Orange and Rockland Utilities Sets 3-Year Rate Hikes for Electricity, Gas

An Orange Rockland Utilities truck in Middletown, N.Y., on July 29, 2015. Yvonne Marcotte/Epoch Times

Orange County, N.Y.—The New York State Public Service Commission on March 20 adopted a new three-year rate hike plan for Orange and Rockland Utilities, which will go into effect on April 1.

The regulated utility serves around 233,000 residential and commercial electric customers in southeastern New York, including Orange County; it also delivers natural gas to 140,000 New Yorkers.

For an average residential customer consuming 600 kilowatt-hours of power per month, one’s monthly electric bill will increase by between $3 and $5 every year, according to a bill impact schedule submitted to the presiding administrative judges.

A typical gas heating residential customer will see his or her monthly bill jump by almost $10 this year, followed by $6 in 2026 and nearly $7 in 2027.

The new rate schedule, which was agreed upon after months of negotiations among state regulatory agencies and the utility company, covers three years between Jan. 1, 2025, and Dec. 31, 2027.

All the above cost changes have to do with delivery rates on utility bills. The costs of electricity and natural gas themselves, on the other hand, are largely set by unregulated market activities.

In its original rate change filing with the state more than a year ago, the utility company had requested steeper rate hikes for electricity and gas deliveries in 2025, bringing an annual revenue increase of more than $30 million to the company.

The state Public Service Commission moved to reduce the first-year hikes by slashing the requested revenue increase by almost two-thirds.

The utility company’s original revenue increase requests for 2026 and 2027 remain unchanged at more than $28 million each year.

“We have been able to drastically minimize any rate increase for customers,” state Public Service Commission Chair Rory Christian said in a statement. “Adoption of this rate plan ensures critical investments are made for the continuation of safe and reliable service.”

The new rate plan also covers the utility’s investment commitments in renewable energy, severe weather mitigation programs, gas pipe replacements, gas detector installations, and more.

In 2025, the company plans to provide $14 million in electric bill discounts and $7 million in gas bill discounts to low-income customers.

Opposing Voices

Attorneys representing the Public Utility Law Project of New York, in an opposing brief, said the rate hikes will hurt many utility customers in the state who are already struggling to make ends meet.

The brief cited the utility company’s September 2024 collections report, showing nearly 20,000 residential customers were 60 or more days behind on bills, with a total outstanding balance of $22 million.

Counsel for the advocacy nonprofit also noted that, based on 2022 census data, around 46,000 households in the utility’s service territory were eligible for energy bill discounts. However, only about a third of them were enrolled in the benefit program at the end of 2023.

They argued for fewer rate hikes, or at least, more outreach efforts on behalf of the company to enroll more qualified low-income families.

Rockland County and several towns therein also opposed the new rate schedule in a joint opposing brief, calling it “another series of rate hikes upon residents that already experience among the highest electric and gas rates in the State.”

James Skoufis, a state Senator representing most of Orange County, opposed the rate hikes in a public statement. He and several other state senators called for new legislative proposals, such as capping utility profits and executive pay, banning rate hikes for certain operating expenses, and conducting a third-party audit of utility expenses.

In addition, the Village of Kiryas Joel in Orange County also opposed the new rate plan on the basis that the utility company should have processed new service requests more timely.

The booming village is expected to add 8,000 new housing units in the coming years based on pending and approved projects. However, the village said in a brief that the waiting time on applications for new electric and gas services has slowed down the development momentum.

In reply, the utility company said that any modification to service request requirements must be made on a service territory basis.