{"id":74380,"date":"2026-07-23T13:43:14","date_gmt":"2026-07-23T17:43:14","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/lakelandgazette.info\/news\/?p=74380"},"modified":"2026-07-23T13:43:27","modified_gmt":"2026-07-23T17:43:27","slug":"the-lakeland-city-commission-unanimously-approved-a-series-of-annual-base-rate-increases-for-lakeland-electric-that-will-total-15-87-over-four-years","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/lakelandgazette.info\/news\/2026\/07\/23\/the-lakeland-city-commission-unanimously-approved-a-series-of-annual-base-rate-increases-for-lakeland-electric-that-will-total-15-87-over-four-years\/","title":{"rendered":"The Lakeland City Commission unanimously approved a series of annual base rate increases for Lakeland Electric that will total 15.87% over four years"},"content":{"rendered":"
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\"\"<\/figure>\n<\/div>\n\n\n

Key Details<\/h2>\n\n\n\n
    \n
  • Start Date:<\/strong> The first base rate adjustment takes effect October 1, 2026<\/strong>, with subsequent adjustments occurring every October through 2029.<\/li>\n\n\n\n
  • Annual Pace:<\/strong> Base rates will go up by 3.75% per year<\/strong>.<\/li>\n\n\n\n
  • Customer Cost Breakdown:<\/strong>\n
      \n
    • Residential:<\/strong> For the average residential customer using ~1,178 kWh\/month, the initial phase adds about $2.83 per month<\/strong> to the base bill. To shield fixed-income and low-use households, rate increases on the first 1,000 kWh are capped at around 2% per year.<\/li>\n\n\n\n
    • Commercial:<\/strong> Impact varies depending on size, ranging from ~10% over four years for large commercial users up to ~20% for small businesses.<\/li>\n\n\n\n
    • County Surcharge:<\/strong> Unincorporated Polk County customers buying power from Lakeland Electric will continue to pay a 10% surcharge (roughly 25\u201330 cents more per month than in-city residents).<\/li>\n<\/ul>\n<\/li>\n<\/ul>\n\n\n\n

      Why Is the Rate Increasing?<\/h2>\n\n\n\n

      According to a formal Cost of Service Study<\/strong> conducted by the utility, operating expenses have risen significantly:<\/sup><\/p>\n\n\n\n

        \n
      • Increased costs for essential equipment, maintenance, transformers, and raw materials.<\/li>\n\n\n\n
      • Rising labor and system maintenance expenses.<\/li>\n\n\n\n
      • Grid modernization to improve reliability and better withstand severe weather events.<\/li>\n<\/ul>\n\n\n\n
        \n

        Note on Utility Bills:<\/strong> Your electric bill is divided into base rates<\/strong>, fuel charges<\/strong>, and taxes\/fees<\/strong>.<\/sup> This decision only<\/em> impacts the base rate.<\/sup> Fuel charges fluctuate separately based on global market conditions and natural gas prices<\/p>\n<\/blockquote>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

