The Midwest is clutched in the coldest freeze of the year, breaking long-held records for low temperatures. The northeast is buried under record snowfall accumulation.
Utility companies are proving their ruthlessness in pursuit of profit by continuing to shut off utilities in residences without regard to residents.
Normal winter in America, right?
On February 1, before it got really cold here in Michigan, John Skelley, a 69-year-old Vietnam vet, died of hypothermia after the gas company shut off his gas service at the Hazel Park home where Skelley lived. Service was disconnected on January 19 due to non-payment.
A statement from Deborah Dodd of Consumers Energy, confirmed that the initial service was turned on in November, but that no payments had been received since that time. The service was under a different name, Joseph Mixon, and Consumers Energy is claiming no knowledge of a senior living at the residence as they offered empty platitudes to the family.
“It’s very unfortunate. We had no idea that anyone else was living with him. … We need our customers to let us know if they’re having problems, the sooner the better. We can’t help you if we don’t know you need help.”
In Michigan, they have implemented policy prohibiting utility shut-offs, but they only did that following public outcry due to several cases of people freezing to death in their own homes. And it hasn’t stopped the deaths at the hands of unscrupulous energy companies.
According to Judy Palnau, a spokesperson for Michigan Public Service Commission,
“Utility companies are prohibited from shutting off heat in homes that have residents aged 65 and older from Nov. 1 to March 31.”
The most publicized, and the proverbial ‘straw’ that prompted the legislation was the death of Marvin Schur, a 93-year-old man who froze to death after Bay City Electric had placed a device called a “limiter” on his service inlet in 2009. The device limits the amount of electrical service delivered to a home and has a circuit breaker that completely shuts off power if the consumer uses too much. These devices are frequently used as a “humane” way to restrict electrical usage for people with difficulty paying their power bills. There is little to no regulatory control on how the devices are deployed by utility companies.
The World Socialist Web Site did the most comprehensive coverage of Skelley’s severely under-reported death, with little to no local news coverage of the event. WSWS laid it out in pretty simple terms:
“The death of Skelley is the latest needless tragedy resulting from the relentless profit drive of the gas and electric monopolies. According to the MPSA, Consumers Energy disconnected 164,604 gas and electric customers in 2014. The same year, the state’s other major gas and electric utility, DTE Energy, shut off 206,799 households.
It comes as the city of Detroit is continuing a brutal policy of water shutoffs, disconnecting service to tens of thousands of households for unpaid bills as little as $150.”
As we follow happenings around the world and our government sends our military off to be the savior of third world nations suffering under oppressive regimes, we have our own problems brewing here. Maybe we don’t have bombs blowing up every day, but people are still dying. Maybe it is time to take a hard look at poverty and sub-standard living conditions in our own country before we spend more tax dollars being the police force of the world?
