In a case with huge financial implications for Indianapolis Power & Light and Virginia parent AES Corp., a labor union and
16 IPL retirees have asked regulators to force the utility to pay up to $115 million to back-fund a retirement plan it spun
off in 2001.
Groups opposing Duke Energy’s coal gasification plant proposed for Edwardsport allege the utility and Gov. Mitch Daniels tried to sway regulators with improper contact and political pressure to get the $2 billion plant approved. They “are clearly trying to back-door the public decision-making process,” said Jerry Polk, an attorney representing a group led by Citizens Action Coalition. Polk this month filed a complaint with the Indiana Utility Regulatory Commission, citing a Sept. 25 letter an executive from Duke’s Charlotte, N.C.,…
Richard and Wendy Horn have had their share of separate real estate successes. Now, they’ve combined their corporate talents as a husband-and-wife team to lead an upstart senior housing developer. Richard joined The Stratford Cos. in May 2006 as chairman and CEO, and has since moved its headquarters from St. Louis to Indianapolis’ north side in Parkwood Crossing. He is known within commercial real estate circles as a former veteran of Duke Realty Corp., where he enjoyed a two-year stint…
Good urban design can create value for communities, individuals, the economy and the environment. The potential benefits include better public health, greater social equity, enhanced land values, a more vibrant local economy, reduced vehicle emissions and a more sustainable use of non-renewable resources. Central Indiana lacks geographical barriers to growth. Land is abundant and reasonably priced. However, the region lacks a cross-jurisdictional plan to manage growth and maximize the benefits from it. Instead, fields grow corn one season and homes…
The state’s apartment industry, backed by firms that landlords hire to bill their tenants for water and sewer service, says state officials are legally all wet if they try to regulate the industry as utilities. Indiana Utility Regulatory Commission jurisdiction “does not extend to the regulation of a landlord’s water pipes any more than it may extend to a homeowner’s garden hose,” Clayton Miller, a Baker & Daniels attorney representing the Water Sub-Billing and Conservation Coalition, told the commission last…
G e o – p o l i t i c a l events and the media keep our focus on the price of oil, its potential supply interruptions and the need to reduce our country’s dependence on foreign oil. Very little is written or reported about another very strategic resource-water. A top United Nations official addressing the 17th Annual World Water Week in Stockholm last August stated that water is going to be the dominant world issue far into…
Six years after its $2.2 billion sale to AES Corp.-a deal that generated at least three shareholder lawsuits-IPALCO Enterprises has signaled that more sparks might fly from the long-done deal. An attorney claiming to represent participants in a retirement insurance plan IPALCO spun off and stopped funding six years ago alleges the utility continues to recover from its 468,000 ratepayers millions of dollars a year toward the plan. The letter asserts that Indianapolis Power & Light “is recovering in rates…
Some in the telecom industry think AT&T had the Indiana General Assembly twirled around its finger like a coil of phone cord
last year. It lobbied legislators to rewrite the state’s telecommunications laws so it could more easily deploy its “U-verse”
video product.
White River Township in northwest Johnson County is dotted with an increasing number of high-priced homes and anchored by one of the area’s strongest school districts. But the area, known as Center Grove, also is marked by crumbling roads, poor drainage and an anemic parks system. To preserve its strengths and shore up its growing weaknesses, some in the area think White River Township needs to incorporate into its own city. The township of more than 40,000 residents faces the…
As the 14th-mostpopulous state in the union, Indiana generates a gross state product that is 16th-largest of the 50 states. Unfortunately, despite significant investments in equipment and processes by manufacturers and public-policy efforts to encourage the attraction and growth of knowledgeand technology-focused industries, our economy remains energy-inefficient. In 2003, Indiana was the country’s sixthlargest consumer of energy per capita, according to the Indiana Energy Report. Ninety-seven percent of Indiana’s electricity is generated by coal. Indiana is the fifthlargest emitter of…
Citizens Gas & Coke Utility shuttered its coke manufacturing plant earlier this summer, much to the relief of neighbors and
health officials who warned that its benzene emissions were a cancer threat. But regulatory filings show closing the plant
at Keystone Avenue and Prospect Street could result in more pollution downtown.
Sooner or later, in the life of almost every building owner, there comes a time when a structure has outlived its usefulness in its current condition. A choice between two options must be made. Do we renovate or do we demolish and build something totally new? The answer is by no means easy or automatic. Confronted with these options, an owner must grapple with a host of issues. The following sample is not exhaustive but may prove helpful as a…
The Indiana Office of Utility Consumer Counselor has filed a lukewarm response to plans from a pair of local utilities to continue a program intended to reduce gas disconnections in the upcoming heating season. The Indiana Utility Regulatory Commission is weighing whether to continue the 20-month-old “universal service” programs offered by locally based Citizens Gas & Coke Utility and Evansville-based Vectren Corp. The programs are funded by the utilities and ratepayers. They amount to the secondlargest source of funds in…
The glacial-but-steady move to renewable-energy sources by Indiana’s coal-dominated electric utilities is picking up speed
and could spur demand for locally manufactured power-plant components.
The S&P 500 on June 1 set a rally high of 1,540. Now, it sits at 1,507. That’s the longest stretch of no forward progress since last summer. So, does that mean anything? There is no shortage of professionals telling us the next bear market is upon us. And with more than a few industries not participating for a while, it might seem the bears have a valid point. Before you pull out the lifeboats, though, there are a few…
Good people, me included, have been making dumb statements about the property tax mess in Indiana. The problem is that we don’t know enough to talk or write intelligently on the topic. The result is that we can be led by our noses into an even worse mess. “Abolish the property tax!” some demand. Then what? Abolition of the property tax means raising some other taxes or fees, unless government spending on services decreases. The state has been urging counties…
Records show 17 percent of the 51 billion gallons Indianapolis Water treats and pumps from its plants never so much as moves
a digit on customers’ water meters.
State utility regulators are examining whether operators of apartments and trailer parks are hosing tenants with excessive bills for water and sewer service. The inquiry by the Indiana Utility Regulatory Commission takes aim at decades-old billing practices that include dividing up a complex’s total water and sewer bills among all tenants. The commission said it’s received a handful of complaints over the years alleging rental property owners, or their billing agents, are assessing tenants higher rates than the commission permits…
Just when the nine-county metro area appeared back in the good graces of the federal government where ozone levels are concerned, the feds want to tighten the standard once more. Manufacturers and other businesses that pump pollutants into the air that combine with sunlight to produce ozone are “apprehensive” about the proposed new rules, said Patrick Bennett, vice president of environmental, energy and infrastructure at the Indiana Manufacturers Association. Businesses in non-attainment counties face possible restrictions on expansion of facilities…
A union that’s aggressively sought to organize the city’s janitors unsuccessfully tried to intervene in an Indianapolis Power & Light case before state utility regulators. IPL’s lawyers mopped the floor with the tenacious union-this time, anyway. The Service Employees International Union Local 3 wants IPL to expand its energy-efficiency and low-income customer assistance program, arguing that IPL and other utilities need to do more to help lower-income workers afford service. Attorneys who argue before the Indiana Utility Regulatory Commission said…
