Dear Source:
WAPA should do two things immediately. Then it should set a strategy that would enable it to gradually decrease its reliance on fuel oil.
It should treat the government like it does any other customer: no pay = no service. There is no special legislation (I hope) that requires WAPA to continue to supply service to a customer deeply in arrears. And since non-payment by the government, which lives largely off the Federal Government, means islanders have to foot the bill, the government is effectively taxing islanders through sloppy budget control. The other thing that WAPA should focus on is getting the power pirates to pay up. How many customers have their own customized hook-ups that don't make it into the rate base? This is a tax on regular customers who actually pay their bills.
Longer term, St Croix could authorize the establishment of a trash-to-cash generator that would incinerate the island's trash. There is actually no cleaner way to dispose of trash than to incinerate it at unbelievably high temperatures. If pursued without the burdens of satisfying every single constituency, the trash accumulation problems would transform themselves into a way to reduce WAPA's purchase of fuel oil and would, I imagine, lead eventually to a more diversified energy base and perhaps lower costs per kilowatt hour.
Sam Bridges
St. Croix
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