IID carrying $10 million in ratepayer debt

EL CENTRO — More and more ratepayers are not paying their energy bills the Imperial Irrigation District reported at its Tuesday meeting.

IID General Manager Henry Martinez said the number of ratepayers who are delinquent on their power bills has exceeded 22,000 to 23,000 accounts through the end of October and that number is still increasing every day.

To date, the district is facing a shortfall of $10 million from these accounts, said Finance Director Belen Valenzuela.

Martinez said staff is making a concerted effort to contact those delinquent to pay at least part of their bills.

If IID had not made the pledge not to disconnect power to anyone for non-payment during the pandemic 8,000 accounts would have been flagged for disconnection of power, Valenzuela said.

Valenzuela said this would be four times higher than in a typical year.

IID has reported the balances will not be forgiven, and even though power for these accounts will not be turned off now, that will not be the case after the pandemic ends.

In March before the county shut down, delinquencies were actually behind the previous year’s pace by $900,000, but over the last six months the total has increased.

Martinez said the hot weather the county experienced in the summer did not help.

“The (delinquencies) continue to increase,” he said. “We had a very hot summer, so we are seeing the remnants of the bills increasing substantially.”

Valenzuela said the large majority of those delinquent are homes and apartments. Only about 15 percent of those delinquent are commercial buildings.

More than half of those delinquent, Valenzuela previously reported, are accounts in Coachella Valley.

Because of the decreased cash flow from people not paying their bills, the district has had to move money around.

The negative cash flow caused by higher delinquencies because of non-payment and unplanned COVID expenditure resulted in staff in September using $11.4 million in budget amendments after they were approved by the IID board in June,

Those budget amendments include a deferral of several capital projects; reduction in travel, training and contract services, and reduction in positions and salaries from vacant positions.

The district also reallocated $2 million in funds from its energy efficiency programs to its customer energy assistance programs to assist customers who have been negatively impacted by COVID-19.