Taking a Stand: Century Aluminum weighs in on House Bill 211 - 14 News, WFIE, Evansville, Henderson, Owensboro

This is a guest editorial from Jason Young, an employee of Century Aluminum.

"I am not a politician or a lobbyist - I am here trying to save the jobs of 700 people I work with. 

High paid lobbyists for the power companies are trying to scare people about House Bill 211 - a bill that will save our plant.

Here are the facts.

First - The power companies are not negotiating in good faith. They have a monopoly and wouldn't even talk to Century until we paid them $600,000 for their DC lawyers. After that they still refused to make a proposal that keeps the plant open.

Second - The bill does NOT raise rates for a single ratepayer. The "increase"  the lobbyists talk about is money the power company themselves asked ratepayers to pay BEFORE the bill was even proposed. Even if there were "extra costs," Century is required by the bill to pay $10 million every year guaranteeing nobody's rates will go up.

Third - Unless the bill is passed now, the plant will close for good and we will lose 700 good jobs at the plant and thousands more throughout Kentucky - and these jobs will never return.    
Don't let high priced lobbyists scare you. The bill does not raise rates for anyone and will saves thousands of Kentucky jobs. Thank you."