Essex councillor feels vindicated after ELK Energy probe, penalty

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An Essex town councilor said she feels vindicated after local electricity provider ELK Energy Inc. was penalized by a provincial regulator for improper record keeping on its assets.

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“I was, unfortunately, not surprised because this is everything I’ve been saying,” said Sherry Bondy. “There’s really no excuse for this.”

Following an integrity commissioner’s investigation triggered by her colleagues, Bondy was docked a month’s pay last summer for, in part, her “long history of aggressively criticalizing staff” at ELK Energy. She had argued she was simply trying to get answers for constituents criticizing the local utility’s provision of services, but a council majority voted to sanction her.

In a report made public Tuesday, the Ontario Energy Board said an investigation found the local utility had not kept appropriate records of asset inspections. It levied a $5,000 fine. ELK also had to sign an assurance of voluntary compliance — a commitment to fix the issue — and acknowledge the non-compliance when it was issued the fine.

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“It’s kind of unfortunate. I would have loved to be proven wrong,” said Bondy. “But now we’re seeing in this report — no evidence of assets inspected, no records of past inspections.”

The latest OEB findings, she said, add credence to her previously voiced concerns. She said the issues date back to 2017 when the OEB advised the municipally owned utility to do several audits and an asset condition assessment. She said she pushed for ELK follow-up, leading to complaints of harassment by ELK employees.

The Ontario Energy Board conducted an inspection in March 2021 related to ELK’s last major rate proceeding and found the utility had not been keeping records of inspections on its assets, and therefore couldn’t provide evidence its assets had been regularly inspected.

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But Ron McDermott, chair of the ELK Energy board, said the issue with inspections dates back years and has now been corrected.

“There was a problem a couple of years ago, we got the fine, everything’s been taken care of,” said McDermott, a former Essex major.

The investigation and resulting fine can be attributed to the need to modernize the utility’s record-keeping, said Essex Mayor Richard Meloche.

“It wasn’t that the work wasn’t being done. It just wasn’t computerized,” said Meloche, who also sits on the ELK board.

With a recent change in management, Meloche said there aren’t any current issues with the utility.

“The OEB … approved the new system that we’re using, so they’re okay with everything that’s happening in the current and present day,” he said. Both Meloche and McDermott said they believe the issue has been resolved.

But Bondy isn’t satisfied.

“Council needs to discuss this quite urgently,” she said. “I hope we look at better practices regarding the governance of this board.

“I would like to see a plan in place that’s going to show that ELK Energy is going to get on track.”

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