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Tuesday June 16 2015 3 INDUSTRY ELECTRICITY Fort Smith Seniors SocietyFort Smith Seniors Society ANNUAL GENERAL MEETINGANNUAL GENERAL MEETING 130 p.m. Tuesday June 23 2015 Seniors Room - Rec. Centre All seniors welcome NTP C proposes low er rates f or S nare hyd ro customers Lo ered holesale rate for ello nife to enefit all su sidi ed customers B y M E AG AN W O H L B E R G The NWTs crown power corporation is proposing to lower electricity rates for the communities of Behchoko Dettah and Y el- lowknife thanks to an unex pected surplus brought on by new industrial revenues and savings from the Inuvik LNG project. The NT P ower Corp. NTP C submitted the second phase of its General Rate Applica- tion to the P ublic U tilities Board P U B last Thursday which proposes a rate rebalanc- ing among customer classes. The application seeks to lower rates for general service customers in the Snare zone - namely Behchoko and Dettah - by 1 5 per cent. Those customers will save approx imately 20 4 per month for a 3 0 0 0 kilowatt-hour kWh monthly consumption. The proposal would also lower the whole- sale rate in Y ellowknife 2.6 per cent from 1 9 .21 cents to 1 8 .7 1 cents kWh. That reduc- tion would be transferred on to all customers in the territory who are currently subsi- dized under the Territorial P ower Support P rogram TP SP which is based on the Y el- lowknife rate. TP SP eligible customers in the Snare and Thermal zones will see a reduction in their monthly bill of approx imately 1 .7 per cent or around 5 per month for a customer with a 1 0 0 0 kWh monthly consumption. According to NTP C Snare customers are currently ex periencing rate imbalances that datebacktowhentheNorthernCanadaP ower Commission was federally regulated. NTP C is now trying to remedy those imbalances by bringing the revenue-to-cost average RCC ratio down to between 9 0 and 1 1 0 per cent for all non-government customers so that cus- tomers will be paying closer to what it costs NTP C to supply the power. In Behchoko and Dettah customers had a higher RCC ratio of 1 3 1 per cent. This decrease will bring them down to a 1 1 1 per cent RCC closer to the targeted range. General service customers in the Taltson and Thermal zones will see no bill impact. Conversely government customers in the Snare Taltson residential and general ser- vice with ratios below 1 0 0 per cent will see rate increases of 1 per cent which will cre- ate an additional 0 .0 26 million in revenue. The lowered rates are made possible due to an increase in revenues from an industrial customer Giant Mine as well as savings from the recently installed LNG storage and gas- ification facility in nuvik. According to the application NTP C saw 0 .227 million in savings from the Inuvik LNGprojectandadditionalmoneyfromGiant Mine that amount to a 0 .28 1 -million surplus for the 20 1 4 year bringing down the ex pected required revenues in 20 1 4 from 1 0 4.8 3 6 million to an actual cost of 1 0 4.5 5 5 million. The application will now be reviewed by the P U B over the summer. The proposed sched- ule put forth by NTP C would see the process completed by late O ctober. NTP Cs last general rate application made in 20 1 2 and approved by the P U B increased base rates across the territory by 28 .4 per cent gradually over four years in order to fully recover the corporations revenue re- uirement. With the final rate increase of around 6.2 per cent on Apr. 1 20 1 5 NTP C believes ex isting rates should now cover the companys ex pected revenue requirements going forward. NTPC s most recent rate application proposed lowering rates for general serv ice cus- tomers in Y ellowknife B ehchoko and D ettah in an attempt to reb alance rates in the NW T. PhotocourtesyofNTPC D eh Cho MLA pleads guilty to assault causing b odily harm B y M E AG AN W O H L B E R G Deh Cho MLA Michael Nadli pleaded guilty last Thursday to assault causing bodily harm in relation to an incident that took place in his home community of Fort P rovidence in April. P olice were called for assistance at 3 p.m. on Apr. 5 after reports that an individual had been assaulted at a residence. The victim was transported to the health centre for treat- ment of non-life-threatening injuries. Nadli turned himself in to police a short time later. The 5 0 year-old who has been MLA for the Deh Cho since 20 1 1 was released on bail under a number of conditions including liv- ing in Y ellowknife instead of Fort P rovidence having to obtain permission to travel to Fort P rovidence and to notify the RCMP when en- tering and leaving the community. With his guilty plea Nadli agreed to un- dergo sentencing via the Domestic Violence Treatment O ption Court a recently estab- lished alternative court that provides coun- selling and treatment for low-risk violent of- fenders before deciding on a sentence. Though Nadli gave up his position as chair of the Standing Committee on Government O perations he did attend legislature for three of the seven days of the final sitting of fifth session. A conviction will not necessarily impact his position as an elected member of the leg- islative assembly. Nadlis nex t court appearance is sched- uled for July 23 . This is the second time Nadli has pleaded guilty to assault. In 20 0 4 he was sentenced to six months of probation for assaulting his spouse. Conditions on the sentence included checking in with a probation officer going to counselling and doing 5 0 hours of com- munity service. PhotocourtesyofGNWT JUSTICE ASSAULT D eh Cho M L A M ichael Nadli will undergo treatment through D omestic V iolence Court.