Goochland County and its school system have added online check registers to their Web sites, showing who’s receiving payments from the county and its schools, and for how much. The idea to post checks came from the community, concerned about the way the county was handling money. That’s after nearly $200,000 worth of checks dating back several years was discovered undeposited by the utility department.

Dominion Virginia Power customers would get back more than $400 million from the company under an agreement the state’s largest utility has reached with the state attorney general’s office and a group of large ratepayers. If approved by the State Corporation Commission, the proposed settlement of several pending Dominion Virginia Power rate cases would save a typical residential customer—using 1,000 kilowatt-hours of electricity a month—about $80 next year, the company said.

Virginia’s attorney general is urging the State Corporation Commission to either cut Dominion Virginia Power’s electric rates this year or have the company give customers a refund for over-earning last year. Experts for Attorney General Bill Mims’ office told the SCC that Dominion Virginia Power’s rates should be reduced by $238 million or customers should receive a refund of $153 million.

Old Dominion Electric Cooperative has struck a deal with Exelon Generation to supply the Glen Allen-based co-op with 200 megawatts of electricity for 10 years beginning in June. ODEC is the power supplier for 11 electric-distribution cooperatives serving portions of Delaware, Maryland and Virginia. The agreement with Chicago-based Exelon is the first contract awarded as part of ODEC’s June request for power-supply proposals.

WATER
Residential
$2.95 ( $3.43 ) per 1,000 gallons for residential use in the Tuckahoe Creek district
$3.33 ( $3.43 ) for the general county system
  Commercial
$4.12 ( $4.80 ) per 1,000 gallons in Tuckahoe Creek
$4.66 ( $4.80 ) for the general county system
SEWER

Goochland County’s utilities operations will end the year in the red, the Board of Supervisors learned yesterday. As a result, the county is proposing a major rate increase, especially for users in eastern Goochland’s Tuckahoe Creek Service District who could see a 16 percent increase for water and sewer service. The rest of the county would pay about a 3 percent increase if the proposal is approved after a public hearing in September.

Reflecting the declining natural-gas price trend and the approach of the warm season, Columbia Gas of Virginia plans to reduce its average customer bill by 16 percent this summer. Chester-based Columbia said the change should save its customers $6.76 on the typical monthly bill, starting May 29. The average gas cost will decrease to $34.97 a month compared with the current level of $41.73. The figures are based on the average monthly summer usage of 2,300 cubic feet of natural gas. The utility filed for the rate reduction with the State Corporation Commission.

Goochland County Utilities department issues run deep Scope of record-keeping problems surprised officials The Goochland County utilities department has found most of its missing money, but now it’s looking for its infrastructure. As auditors begin a probe into years of utility finances, county officials are discovering just how deep the hole is in the department’s record-keeping.

Utilities in Maryland, Virginia and Washington have sent out millions of shut-off notices to customers in the past year and are turning off service more often.

Henrico County officials and developers say a dispute over the way utility hookups were billed will not delay construction of West Broad Village.

As the recession deepens, more Virginia utility subscribers are falling behind in paying their winter heating bills, and more are having their electric and gas service disconnected, officials said. “There’s an uptick in the number of customers who are having difficulty paying their electrical bills,“ Dominion Virginia Power spokesman David Botkins said.

Capital One Financial Corp. wants to know why Goochland County billed it for 23 million gallons of water during a two-month period last year when it used only 1 million gallons during the same period the year before. The credit-card company paid the bill for $96,256 but is asking the county to investigate. It’s the latest in a growing list of questions that Goochland is trying to answer about its utilities department.

The mismanagement of Goochland County’s utilities department has prompted two supervisors to try to oust the county administrator and another to suggest adopting a county-manager system of government. Supervisors Ned S. Creasey and Malvern R. “Rudy” Butler tried to remove County Administrator Gregory K. Wolfrey from his job at a meeting Jan. 13 before a crowd of about 100 frustrated county residents.

It’s not just missing checks. Goochland County’s utilities department is confronting a growing list of problems: LANDFILL: Concerns dating back years about excessive methane gas coming from the county landfill at Hidden Rock Park are now being addressed. A new $70,000 system to reduce methane levels is almost complete after the Virginia Department of Environmental Quality ordered it installed last year.

Goochland County is working to recoup the final $22,000 of $157,000 in undeposited checks found in the county utilities office.