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Consider adopting Ordinance No. 3245 approving a negotiated resolution between the Atmos Cities Steering Committee and Atmos Energy Corp., Mid-Tex Division, that adopts new natural gas rates for the City of Farmers Branch and take appropriate action.
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BACKGROUND:
The City of Farmers Branch, along with approximately 164 other cities served by Atmos Energy Mid-Tex Division, is a member of the Atmos Cities Steering Committee ("ACSC"). On or about July 15, 2013, Atmos Mid-Tex filed with an application with the City to increase natural gas rates pursuant to the Rate Review Mechanism ("RRM") tariff renewed by the City in June 2013 as a continuation and refinement of the previous RRM rate review process. This is the first annual RRM filing under the renewed RRM tariff.
The Atmos Mid-Tex RRM filing sought a $22.7 million rate increase system-wide based on an alleged test-year cost of service revenue deficiency of $25.7 million. The City worked with ACSC to analyze the schedules and evidence offered by Atmos Mid-Tex to support its request to increase rates. The Ordinance and attached rate tariffs are the result of negotiations between ACSC and Atmos Mid-Tex to resolve issues raised by ACSC during the review and evaluation of Atmos Mid-Tex's RRM filing.
The Ordinance resolves Atmos Mid-Tex's RRM filing by authorizing additional revenues to Atmos Mid-Tex of $16.6 million system-wide. For purposes of comparison, this negotiated result is about $11 million less than what ACSC's consultants calculated that Atmos would have been entitled to if Atmos had filed a case under the Gas Reliability Infrastructure Program ("GRIP") rather than an RRM case. The settlement is expected to increase the average residential customer's bill by approximately $0.74 per month. An Average Bill Comparison of base rates has been prepared for residential, commercial, industrial, and transportation customers.
The ACSC Executive Committee and ACSC legal counsel recom...
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