Local restaurants hurting from Colorado Springs Utilities recent rate increase

COLORADO SPRINGS, Colo. (KRDO) -- When asked about his business, positivity beams through Jake Norment's voice. He's owned the ice cream and coffee shop the Caffeinated Cow in Colorado Springs for "three and a half glorious years."

During those three years, Norment and his wife have experienced the strain of the pandemic and are working to come back from that. However, now he's facing a new financial obstacle, a utility rate hike from Colorado Springs Utilities.

On Nov. 9, the Colorado Springs City Council approved a rate hike for electric and natural gas. For residential customers, prices were raised by 13.5% for electricity and 26.8% for natural gas.

For commercial businesses, the increase was even higher. Rates went up by 17.4% for electricity and 32.9% for natural gas.

Norment says he's never had a bill this high and believes the only way to make up the difference is to raise prices.

"You can't just magically mysteriously make 33% just appear out of anywhere," Norment told KRDO. "33% is pretty intense, especially on a small business, not a corporation, a small business."

Caffeinated Cow isn't the only local business struggling to pay the rate increase.

Travis Blaney, the president of the Pikes Peak chapter of the Colorado Restaurant Association and the general manager for the group Choice Restaurant Concepts, explained the financial hit he's bracing for.

"It's tens of thousands of dollars a year for us," Blaney said when asked how much his group will lose from the rate increase.

Colorado Springs Utilities told KRDO that natural gas prices have continued to rise globally, and the rate hike is just a response to the rise.

According to CSU, natural gas prices are now almost 100% higher than this time last year because of a combination of supply concerns and rising demand.

Like small business owners, Colorado Springs Utilities hopes the rates decrease. Still, Norment is left questioning why the rate increase was higher for businesses, who are still working their way out of the financial hole of the pandemic than they are for residential.

"We understand that those prices go up for whatever reason," Norment said. "But It doesn't make any sense."