Most of the discussion about the agreements took place on Dec. 9. At that meeting, Hunt stressed that the agreements did not include franchise fees. Franchise fees in other places tend to be passed on to consumers instead of the utilities absorbing the costs.
“No electric bills are going to be going up, nothing like that,” Hunt emphasized on Dec. 9.
Prior to the unanimous vote to approve the agreements, attorney Linda Ain reviewed the documents. “She went through this with fine-tooth-comb and signed off,” Hunt explained last week.
This week’s vote enables Mayor Aubuchon to sign the much-debated contracts.