Ewa renters told math is correct on soaring power bills

Renters of Kapilina Beach Homes in Ewa Beach were shocked and outraged by electrical bills for mid-July to mid-August that were much higher than usual and in some cases topped $1,000.

Up to 200 residents Monday turned out to complain about suspect billing at a town hall meeting held by state Sen. Kurt Fevella. Additional resident meetings to discuss the issue will be held Sunday and later in the month.

But some residents now have added skepticism to their reaction after hearing that following a pause in billing and a review, the property owner says the math was correct.

An extraordinarily hot late summer, a longer 35-day billing cycle and some rate increases over the past year all added up to some big bills.

The owners of Kapilina, a 1,457-home, 4,500-resident oceanfront property that started life in 1960 as Navy housing, said in an email to the Honolulu Star-Advertiser that all the bills were reviewed.

“The vast majority of residents did not receive large $1,000 bills,” Kapilina said. “In fact, the median electric bill across all of our residents was $325 for the 35-day period of July 12 through Aug. 15.”

In a letter just sent to residents, Kapilina noted that the 35-day period represented a 25% increase in the number of billing days from the prior month. Quarterly billing cycles cover 28 days, 28 days and 35 days.

The company acknowledged that “most residents saw a significant increase in their bill.” Kapilina also pointed out, not surprisingly, that the uncharacteristically high temperatures “probably resulted in significantly more air conditioning use.”

The information provided to the Honolulu Star-Advertiser was sent by Peter Jakel, a public relations official working on behalf of Carmel Partners, which Jakel said is one of the owners of Kapilina. Jakel said the property is managed by Greystar, which describes itself as a “global leader in rental housing.” The two- to four- bedroom homes rent from $2,000 up.

The Navy still supplies power to Kapilina and still maintains the outage-prone grid there — leading to separate concerns about electrical service. The billing schedule is a reflection of the Navy system.

“We are exploring ways to change the billing going forward so these monthly fluctuations do not occur,” Kapilina said.

The company said it will be reapplying the paused utility charges and is extending the due date to Oct. 15. Resident suspicion remains about the billing, however.

“It’s the fact that they seem to just claim that we used ridiculous amounts of power when nothing changed,” one resident said on an internal community Facebook page.

“I can deal with the kWh rate. That’s not the issue. It’s when I get billed for over 2,000 kWh and my average for two years is no more than 1,250 kWh a month,” said another.

Most residents asked that their names not be used, claiming Kapilina would take retaliatory action. Concern also has been raised about accurate metering in a community where, for example, multiple meters make it difficult to determine whose is whose.

“We only charge residents for electrical usage in their apartment homes,” Kapilina said. “We pay the electrical bills for common areas.”

The cost of Navy-provided electricity on Joint Base Pearl Harbor-Hickam jumped from about 19 cents per kilowatt-hour to 32 cents on Tuesday due to budget reforms enacted by the Department of the Navy.

But the rate Kapilina was charging its tenants was higher than the Navy rate. About a year ago Kapilina residents were paying 23.6 cents per kilowatt-hour. That started increasing in March and recently reached 28.7 cents.

Over the past six years, Navy electricity rates passed on to Kapilina ran as high as 62 cents. Recently that rate was 21 cents, the company said. The fluctuations depended on what Navy costs were and whether the Navy overcharged or undercharged in previous years, Kapilina said.

“To avoid these swings in utility rates,” Kapilina said in its letter to residents, “we have attempted to smooth out the volatility by subsidizing the residential rate to be no more than the rate a resident would pay if they were getting power directly from the Hawaiian Electric Co., and to recover some of the subsidy back when the Navy rates are significantly below HECO.”

As of Oct. 1 the Navy committed to a rate in line with the HECO residential rate — about 32 cents, which includes all fees, Kapilina said.

The current rate Kapilina charges to its residents — 28.7 cents — will remain in effect for the next two monthly service periods, the letter to residents said. After that it will apply a half-cent increase in each billing cycle to bring it to the Navy’s 32-cent rate.