CLAYTON — During the November general election Clayton voters approved a ballot issue to implement an electric aggregation program.

On March 16 city council passed a resolution approving the Plan of Operation and Governance for the Miami Valley Communications Council electric aggregation program for the purpose of establishing and implementing an electric program for the city.

At its Feb. 16 meeting, city council passed a resolution authorizing MVCC to act as its governmental aggregator for electricity.

MVCC is a council of governments with projects that are conducive collaborations with aggregation among the benefits. MVCC opted to use Toledo based Palmer Energy Company to obtain a best price for participating municipalities.

Palmer works to negotiate the lowest possible price for electric and natural gas services for participating government agencies.

By the end of March or April the MVCC hopes to have fixed price quotes in place for electric aggregation for participating governments. By the end of summer or early fall requests for proposals (RFP) for gas rates should also be in place.

Several Miami Valley communities are either actively involved in, or are seeking to join the regional aggregation effort to obtain more competitive energy rates for its residents and small businesses.

Clayton held two public hearings on March 16 regarding its intent to adopt a plan of operation and governance by the MVCC for the electric aggregation program.

One public hearing, held at noon on March 16, saw three residents and two council members in attendance. A second public hearing held at 6 p.m. the same day saw four residents attend with one council member present.

“The questions from residents were good. I think once everyone understood what was happening, everybody was on board,” said City Manager Amanda Zimmerlin. “They did ask that we hold more informational meetings and our representative from Palmer said that he was happy to do that for us, so we can get those scheduled and we will get information out to our residents about that.”

Reach Ron Nunnari at (937) 684-9124 or email [email protected].