LETTERS: All electricity consumers should pay the same rate

Power rate equity

I read about the Nevada Public Utilities Commission voting to penalize homeowners who try to reduce their power bill by installing solar panels ("PUC OKs new solar rates," Dec. 23 Review-Journal). I paid big bucks to install solar on my house last year and did not realize that I was subsidizing solar owners before I installed them.

Since my installation, I have not received any subsidy checks. What gives? The rate per kilowatt hour and the fixed fees I paid before and after installation are the same. The only cost to NV Energy was the electric meter that allows them to use any temporary excess energy I might generate. NV Energy has not sent me checks for excess generation.

The net metering policy limited the number of solar panels I could install, thus limiting over-generation. I do use less power than before, but that just leaves more for others. I do understand NV Energy's mandate to provide power to everyone, that demand for power is ever increasing and the supply of power is relatively fixed, unless more power plants are built.

Two things could be done: One, increase the supply by building another power plant (which might be too costly). Two, decrease the demand by using less power. Both could be accomplished by encouraging homeowners to foot the bill by installing solar panels on their homes.

Otherwise, NV Energy will have to build the plants, buy the fuel to run them and build the transmission lines to deliver the power, with all costs passed on to the consumer.

It makes sense to generate power at the point where it is used (the home) at no cost to NV Energy or to other homeowners who do not have solar. The excess electricity not used by solar owners is available to nonsolar homes at whatever rate NV Energy decides (blame NV Energy, not solar owners). The bottom line is that the rate should be the same for all who buy power.

Robert Morrow

Las Vegas

Paying teachers

Regarding Steven G. Hayes' letter on teachers' salaries ("Teachers contract," Dec. 24 Review-Journal), once again, we see misinformation about teachers' salaries. This is not surprising, since Las Vegas ranks as one of the most stupid cities of its size in the country.

Mr. Hayes thinks the teachers are only interested in their income, not in the welfare of the students. Well, of course. When a person puts in a minimum of four years to get a college education, that person is going to want decent compensation for work.

In this country, the average starting salary for a college graduate is almost $49,000. Now, back when women could only do "women's work," there was an abundance of talented people with degrees who could only work as teachers, nurses or secretaries. Almost all other venues were closed to them. But now a woman with a degree can have her choice of jobs.

Given the poor pay for Clark County teachers — the new starting salary is $40,000, about 20 percent lower than average for a college graduate — the people going into teaching in this state are usually the poorest students from the worst-ranked schools. Heck, a highway flagman in this state starts at that salary.

If our state legislators didn't reflect the level of ignorance of our population, then they would find some way to pay teachers enough so that we could attract enough qualified people to not have a shortage of almost 1,000 teachers. But this is to be expected in a state where less than a quarter of the population has a college degree.

If you want competence, you need to pay for it. In this case, that would require that teachers start at almost $50,000 a year, 25 percent more than their current starting salary. And until the state sees fit to pay teachers at least an average wage, we will continue to rank as one of the least educated states in the country.

Doug Nusbaum

Henderson

Postal policy

Congratulations to the U.S. Postal Service for enforcing the law of the land, something the Justice Department is reluctant to do ("USPS and pot ads," Monday Review-Journal editorial). Despite the potheads' contention that a majority of Americans support legalization of recreational marijuana, it hasn't happened yet, and hopefully never will.

In the meantime, let's educate our population about the dangers and harmful effects of marijuana and other drugs. I'm pretty sure a healthy United States would prevail.

Fred G. Breitling

Las Vegas