May 16, 2018 – The Missouri House today gave final approval to a bill that will allow electric utilities to move forward with infrastructure improvements and enable quicker recovery of those costs while capping rates and returning benefits of the federal tax cuts to consumers right away.
“Associated Industries of Missouri has examined this issue for a very long time, making sure this is a good deal for our business members,” said Ray McCarty, president/CEO of the association. “This bill, following some very important pro-consumer changes to the bill in the Missouri Senate, will benefit our members by allowing the electric utilities to improve reliability and security of our energy supply and, because of the time-value of money and the ability to better plan these improvements, the utility will be able to do so at a lower cost to consumers,” said McCarty.
Rep. T.J. Berry handled the bill originally sponsored by Sen. Ed Emery, SB 564. The bill was amended in the Senate by Sen. Doug Libla and Sen. Gary Romine to improve the bill for consumers.
During debate, much discussion surrounded the rate caps in the bill that prevent rapid increases in rates and the immediate return of tax benefits received by the utilities from the federal tax cut bill to consumers.
The bill was passed by the Missouri House on a vote of 125-20. The bill will now go to Governor Greitens.