Macon Reporter

Ameren Illinois continues to receive bad feedback from customers questioning skyrocketing utility bills.   

“Ameren Illinois power corporation is nothing but greedy and should not get away with doubling or tripling the power prices on us poor and elderly and disabled people who can hardly make it now. As far as I'm concerned they are criminals,” Decatur resident Dana Deneen Taylor Best said on Facebook.

In downstate areas Ameren has hiked rates 116% higher than last year, translating to an increase of $626 per customer. The utility provider has filed paperwork to push power bills even higher, which saw immediate pushback from the Citizens Utility Board.

“In one month, Ameren Illinois has filed for a $160.4 million gas rate hike and a four-year $435.6 million electric increase, and they couldn’t have come at a worse time,” CUB Executive Director David Kolata said in a press release. "This is awful news for Ameren customers who already were suffering under some of the highest electric and gas supply prices in Illinois history as well as earlier Ameren rate hikes. CUB will do a thorough review of these rate cases, and we will challenge every penny Ameren can't justify."

Downstate legislators gathered earlier this week to address the issue of Ameren rate hikes. State Sen. Chapin Rose (R-Mahomet) said the situation in downstate Illinois is dire. “Last week in Kincaid, Illinois, an entire grocery store went out of business because they couldn't pay the power bill for their coolers,” Rose said at a press conference, Chambana Sun reported. “That community is without a grocery store and I think Rep. (Dave) Severin, when he talks he's got the exact same thing happen in his district, a different place. So this is a significant crisis. It is a serious crisis. Families cannot afford what is happening to them.”

State Sen. Jil Tracy (R-Quincy) is pushing a legislative fix. She is sponsoring two bills meant to resolve the crisis. Senate Bill 1548 would cut regulations barring new power plants from coming online. Senate Bill 1547 creates the Power Grid Task Force which would set up a team of lawmakers to inspect the state’s energy policy and the effects it is having on ratepayers, according to WICS ABC Newschannel 20.