The home of Dianne Michon – which is located, ironically, in Sunset – is the only one in her neighborhood whose roof is laden with solar panels.Read the full story here.
Michon, an Entergy customer, said she is a new solar power user who installed a system on her home this year.
“I’ve always wanted solar,” she said. “My husband used to live in California and they had major incentives for using solar power in that state.”
Houses with solar panels that generate electricity also come outfitted with a net meter, something that Michon said is her “declaration of energy independence.”
“They’re actually purchasing electricity from me right now,” she said. “When the arrow is going backwards, Entergy is purchasing electricity from me.”
Hearing about Holloway’s proposed, additional “utility charge,” Michon said made her angry.
“Why should I have to pay more for net metering? I don’t understand the purpose of raising the net metering fee,” she said. “Holloway said that the Public Service Commission’s job is to make sure that the electric companies keep their costs low so that we can afford to buy electricity. Well, it doesn’t look like (Holloway) is looking out for my best interest if he is going to allow the electric companies to go up on a net metering fee.”
Michon said that since using a solar power system on her home, her Entergy utility bill has shifted from what she expected for her last billing cycle. September’s average bill for her home – which last year was at around $185 – dropped to $50 this September, according to Michon.
“My total energy use for the month is probably around $25,” she said. “All these other fees that are tacked-on, made my bill $50. There’s a hurricane fee, I pay a customer fee. They add on all these things that make up half of my bill. But in reality, my bill is $25.”
MAY 21 Gambit columnist Clancy DuBos writes about the Mother's Day shooting, and how the stages of shock and blame and healing mirror those traveled by the same city following Hurricane Katrina. The city will recover, just as it did following the storm, by reaching out to help the people injured most seriously by the event, DuBos writes. It's how we heal, he says.
MAY 21 Here's a post on the Advocate (but buried on a subpage, not on the front) that reports something Louisiana Voice reported some time ago: a top DOE official lives in Los Angeles and "commutes" to Baton Rouge. The positioning of the story caused a stir on Facebook Monday, with several posters asking if the Advocate was covering someone's hiney. Sentell's stories on DOE are notoriously soft, and this one is no different: don't expect any hard questions in here.
MAY 21 Here's another post from blogger Tom Aswell about the "course choice" program. He's already reported on kids being signed up without their consent or knowledge, and has more here: For example, he tells of a six-year-old who was signed up for high school Latin. He also digs a little deeper into the sister companies of the main one operating in Louisiana; all of them seem to have complaints against them. Stinky.
MAY 21 Given the 80 percent cut in higher ed funding since he's been in office, it's clear Gov. Jindal would rather give tax cuts to out of state companies than have a functioning system, blogger Dayne Sherman argues in this post. The cuts have been such a disaster, Sherman says, that it will take 30 years to fix what's been broken. He says he believes the aim is to shut down most of the schools before Jindal leaves in 2016.
MAY 21 Blogger CB Forgotston says there are too many elections in Louisiana, and they're costing us too much money. The proof is in the pudding: turnout for most of these nonsensical pollings gets worse and worse, CB opines, even as millions of dollars that could be spent on health care or higher ed go down the tubes. The legislature must take action to stem the tide of pointless elections, he says.
MAY 21 Here's an interesting investigative piece by WVUE on the retirement benefits of some Jefferson Parish public employees. According to the story, the taxpayers are paying 100 percent of the retirement contributions of employees who started work prior to a certain date in April 1986 -- and have done for more than 30 years. It costs the parish millions annually, and might not be legal, the story reports.
MAY 21 This post on Bayou Buzz provides insight from Louisiana's intrepid pollster, Bernie Pinsonat, on the winners and losers from this year's legislative session. But to hear Bernie tell it, there's almost nuttin but losers: Jindal, the Republican party, the Fiscal Hawks all get big goose eggs in his win column.
MAY 20 This post on The Lens takes a look at a huge (either $500K or $250K) bill that one NOLA charter now has for school lunches. The RSD says the charter group didn't fill out the proper paperwork for federal reimbursement, but the story details how the RSD didn't ensure the people running the charter had the proper training, despite requests from hapless charter employees trying to fill out forms. Either way, somebody's asleep at the wheel.
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Is this current couillion Mr. Holloways the same couillion who was found rapping his electric meter with his hammer's wooden handle causing the meter to jump track and become inoperable ? Is this the same Holloway ?