debt

Santee Cooper’s Legal Costs For Current And Former Employees Reaches Over $1 Million

Featured Image: The State

Santee Cooper is, once again, catching heat for its reckless spending.

Recent reports obtained by the Post and Courier show that Santee Cooper has racked up $1.7 million in legal fees by covering the cost of attorney fees for eight current and former employees, executives, and board members.

This comes after recent concerns of the state-owned utility’s decision to hire a new CEO and Deputy CEO with a million dollar a year and $560,000 a year salary, respectively, while in billions of dollars of debt.

According to the Post and Courier, the legal costs can be traced back to late 2017 when the unfinished V.C. Summer plant was abandoned by the state-owned utility and continues to grow as of last month when the records were obtained.

Not included in the $1.7 million, are the funds being spent on attorneys to represent the utility itself.

While the records don’t show the exact work being performed, a spokeswoman for Santee Cooper told the Post and Courier, the costs were tied to civil lawsuits against the utility.

One of those lawsuits pits the state-owned utility against its largest customer, the electric cooperatives who purchase their power from Santee Cooper. In the lawsuit, the cooperatives claim Santee Cooper kept the problems of the V.C. Summer project hidden from them and are suing so their customers won’t be held responsible for paying off the debt. However, as of this week, South Carolina Supreme Court Chief Justice Jean Toal put the lawsuit on hold further delaying the outcome.

More recently, Dominion Energy attorneys sent a letter to the state-owned utility demanding Santee Cooper pay for a portion of Dominion’s costs for the failed V.C. Summer project. The letter referred to the agreement between SCE&G and Santee Cooper to build the abandoned reactors, a project Santee Cooper owned 45 percent of.

As Santee Cooper’s $4 billion debt continues to increase by around one million dollars a day, the utility finds itself owing even more money while continuing to spend causing the millions of direct-serve and cooperative customers throughout the state to worry about the future of utility rates.

Featured

Take This Quiz: Will The Santee Cooper Debt Affect You And Your Family?

In 2013, Santee Cooper and SCE&G began construction on their V.C. Summer Nuclear Project hoping to bring new energy sources to their customers. Four years later, Santee Cooper and it’s direct-serve and co-op customers remain billions in debt and growing a million each day, while SCE&G customers were sold to Dominion and have been elevated from some but not all of their debt burden.

Santee Cooper alone has $8 billion in debt, half of which comes from the failed nuclear project. If all things remain unchanged, the state-owned utility has no other option but to raise rates on all direct serve and co-op customers in order to pay off the debt. That is, unless, state lawmakers make the decision to sell to a private utility who can absorb the debt.

How will the failure of V.C. Summer impact your family’s bottom line?

Take this quick quiz to find out!

Palmetto Promise Institute, an organization that researches, studies, and promotes public policy which supports a free and flourishing South Carolina, has a quiz that will test your knowledge on the Santee Cooper fiasco and let you know if you’ll be affected by the debt.

Take the quiz here.

Featured

Poll Shows That Informed Voters Want Santee Cooper Sold

Last week the South Carolina Senate decided to not move forward with the consultant responsible for the vetting and research for the possible sale of Santee Cooper, a move that could leave the 2 million direct-serve and co-op customers of Santee Cooper responsible for the $8 billion debt they owe.

Despite this decision, S.C. Club For Growth, a group of South Carolinians whose mission is to promote economic growth in the state, recently released a poll that showed overwhelming support for the sale of Santee Cooper among informed voters.

Nearly three-quarters of the state was more likely to support the Santee Cooper sale if a private company agreed to pay down the $8 billion debt and prevent customers from carrying the weight of paying down the debt.

However, the poll also found that a large amount of the state is still unaware of the V.C. Summer Project that caused a majority of the debt owed by Santee Cooper.

The poll showed that only 48.3% of the state is even aware of the debacle. And, when you look at just Santee Cooper and co-op customers, that number is even lower.

With news of the South Carolina Senate not wanting to move forward with ICF Consulting, the future of Santee Cooper continues to be unclear. And, as more South Carolinians become aware of the billion dollar problem and the effect it may have on them, frustrations will continue to grow and support for the sale will increase.