Pilar Turner: Stuck in a story that is no longer true

COMMENTARY

MARK SCHUMANN

According to the latest statewide bill comparisons, Florida Power & Light’s rate for 1000 kilowatt hours a month is 19 percent less than the rate charged by Vero Electric. (This comparison allows for a 6 percent franchise fee. Not accounting for the fee, the current rate differential is 24 percent.)

Vero Electric’s rate trajectory is downward, while FPL is seeking a $1.337 billion rate increase. The utility giant is also facing unexpected costs in dealing with problems at it’s Turkey Point nuclear plant. In all likelihood, then, if the sale of Vero Beach’s electric utility to FPL cannot go forward, the City’s customers can still expect lower rates and a shrinking rate differential.

Vero Beach City Councilwoman Pilar Turner remains impervious to these facts. As she did during the May 3 Council meeting, Turner continues to claim the rate differential between the two utilities is “thirty to forty percent.”

When Turner was in the majority on the Council, supported by Tracy Carroll and Craig Fletcher, she did everything humanly possible to drive up Vero Electric’s rates, including funding long-term capital projects out of current rates, and wasting, literally wasting $2 million dollars on transactional attorneys who accomplished nothing of value for the city or its electric customers.

More recently, Turner opposed the renegotiated wholesale power agreement between Vero Beach and the Orlando Utilities Commission, even though the new deal will collectively save customers an average of $750,000 a month. Yes, thanks to Turner, Carroll and Fletcher, Vero Electric’s rates were once much higher than they are today.

But Turner is stuck in a story that is no longer true. Further, she continues to knowingly and intentionally exaggerate and distort facts.

2 comments

Is Turner on the FPL payroll??
Brad Marshall

Give Pilar Turner credit for one thing; she is able to repeat the same blatant , false FPL narrative over and over again with a straight face. She’s best at saying one think at a meeting and then voting the opposite of what she just said. She is a master of double speak.In addition, most people know by now the sale to FPL is impossible and will remain that way for many years into the future. I also wonder how much PAC money she gets which originates from FPL coffers.