OMU hoping tides turn for revenue in second half of year

July 24, 2020 | 12:07 am

Updated July 23, 2020 | 11:29 pm

Photo by AP Imagery

In a financial report presented Thursday, Owensboro Municipal Utilities revealed that revenue has been down since the start of June due to COVID-19, but officials are hoping to rebound in the coming months.

June saw electricity revenue down 14% and water revenue down 1.4% for residents, bringing the total revenue stream down by $61,000. 

With so many Owensboro residents facing economic challenges themselves during the pandemic, OMU said it made fiscal sense to see June’s revenue stream down from the previous year. 

“We’re still seeing some COVID impacts in June,” General Manager Kevin Frizzell said Thursday. “Hopefully those will improve as we move forward.” 

One of the positive outcomes for the month of June included increased telecommunications revenue, which improved by 8.3%. 

Increased use of OMUfibernet during the pandemic stemmed from more people working from home and utilizing their residential and commercial internet service. Frizzell said OMU was continuing to see more City residents make the switch to OMUfibernet since the pandemic began, adding that the service now covered one-third of the City. 

Bracing for what could be a rough quarter if COVID-19 numbers don’t improve means OMU is still not out of the woods in terms of revenue, but Frizzell said OMU had handled the pandemic very well. A 2020 financial report revealed steady streams of revenue and lower-than-normal expenditures because of the closure of the Elmer Smith Power Station. 

“For fiscal year 2020, we’re pleased with the outcomes of our financials,” Frizzell said. “It was a challenging year in a couple different ways. The coronavirus impacted a whole quarter of that year. We responded very well as a utility, and as an organization. We were able to weather that different kind of storm.” 

Customer usage in July was coming closer to what OMU had budgeted for, Frizzell said. 

“In June we’ve seen a fairly normal temperature load,” he said. “We’re tracking usages and coming back up toward normal for this time of year.” 

July 24, 2020 | 12:07 am

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