Letter to the Editor: A lot of risks to a municipal electric utility in Decorah

(The following Letter to the Editor has been submitted by Herb Hageman of Decorah.  Hageman is a retired Alliant Energy employee):

"I've heard a lot of talk about taking over the electric utility but there are a few things that have been missing from the conversation. 

Reliability
When Decorah gets hit with a bad storm, Alliant Energy's Decorah team will be on the scene immediately with hundreds of additional technicians close behind them. Storms are inevitable, and I feel better knowing that the people maintaining the energy grid have strong backup. Over the last few years, I've had to reset the time on my microwave more for daylight savings than for outages and I'd like to keep it that way.

Replacing the taxes
Alliant Energy pays more than $160,000 annually in property taxes to the city, the county, and, most importantly, to the school district. If the utility's property becomes the city's property, there will be a hole in all of their already-tight budgets.

The county and school district are sensitive to the loss of tax dollars. It would make it harder for the county to replace and repair bridges and for schools to have the resources they need. Less taxable property also reduces local bonding limits. This would affect people in town and the whole county.

Alliant Energy and its predecessor, Interstate Power, worked very hard and invested in the development of the industrial parks and in bringing industries to Decorah. When local businesses grow and new ones come to town, Alliant Energy has built to them and covered the costs.

There's just a lot more risks to this than many people are thinking."