MITCHELL, S.D. – South Dakota-based Central Electric Cooperative has a policy in effect to provide electricity to its customers in the winter months regardless of their ability to pay. However, Crow Creek Reservation tribal members are getting their power turned off by the company in the midst of extreme blizzard conditions.
In numerous instances, Crow Creek residents have medical conditions that require the use of electricity, and many other residents have small children and/or elderly in the home.
In a place where tribal members remember promises from Central Electric to provide electrical power free of charge, tribal residents’ pay electricity rates one-third higher than the national average.
In 1955, Central Electric displaced an entire town of American Indians on the Crow Creek Reservation with the construction of the Big Bend Dam, built to provide a source of electricity.
Upon the dam’s completion nine years later, tribal members remember the company promising to rebuild schools and other buildings abandoned because of the tribes relocation. According to tribal members, the company also promised free electricity to residents living on the reservation.
None of these promises have ever been fulfilled.
Central Electric has denied claims of unfair treatment, but recent video footage from resident and former Marine Peter Lengkeek proves the company is not being forthcoming.
Lengkeek admits he did not initially know why he should film the footage, he simply felt that Central Electric was unfair to tribal members.
“I don’t know what prompted me to get a video recorder. Something just told me I had to. I hung onto the footage for almost a year until I had met Eric Klein, and when I met him, something inside me told me that I was supposed to give it to him. So I gave it to him, and unbelievable things are happening now.”
Klein is the founder of CAN-DO, a direct outcome organization that provides aid and relief in emergencies.
In June 2008, the organization delivered relief supplies to the residents of the Crow Creek Indian Reservation in South Dakota. During this time, Klein learned from Lengkeek that for years, the local utility company had been discontinuing electric service to residents during the coldest winter months for inability to pay.
Klein took the footage from Lengkeek and posted it on his organization’s Web site.
In response to Klein’s assertions and posting of Lengkeek’s video, officials from Central Electric denied that electric service has been discontinued in extreme winter conditions.
“The video that you recently watched is not a true description of what actually takes place to collect delinquent accounts on the Crow Creek Reservation. Central Electric follows the South Dakota Public Utility laws for disconnecting electric services for non-payment, which means we will disconnect a service for non-payment at the appropriate time,” reads a statement from the company.
“Central Electric does have a winter disconnect procedure whereby no meters are disconnected in cold or inclement weather. Also, Central Electric does not disconnect services when there is a medical necessity for electricity. Central Electric works very close with the tribal leadership groups and tribal members to minimize the need to disconnect services. In fact, there have not been any disconnects for the past three months.”
“The electric company says that they are not going to cut you off in inclement weather, but they’ve been doing it,” Klein said. “We have proof that the company has been doing it since 2006. The housing board gave me all of the information.”
Klein’s claim in opposition to Central Electric appears true. On the CAN-DO Web site there are copies of customer utility discontinuation notices dated within severe winter timeframes.
On a reservation that has an unemployment rate of 80 percent and which lies close to Central Electric, Klein wonders why residents pay one-third higher rates than the rest of the country.
“We were told originally that the electricity came from Chicago, but it does come from Central Electric Cooperative. They do have the power to give them the free electricity. They said there are 500 meters on the reservation and we are only a small operation. That is not true because the electric company supplies electricity to eight states. The senators from those eight states would probably be interested to know that the power that is coming to the states is actually originating from the reservation.”
Lengkeek praised the work of Klein and CAN-DO.
“I have no words for what Eric Klein and CAN-DO have helped us do. It took awhile for us to trust Eric because of people who have come here in the past. We prayed on it and were told that Eric is the man who will help us. CAN-DO is providing hope in a place where there is no hope.”
Additional comments from Central Electric Cooperative are currently being sought.
To express your concern on this matter contact Central Electric Cooperative at (541) 548-2144.
