Torrington resident Andrielle Walsh always pays a little extra on her bills to stay ahead for the next month. But when she opened her latest electricity bill, one she'd already paid ahead, the amount due caught her completely off guard.
“When I got my bill this last time I almost cried,” Walsh told Cowboy State Daily.
The bill came in about $100 higher than usual. For Walsh, who works at a local brewery and said she lives paycheck to paycheck, the hit was hard to absorb.
“I have five kids, so it’s definitely a difference, especially since school started,” she said. “We had just bought school supplies, we had done all these things. So it was a big shock when I got my last bill.”
189% increase
Walsh isn't alone.
The city of Torrington announced a sharp, unexpected jump in the cost of transmitting power into the city, which is rippling down to residents' bills.
The city announced the transmission portion of the utility's wholesale power bill rose 189% in June 2026 compared to June 2025 after the region's provider switched from the Western Area Power Administration to the Southwest Power Pool.
That increase translates to an estimated $800,000 in additional costs annually, the city said.
“Torrington and its wholesale power provider Municipal Energy Agency of Nebraska (MEAN) are working diligently together to discern the cause of the sharp increase,” the city said in a statement.
It is unclear why the transition resulted in such a dramatic increase.
Cowboy State Daily reached out to Torrington Mayor Herb Doby for comment and did not hear back by publication.
Officials from WAPA and the Southwest Power Pool also did not respond to requests for comment.
The average income in Torrington between 2020-2024 was $47,902, according to the U.S. Census. The U.S. Census American Community Survey found that 18.8% of Torrington residents were living below the poverty line, which is 84% higher than the national average.
‘Nothing has changed’
Kaylynn Fogleman, who's lived in Torrington for 43 years, said she was also hit with an increase of about $100 on her last bill. Because she said she powers several campers from her home electricity, she’s accustomed to a high bill and wasn’t especially shocked by the increase.
“Inflation is bad,” Fogleman said. “I think everything gets slow.”
But when Manda Kimmel, a 10-year resident of Torrington, opened her monthly bill for $312.92, she did a double take.
“I went online to look at the bill because I was like, 'There's no way it went up that much,’” Kimmel said. “Our AC isn't running any more than it ran the month before. Nothing has changed in our house.”
Her bill for July was around $245, Kimmel said, and while she wasn’t happy to pay almost $70 more, she decided not to call the power company to complain or report the spike.
“I just paid it,” Kimmel said. “I also have questions about the utility bills for my business address. I just feel like I'm not going to get anywhere.”
