Now that Toronto Hydro’s Board has asked Toronto Hydro to look for a suitor to purchase The Telecom… What Next? What do you think? Where should politics, business and common sense start and finish? Is this whole announcement “Smoke and Mirrors” to appease the City. Will it actually sell at the estimated price of 125million?
links of Interest:
http://www.marketwire.com/mw/release.do?id=813041
http://www.cnw.ca/fr/releases/archive/January2008/24/c3973.html
The City of Toronto has just established a new panel charged with giving the City’s budget the once-over. They can consider every possible way of saving money, from selling city real estate to contracting out. Yet Miller has also said Toronto Hydro is not for sale. We in the city need to deal with new taxes (land Transfer /motor vehicle /property tax increase etc) while Toronto Hydro can continue to run business as usual. I don’t agree with this. I am not asking to sell the utility. That would be wrong. It provides large retinues annually. But the city counsel and new panel need to look at how much more $$$ can be injected into the city through Toronto Hydro regulated rate of return. The city also needs to take a very serious look at Toronto Hydro’s non regulated services and investments. This may be a way to lower the burden on the tax payer while at the same time have little to no effect on our lives in the GTA.
It surprises me that no one has really looked at Toronto Hydro as a source of income for the city. Toronto Hydro makes a guaranteed 9-10% on investment (regulated Utility) yet the city does not get all that back. It seams while the city is looking at reducing core services, they are allowing the Utility to spend our regulated money on non regulated businesses such as the Telecom and software companies (which in my eye are not as important as police and the TTC). The Telecom side of TH says they are profitable and looking to expand. They are profitable because they are not properly paying for the services that the regulated side provides them (and we pay for). Where is the money going to come from to expand the Telecom Bus…and where did the money come from that set up the non regulated businesses… US... the rate payer. Why is a regulated company playing in non regulated business. To my knowledge out of almost 90 electricity utilities in the province, they are the only ones playing in non regulated businesses like this. Why??? If we didn’t allow these non core business to continue TH would be able to provide the city 10’s to 100’s of millions of dollars a year (guaranteed through the regulated rates charged to us on our electricity bill) instead of waisting it in businesses that are already provided by private companies. Why are we allowing Toronto Hydro to play with our money when the City needs it. Why are we allowing them to continue??? Why is counsel not looking at this? Who is hiding what?
