LETTER: Henderson Says Rye Should Not Renew Westchester Power Contract

In a letter to MyRye.com, Rye mayoral candidate and current Councilmember Bill Henderson says the City should vote no on renewing its contract with Westchester Power that promotes renewable energy development. Henderson has written on the issue before. He announced his candidacy for mayor in March (see GOP Running Henderson for Mayor, Plus Council Slate of Fee, Jovanovich & Shuck). Learn about the City Council presentation by Westchester Power.

Dear MyRye.com:

Last Wednesday, April 9, the CEO of Westchester Power gave a presentation to the Rye City Council urging the Council to renew its contract with Westchester Power. The City Council is scheduled to vote on the renewal on April 23^rd.

Westchester Power is a Community Choice Aggregation program (“CCA”) that promotes renewable energy development. Since 2019, the City of Rye has participated in this CCA program, requiring all Rye residents, who have not OPTED OUT, to buy their electricity from Westchester Power. The contract ostensibly offers Rye residents electricity sourced from 100% renewable sources. The charges come through Rye consumers’ ConEd bills.

It is great that people want to support renewable energy, but I believe strongly the City Council should vote “no” to continuing this program:

• The Westchester Power program is not competitive and is more expensive. Starting with Rye’s first contract in 2019, it has been more expensive in 5 of 6 years, costing Rye consumers approximately 20% more and collectively over $3.5 million more. In this year’s current contract, Rye consumers on average can expect to pay over $280 more for electricity than the ConEd spot market. That is more than Rye City’s portion of this year’s property tax increase.
• A majority of Rye residents – 51.4%, have shown their disapproval of these contracts and have already OPTED OUT, many more recently in the last 8 months. It is also telling that sixteen other municipalities in Westchester, including Scarsdale, Bronxville, North Castle, Pelham Manor, and Harrison have not put their citizens into such arrangements.
• Local government should only act where there is a need to provide services for the common good. Think Fire Department, Police, EMS, garbage pickup, paving the roads, etc. Rye citizens can make better decisions for themselves about how to provide for their own electricity needs and whether they want to support renewable energy production. They don’t need the Rye City Council’s involvement, forcing them into an OPT OUT default program that makes them pay more.
• Rye citizens should only pay more if they choose to do so.  Rye Citizens are busy people, they lead busy lives, and many will never know that the City Council has put them into a more expensive electricity program. Many don’t read the ambiguous fine print on the second page of the ConEd bill. As such the Westchester Power OPT OUT program seems like an indirect or secret tax on unaware Rye citizens.
• Renewable energy does not flow directly to Rye under the contract. Westchester Power claims to provide 100% renewable energy to Rye, but due to the physics of electrical power, Rye residents are not getting cleaner air or a much greener local electricity grid to power their homes.  Instead, Westchester Power’s purchases Renewable Energy Certificates (“RECs”) that are used to subsidize renewable energy producers that provide energy to the various power grids all over New York State. If you believe that renewable energy benefits everyone in New York State, you might question why consumers in certain New York municipalities get to pay more, where consumers from other municipalities like Scarsdale or Bronxville get to pay less.
• Proponents represent that Westchester Power’s program gives Rye consumers more choices, but Rye consumers already have plenty of choices. Currently, including renewables and nuclear energy, the ConEd spot market already provides close to 50% non-fossil fuel generated electricity to New York State consumers.  Rye consumers can also OPT IN and contract with 53 other ESCOs (Energy Service Companies) which can be found on ConEd’s website, many of which have renewable energy programs like Westchester Power.  Rye consumers don’t need a 55^th choice requiring them to OPT OUT.

Rye consumers should individually decide whether and how they want to support renewable energy efforts, not their local elected officials. The City Council should vote “no” against renewing the Westchester Power contract. Citizens feeling strongly about this should come to City Hall on April 23^rd and be heard.

Bill Henderson