        Key Details Why Is the Rate Increasing? According to a formal Cost of Service Study conducted by the utility, operating expenses have risen significantly: Note on Utility Bills: Your electric… <\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":52931,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_seopress_titles_title":"","_seopress_titles_desc":"","_seopress_robots_index":"","_seopress_robots_follow":"","_seopress_robots_imageindex":"","_seopress_robots_snippet":"","_seopress_robots_primary_cat":"","_seopress_robots_breadcrumbs":"","_seopress_robots_freeze_modified_date":"","_seopress_robots_custom_modified_date":"","_seopress_robots_canonical":"","_seopress_social_fb_title":"","_seopress_social_fb_desc":"","_seopress_social_fb_img":"","_seopress_social_fb_img_attachment_id":0,"_seopress_social_fb_img_width":0,"_seopress_social_fb_img_height":0,"_seopress_social_twitter_title":"","_seopress_social_twitter_desc":"","_seopress_social_twitter_img":"","_seopress_social_twitter_img_attachment_id":0,"_seopress_social_twitter_img_width":0,"_seopress_social_twitter_img_height":0,"_seopress_redirections_value":"","_seopress_redirections_enabled":"","_seopress_redirections_enabled_regex":"","_seopress_redirections_logged_status":"","_seopress_redirections_param":"","_seopress_redirections_type":0,"_seopress_analysis_target_kw":"","inline_featured_image":false,"_uf_show_specific_survey":0,"_uf_disable_surveys":false,"wpai_generated_summary":"","footnotes":"","jetpack_publicize_message":"{title}\n\n{excerpt}\n\n{url}","jetpack_publicize_feature_enabled":true,"jetpack_social_post_already_shared":false,"jetpack_social_options":{"image_generator_settings":{"template":"dois","default_image_id":71799,"font":"","enabled":true,"token":"eyJpbWciOiJodHRwczpcL1wvaTAud3AuY29tXC9sYWtlbGFuZGdhemV0dGUuaW5mb1wvbmV3c1wvd3AtY29udGVudFwvdXBsb2Fkc1wvMjAyNFwvMTJcL2xha2VsYW5kLWVsZWN0cmljLWJ1aWxkaW5nLndlYnA_Zml0PTEwMjQlMkM2ODImc3NsPTEiLCJ0eHQiOiJUaGUgTGFrZWxhbmQgQ2l0eSBDb21taXNzaW9uIHVuYW5pbW91c2x5IGFwcHJvdmVkIGEgc2VyaWVzIG9mIGFubnVhbCBiYXNlIHJhdGUgaW5jcmVhc2VzIGZvciBMYWtlbGFuZCBFbGVjdHJpYyB0aGF0IHdpbGwgdG90YWwgMTUuODclIG92ZXIgZm91ciB5ZWFycyIsInRlbXBsYXRlIjoiZG9pcyIsImZvbnQiOiIiLCJibG9nX2lkIjoxNjMwNDA2NjF9.noT1wXOUC2R_bDETP3PfdLiaCg6cA9baRnZ23YftQU8MQ"},"version":2,"media_source":"sig","attached_media":[{"id":0,"url":"https:\/\/jetpack.com\/redirect\/?source=sigenerate&query=t%3DeyJpbWciOiJodHRwczpcL1wvaTAud3AuY29tXC9sYWtlbGFuZGdhemV0dGUuaW5mb1wvbmV3c1wvd3AtY29udGVudFwvdXBsb2Fkc1wvMjAyNFwvMTJcL2xha2VsYW5kLWVsZWN0cmljLWJ1aWxkaW5nLndlYnA_Zml0PTEwMjQlMkM2ODImc3NsPTEiLCJ0eHQiOiJUaGUgTGFrZWxhbmQgQ2l0eSBDb21taXNzaW9uIHVuYW5pbW91c2x5IGFwcHJvdmVkIGEgc2VyaWVzIG9mIGFubnVhbCBiYXNlIHJhdGUgaW5jcmVhc2VzIGZvciBMYWtlbGFuZCBFbGVjdHJpYyB0aGF0IHdpbGwgdG90YWwgMTUuODclIG92ZXIgZm91ciB5ZWFycyIsInRlbXBsYXRlIjoiZG9pcyIsImZvbnQiOiIiLCJibG9nX2lkIjoxNjMwNDA2NjF9.noT1wXOUC2R_bDETP3PfdLiaCg6cA9baRnZ23YftQU8MQ","type":"image\/jpeg"}]},"_wpas_customize_per_network":false},"categories":[12,14],"tags":[15141],"class_list":["post-74380","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-local","category-news","tag-the-lakeland-city-commission-unanimously-approved-a-series-of-annual-base-rate-increases-for-lakeland-electric-that-will-total-15-87-over-four-years"],"jetpack_publicize_connections":[],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/lakelandgazette.info\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/74380","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/lakelandgazette.info\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/lakelandgazette.info\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/lakelandgazette.info\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/lakelandgazette.info\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=74380"}],"version-history":[{"count":1,"href":"https:\/\/lakelandgazette.info\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/74380\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":74381,"href":"https:\/\/lakelandgazette.info\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/74380\/revisions\/74381"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/lakelandgazette.info\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/52931"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/lakelandgazette.info\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=74380"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/lakelandgazette.info\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=74380"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/lakelandgazette.info\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=74380"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}