{"id":422867,"date":"2026-10-09T03:02:08","date_gmt":"2026-10-09T03:02:08","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-fl\/422867\/"},"modified":"2026-10-09T03:02:08","modified_gmt":"2026-10-09T03:02:08","slug":"rates-increasing-again-thats-what-jea-cfo-says-is-next-for-the-company-as-customers-struggle-to-pay-bills","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-fl\/422867\/","title":{"rendered":"Rates increasing again? That\u2019s what JEA CFO says is next for the company as customers struggle to pay bills"},"content":{"rendered":"

JACKSONVILLE, Fla. \u2013 JEA customers are still trying to adjust to a rate increase<\/a> that took effect Oct. 1, and now News4JAX has learned another one is on the way.<\/p>\n

JEA\u2019s Chief Financial Officer Ted Phillips confirmed a rate hike is planned for fiscal year 2027-28, driven in part by the cost of building a new combined cycle power plant \u2014 a project priced at roughly $1.5 billion \u2014 that will replace a nearly 50-year-old JEA facility. <\/p>\n

Phillips said rising fuel costs are also a factor, noting the utility\u2019s fleet drives nearly 11 million miles per year, much of it in diesel trucks.<\/p>\n

RELATED | JEA customers to see higher water, sewer bills as rate increases take effect<\/a><\/p>\n

\u201cSo for us to keep our systems reliable, we are having increased costs and we have to pass those costs back to our customers,\u201d Phillips said.<\/p>\n

Rates already up for the second time in 18 months<\/p>\n

The Oct. 1 increase \u2014 the second in a year and a half \u2014 raised electricity rates by more than 6% and water and sewer rates by 8%. For many customers, the back-to-back increases have been a breaking point.<\/p>\n

Frustrated JEA customers came to Jacksonville City Hall Thursday night, expressing anger at rising costs and what they described as a lack of flexibility from the publicly owned utility.<\/p>\n

Wilshan Tiller, a JEA customer, spoke at the podium and said the utility doubled his deposit despite a 15-year relationship.<\/p>\n

\u201cI gotta make this out. So because my lights was getting cut off, they didn\u2019t help me. They didn\u2019t say \u2018we\u2019re community serviced.\u2019 They said, \u2018Hey, we\u2019re going to double your deposit\u2019 \u2014 that I done have service with them for 15 years!\u201d Tiller said.<\/p>\n

Rev. Dr. Russell Meyer, pastor of St. John\u2019s Lutheran Church, put it bluntly: \u201cThis is unconscionable. JEA\u2019s money is the public\u2019s money. It\u2019s not their money.\u201d<\/p>\n

Council members float $2 million relief plan<\/p>\n

City council members Reggie Gaffney and Jimmy Peluso spearheaded Thursday\u2019s meeting in an effort to find ways to help customers at risk of having their electricity or water cut off.<\/p>\n

The proposal taking shape: pull $2 million from the city\u2019s operating reserves to assist customers with late utility payments and hire additional staff in the nonprofit sector to handle calls for help.<\/p>\n

That need is significant. United Way of Northeast Florida\u2019s 2-1-1 call service received more than 46,000 calls from Duval County residents in a single year \u2014 but had only seven staff members to handle them.<\/p>\n

\u201cThe 5,100 were the people who got support. The number of calls we have gotten from Duval County is over 46,000 each year,\u201d said Coretta Hill, CEO of United Way of Northeast Florida.<\/p>\n

What happens next<\/p>\n

Council members agreed to refine the proposal at a follow-up meeting. They may wait to bring it before the full council until after the November vote on Amendment 3.<\/p>\n

Copyright 2026 by WJXT News4JAX – All rights reserved.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"JACKSONVILLE, Fla. \u2013 JEA customers are still trying to adjust to a rate increase that took effect Oct.…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":422868,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[8],"tags":[116,118,117,501],"class_list":["post-422867","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-jacksonville","tag-jacksonville","tag-jacksonville-headlines","tag-jacksonville-news","tag-jea"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-fl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/422867","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-fl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-fl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-fl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-fl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=422867"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-fl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/422867\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-fl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/422868"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-fl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=422867"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-fl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=422867"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-fl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=422867"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}