Opponents Rally Against Higher Utility Bills As Gov. Kehoe Signs Senate Bill 4 on April 9

Gov. Mike Kehoe has announced he will sign Senate Bill 4 (SB4) into law at 9 a.m. on Wednesday, April 9. Opponents of Senate Bill 4 will hold a small rally against that action and a media conference outside the Capitol Building at 12:15 p.m.

The biggest dangers to consumers in SB 4 are:

• Construction Work in Progress (CWIP). In 1976, Missouri voters banned paying for utility plants while they are being constructed. This overturns that statute.
• Future Test Year (FTY). Presently real expenses that have been audited are used to set rates. FTY would use projected budgets instead.
• An expansion of Plant in Service Accounting (PISA). This allows rates to go up based on one or more expenses instead of a comprehensive look at the total cost of producing the utility.

Consumers Council of Missouri has projected that SB 4 will cost monopoly utility rate payers at least $1,115 more per year. This estimate was produced by looking at how similar policies have impacted on customers in other states.

Monopoly utility companies put their foot on the gas for SB 4 throughout this Legislative Session by dispatching more than seven dozen staff and contract lobbyists into the halls of the Capitol Building. Even though reliable power is a duty in the compact with Missouri to which monopoly companies are obligated, the lobbyists peddled fear that the lights would not come on if SB 4 did not pass.

SB 4 sponsor Senator Mike Cierpiot pre-filed the legislation on December 1, 2024, and moved it quickly through the Senate Committee on Commerce, Consumer Protection, Energy and Environment which he chairs. It was passed by the Senate 22-11 on February 24 with one absent. Sen. Tracy McCreery (D-St. Louis County) led efforts to improve the bill’s language, but continued to speak against it and voted no.

House leadership sped SB 4 through the House in a single week, March 10-13. The final vote was 96-44 with three voting present and 19 absent. Bi-partisan opposition was present in roughly equal amounts in both the House and Senate.

With many economists predicting rising inflation and economic volatility in 2025, partly due to new tariff policies, higher utility rates are of deep concern to Missouri rate payers. Some opponents say SB 4 subsidizes the fossil fuel and nuclear power industries, socializing risk and privatizing profit while polluting the air and creating other health risks. Opponents are also concerned about the firing of Low Income Home Energy Assistance Program (LIHEAP) staff at the federal level by the Trump Administration last week. It is presently unknown whether energy assistance will be available in adequate amounts for families already at risk of utility disconnection.