NANTUCKET INQUIRER & MIRROR

Oct. 15, 1998:
Nantucket Electric Co. officials announced Tuesday that island ratepayers have saved $500,000 since legislation deregulating the electric industry and imposing a mandatory 15 percent rate reduction went into effect March 1.

Massachusetts voters must decide whether to keep the new law on the books when they head to the polls on Nov. 3. Ballot Question Four asks voters whether or not to keep the law that was overwhelmingly passed last November by state legislators.

According to Steve Regan of the Yes on 4 Coalition, nearly 60,000 consumer advocates, employers, environmentalists and other individuals have joined the group to support the law.

The new legislation mandated an immediate 10 percent rate cut upon its institution in March, and requires another 5 percent cut by Sept. 1, 1999. It also sets a rate cap to lock in lower rates for the next six years. The deregulation will allow electricity customers to choose their power supplier by breaking up the utility monopolies and creating competition, a move Regan said should lead to lower rates.

The law also has environmental and economic benefits as well, he said.

New England Electric Systems, the parent company of Nantucket Electric, recently sold off its power plants and cut its rates by the additional 5 percent required by September 1999.

Island customers can check the amount they have saved since the law was enacted at the bottom of their monthly electric bill.

"We believe the law is in everyone's best interest," Nantucket Electric vice president David Fredericks said. "The savings and competition will be good in the long term for rate payers and the companies."

A no vote Nov. 3 would repeal the deregulation, the rate reductions and the rate cap.

"If this law is repealed it would wreak havoc within the electric industry since there is no alternative proposed," Regan said.

In other electric news, island residents lost power yesterday while Nantucket Electric workers were conducting routine maintenance. The went out at 11:09 a.m. and was completely restored by 11:29 a.m., Fredericks said. Nantucket Electric officials are still investigating what caused the mechanical failure.

"We are very disappointed that this happened, but a lot of the things we have worked on in expediting outages are working well," he said.

Changes were implemented after seven island outages during the months of June and July and prompted pledges of improved reliability by Fredericks and president Lawrence J. Reilly.