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Delegate Chisholm urges end to EMPOWER surcharge; advocates and regulators push back
Summary
HB 521 would immediately stop the EMPOWER program and its customer surcharge and seeks to retire remaining EMPOWER debt. Delegate Brian Chisholm called the program an unfair long‑term cost to ratepayers; the Public Service Commission and Sierra Club defended EMPOWER as cost‑effective and warned about unintended bill impacts from removing statutory billing requirements.
Delegate Brian Chisholm told the committee that HB 521 seeks to stop the EMPOWER program and its associated surcharge and to retire outstanding EMPOWER debt, arguing the long‑running program has not delivered promised benefits to low‑income households and that interest costs have accumulated for ratepayers.
Chisholm said…
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