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For the week of April 26 through May 2, 2000

Zap! A new power agreement

Hailey and Idaho Power work out the details


"The rationale behind the fee is that utility companies utilize the public right of way to make money. Therefore, the state allows us to collect a fee."

Hailey Mayor Brad Siemer


By TRAVIS PURSER
Express Staff Writer

Over the next few years, Hailey residents should be seeing fewer above-ground power lines—and costlier power bills.

After six years of wrangling, the city of Hailey and Idaho Power Co. came one step closer Monday to approving a new franchise agreement.

During a city council meeting that night, council members and three Idaho Power Co. representatives hashed out the last details of the franchise agreement.

If approved in its final form, the agreement, among other things, will provide an incentive for the city and Idaho Power to work together at burying new and replaced power lines. The agreement would also provide for a 1- to 3-percent franchise fee to be charged customers on electricity bills.

With the entire amount of the fee paid to the city, power company representative Dan Olmstead said, Hailey could see a financial boost of about $33,000 per year.

"The rationale behind the fee," Mayor Brad Siemer said, "is that utility companies utilize the public right of way to make money. Therefore, the state allows us to collect a fee."

Monday night’s meeting follows six years of debate between the power company and the city. That debate started after the previous franchise agreement with Idaho Power terminated in 1994 following a long conflict over franchise fees.

"The power company for years felt—right or wrong—exempt from charging a franchise fee," Olmstead explained during a quick synopsis of the half-century relationship between Hailey and Idaho Power Co.

Now, a nine-page draft amendment to a city ordinance lays out in detail the results of six years of work between the city and the power company.

One of the most important issues for the city council was an aspect of the agreement that encourages the burying of power lines.

Under the agreement, whenever a new line needs to be installed or an existing line needs to be moved, the power company will contribute the cost of installing new poles and wire toward burying the line instead. Hailey would contribute the remainder.

During the discussion, former Hailey P&Z commissioner Jan Edelstein said the new ordinance was a good opportunity for the city council to ask Idaho Power Co. to modify its streetlights and rented security lights to cast illumination downward only, which would help preserve Hailey’s dark skies.

Details of that discussion were delayed to future meetings.

 

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