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Show Public Service Commission Turns Down City's Electric Power Differential Rate Plea The Utah State Public Service Commission has turned down Cedar City's request for a reduction in rates from the Southern Utah Power Company. The commission announced an-nounced its rejection of the application for a differential rate Thursday, the members explaining that the differential differen-tial rate would represent a departure from Utah rate-making theory. The plea was filed for the city by Dr. L. V. Broadbent, then serving as mayor, who based the plea for lower rates on the assumption that power can be furnished cheaper inside the city or in an area with congested con-gested population than in other parts of the Southern Utah Power Company territory. It was pointed point-ed out that distribution to users within the city residential, industrial in-dustrial and commercial was much more economical than to the widely separated farm areas and small communities long distances dis-tances apart. However, the commission ruled that even if this is true, the theory that rate for a given class of service should be the same to all customers of an electric utility utili-ty regardless of location, should not be put aside. Commission members argued that if Cedar City's position is valid, a separate rate should also be fixed for every other community, commu-nity, taking into consideration its location, population and power usage. The city application did not claim that company rates were unreasonable, but simply asked that the city rates be based on actual cost of serving the city, and not on cost of serving serv-ing the entire area. The commission also raised doubts as to whether "actual cost" figures could be broken down accurately, since so many different factors must be considered consid-ered In making such a cost study. The action by the commission means that no differential rate scale can be expected, or any immediate im-mediate change in rates. This particular study and decision dealt only with the differential rate and had no bearing on general gen-eral rate increases or reductions. |