Rural Missouri - November 2013 - (Page 5)

Hart to Heart Help win the war on rates strategy. The president's plan would Now EPA has released new rules certainly end those benefits. Not only that effectively prevent any new coalwill your bills increase dramatically, fired power plants from being built. but the reliability of the entire elecOur chief concern is that in 2014, the ports cars. Jewelry. Yachts. A tricity grid in Missouri could eventuagency will announce similar rules mansion on the beach. These ally suffer. directed at existing coal plants. are all luxury items that some The concept of electricity as a This "all-but-one" energy policy - of us might want, but few of us luxury item has already become realwith coal being the "one" - replaces can afford. Let's hope we don't have ity in Germany, where misguided sound business strategy that encourto add electricity to that list. energy policy should ages a balanced portfoElectric cooperatives nationwide serve as a dire warning lio of energy are gearing up to to Americans. Germany sources. Your make sure that moved away from the cooperatively doesn't happen with traditional base-load owned eleca goal of sending 1 generation we have in tricity supplier million member mesTo watch a video on the Missouri and the Midhas used a balsages with a common fight for affordable rates, west. The result has theme - "protect click this button inside our ance of coal, been a disaster. natural gas, our rates" - to the digital edition, online at Germans now pay hydropower Environmental Prowww.ruralmissouri.coop. the highest electricity and wind tection Agency (EPA). rates in Europe. Electric energy to ensure reliMembers, we need your help in bills have doubled, and ability and affordability. this effort, just like we did when you disconnects for nonYou have benefited responded to the threats of cap-andpayment of electric bills greatly from this "alltrade legislation and flooded our electaverage 300,000 a year. of-the-above" energy ed officials with more than 650,000 similar messages. Here's what's happening: In June, "You can help win this war on rates. Join the President Obama gave a speech at Georgetown University where he rest of Co-op Nation as we fight for affordable promised new regulations directed electricity at www.action.coop." against power plants that use coal to generate electricity. Of course, this caught our attention, because 80 perBarry Hart cent of the electricity you use comes from coal. S by Barry Hart bhart@amec.coop A study commissioned by the German government says electricity will cost 40 cents a kilowatt-hour by 2020. The situation is so bad German charity groups have coined a new term: "energy poverty." Back home, Missouri's U.S. Sen. Roy Blunt has joined the fight to protect rates and reliability. In a recent column, he wrote that nearly 40 million American families "earning less than $30,000 a year already spend almost 20 percent of their budgets on energy costs. By putting in rules that would, basically, ban the construction of new coal plants, the EPA is punishing our nation's most vulnerable families who suffer the most from bad energy policy and higher utility bills." You can help win this war on rates. Join the rest of Co-op Nation as we fight for affordable electricity at www. action.coop. This grassroots website will let you quickly and easily send a message to the EPA that you are concerned about the consequences of this misguided plan. Stand with us as we fight to keep electric bills affordable. Tell the EPA we need an "all-of-the-above" energy strategy. Hart is the executive vice president of the Association of Missouri Electric Cooperatives. Guest Column Reducing the regulatory burden M by U.S. Rep. Sam Graves info@ruralmissouri.coop any of us who own small businesses recognize that the cost of federal regulations is unbearable - and getting worse. Every day, it seems there is some new requirement or yet another new rule that makes it that much harder to keep our businesses operating, let alone expanding. Remarkably, a recent study found that regulatory burdens on Americans increased by nearly $70 billion during President Obama's first term in office, with federal agencies imposing 131 new major regulations. In 2012 alone, the administration issued $23.5 billion in new regulatory costs from 25 major rulemakings and issued 3,800 new final rules in total. And more regulations are on the way, including more than half of the 398 rules required by the Dodd-Frank law that have yet to be written, as well as additional regulations from the president's health-care law. As chairman of the House Small Business Committee, I have made scrutinizing federal regulations a priority. One of the ways we have done that is by being a resource to small business owners about new and forthcoming regulations. On Jan. 31, we launched "Small Biz Reg Watch," an online initiative of the committee to help small businesses across the nation participate in the development of federal regulations. The interactive resource on the committee's website (smallbusiness.house.gov) highlights key proposed regulations that affect small companies and instructs business owners how to make comments to the federal agency considering the proposed regulation. Most small businesses do not have employees who focus on regulatory compliance, nor do they understand the rule-making process, so this initiative will help them engage in how regulations are created. Another item we have looked at is the Regulatory Flexibility Act (RFA), which requires federal agencies to assess the economic impact of their regulations on small firms, and if significant, consider less burdensome alternatives. Although the law has been on the books for more than three decades, agencies still fail to fully comply with the RFA's requirements. That is why I introduced legislation called the Regulatory Flexibility Improvements Act of 2013 to protect "Not all regulations are bad. But far too many are burdensome, and the sheer sum of them is a problem." U.S. Rep. Sam Graves NOVEMBER 2013 small business from costly regulations. This legislation does not stop new rules from being written, but it creates a more transparent process so there is a better understanding of the consequence of regulations on those who are forced to comply. This will, in turn, ease compliance concerns and result in better rules for everyone involved. We have 125 small business groups from across the country on board with our effort, and both the Small Business and Judiciary committees have reviewed and approved the bill. I expect the House to act on this in the near future. Not all regulations are bad. But far too many are burdensome, and the sheer sum of them is a problem. There is no question that small businesses are struggling under the weight of government mandates. To alleviate this situation, let's call on Washington to practice some restraint. The economy will be better off, and small businesses will have more room to both grow and create jobs. Graves represents Missouri's 6th Congressional District in the U.S. House of Representatives. He also chairs the House Small Business Committee. 5 http://www.action.coop http://www.action.coop http://www.action.coop." http://smallbusiness.house.gov http://smallbusiness.house.gov

Table of Contents for the Digital Edition of Rural Missouri - November 2013

Rural Missouri - November 2013
Contents
Comments
Columns
White mules and family wine
Helping our neighbors
A rolling tribute to freedom
Outdoors
Out of the Way Eats
Big man from a small town
Hearth and Home
Best of rural Missouri
Salvaging history
Around Missouri
Marketplace
Neighbors
Just4Kids

Rural Missouri - November 2013