BAKER CITY – The Bonneville Power Administration (BPA) is proposing that utilities that were overcharged millions of dollars forgive the error.

The BPA recently acknowledged that it overcharged Oregon Trail Electric Cooperative (OTEC) and other utilities with irrigator members a total of approximately $2 million. The overcharge coincided with a $2 million undercharging of other BPA customers.

Werner Buehler, general manager of OTEC, said that with just over 1,100 irrigator accounts, the overcharge to OTEC came to about $60,000.

“The proposal to forgive the overcharge and simply move on is not only the wrong solution but it would be unethical to do so. BPA identified the overcharge, so the only right thing to do is to fix it,” he said. “This is especially true at a time, given the current economic climate, when OTEC is doing all it can to hold its costs down.”

He said the $60,000 may not seem like a lot to BPA, but OTEC has a “responsibility to watch every dime for our members.”

The overcharge was the result of an oversight in the in the calculations of BPA’s Irrigation Rate Mitigation Program (IRMP), which was developed to mitigate significant rate increases for the utilities’ large irrigation loads due to BPA’s change in seasonal rates.

“The proposal to forgive the overcharge is counter intuitive to the original purpose,” said Buehler.

OTEC is urging members to comment on the proposal to BPA. Comments are due by Feb. 26. For a link to the BPA website, visit MyEagleNews.com., or write to Bonneville Power Administration, Public Affairs Office-DKC-7, P.O. Box 14428, Portland, OR 97293-4428, and reference “Irrigation Rate Mitigation Program.”