ALEXANDRIA, La. (KALB) - For 45 minutes during Tuesday’s Alexandria City Council meeting, utility customers spoke out claiming that recent high utility bill costs have put them in a tough, financial bind.

“A changing policy needs to be clearly communicated,” said one resident. “The people of our city simply do not understand what’s going on their bill, because the city has not made an effort to clearly communicate what’s on their bills.”

Earlier this month, a survey went out to utility customers in Alexandria asking them about the impacts that the high bills have had on their wallets. The survey was sent out on October 9 by Central Louisiana Interfaith and within a few days, the survey had received over 1,000 responses. In the findings, 70 percent of utility customers reported struggling to meet basic needs due to high utility bills.

86 percent of those who responded to the survey said their monthly bills are at least $250, while close to six percent shared that their average bill is over $1,000. Many Alexandria utility customers who responded also stated that they are falling behind on their bills with 67 percent saying they have an overdue balance greater than $100. The survey broke down the stats even further to show that 15 percent of respondents have a standing balance of over $1,000.

One-third of the respondents also shared that their power had been cut off at some point over the last three months.

At the beginning of this year, the City of Alexandria unveiled Project RESTOR, a multi-million dollar grant relief fund aimed at helping relieve customers from those hard-to-pay bills. Hundreds of applicants received financial assistance as part of the program, but some customers still had a remaining balance in their account depending on how much they were awarded.

According to information provided by Utility Director Mike Marcotte back in April, the remaining RESTOR balance would be converted to an installment payment plan not to exceed 12 months. This also applied to customers’ accounts who still had a balance but either did not qualify or applied for a RESTOR grant. In that release sent to KALB, Marcotte said each customer’s payment plan information would appear at the end of their monthly utility bill under the heading Project RESTOR.

However, some residents claimed during Tuesday’s council meeting that the information was not properly communicated to them and that the extra costs due to the payment plan have made their monthly bills unpayable.

“We feel like this Project RESTOR was supposed to help the citizens,” said another utility customer. “In reality, it tremendously hurt us.”

Utility customers called for more transparency from the City of Alexandria and Utility Director Mike Marcotte. Alexandria Mayor Jacques Roy and Marcotte were not present at the council meeting.

District 2 Councilman Gary Johnson called for the public hearing on Tuesday, October 31. Following the meeting, he said it won’t be the last meeting that customers will have the chance to express their concerns with their utility bills.

Story by Dylan Domangue

Read more from KALB here.