Gov’t pressed anew to settle unpaid utility bills

The Commonwealth Utilities Corp. has pressed the government to settle overdue billings, raising anew the possibility of cutting off power to some public offices to force the Tenorio administration to meet its obligations.

“Our own research shows that some government agencies have not paid their bills for years. After we have concluded our survey of electrical use by government agencies and settle on the amounts due, we will consider our options,” said CUC Board Chair Jesus T. Guerrero.

The board last September warned the government that it would be forced to shut off utility services to non-essential departments and agencies if it fails to pay over $12 million it owes in arrears.

CUC officials have since met several times with finance department to try to work out an agreement, even reviewing past accounts that amounted to around $3 million following dispute on some of the charges.

But Deputy Director Patrick Leon Guerrero disclosed to the board last week that the review showed the government has been underbilled on some of the services, pushing the amount in question with another $700,000 in services that have not been charged.

According to Executive Director Timothy P. Villagomez, the Department of Finance may appeal to the CUC board for some debt relief.

He told the board that he would meet with Finance Sec. Lucy DLG. Nielsen to inform her of the CUC’s findings as well as to hammer out a payment schedule.

“The dialogue has tremendously improved now, so we’re working closely with the finance [department] and this one area that we need to look at,” the CUC chief told reporters in an interview.

“But they are paying and we hope to manage to collect the rest [of the debt],” he added.

The Tenorio administration has run up such amount of unpaid billings due to the serious financial crisis confronting the islands for the last three years.

Although it has managed to pay current accounts, overdue charges have accumulated since early 1998 as the remittance to CUC has been lower than the monthly billings of $800,000 to $850,000.

During FY 2000, DOF failed to make its regular payment only for three months, and the debt did not balloon that much as it paid more for the rest of the nine months, according to the government-owned utility corporation.

Mr. Guerrero underscored the need to reach a compromise with finance officials on the matter in light of the latest financial report indicating that CUC suffered loss of close to $300,000 by the end of Sept. 30, 2000 due to rising fuel costs and the number of delinquent customers.

“We need the government to pay us immediately,” he told the board meeting held last Thursday.