To the Editor:
I would like to urge all Rutherford Electric Membership Corporation members to attend REMC’s 2011 Annual Meeting held at Freedom High School in Morganton, N.C. on Saturday, Oct. 29 at 10 a.m.
My concern is that REMC’s Board of Directors implemented a bad policy in 2007, which for some of its members is just now coming to light.
My understanding is that they decided that any account, individual or commercial, which has been paid late three times in a 24-month billing period will be charged a deposit of $375 or more as “insurance” against another late bill if the customer paid no deposit upon establishing the account. Please understand: this applies to accounts, which are current as well as those, which are actually in arrears at this time.
Failure to pay the deposit will result in disconnection of service – and this they choose to impose in the middle of a major recession. Nice.
I’m guessing that there will be a few more lower-income working families and fixed-income senior citizens needlessly living in the cold and the dark this winter as a result of this policy.
I have spoken to the Attorney General’s EMC office, which informed me that this is all perfectly legal because “the EMCs write their own rules” – which brings to mind a story I once heard about a fox and a henhouse.  In other words, the only appeal to this policy is to REMC itself.
I am a small businessman.  If I demanded all of the money for my services up front from any customer who had ever paid me late, I would be out of business.  But how exactly does one “vote with his feet” when a bad policy involves the electric company?
Unfortunately we can’t, but we can attend their meeting and let each director on the board know how we feel about REMC’s “Kick ‘Em While They’re Down” policy.  I say, “Let’s do it!” It’s time to remind the directors that the members still have a voice. If this development concerns you as much as it concerns me, please call me at 828-659-1428 or email me at jdreibus@yahoo.com and we can discuss what steps might be taken to change it.
– Jeff Dreibus, Nebo, N.C.