Another hit to Oregonians' pocketbooks

As if soaring gas and food prices isn't enough, we've just learned about another way Oregonians are going to be hit in the pocketbook - heating your homes this winter.

NW Natural and other natural gas companies offered projections to the Oregon Public Utility Commission today, and the numbers aren't good:

Northwest Natural says its 595,000 customers in Oregon can expect a rate increase between 35-40%. Cascade, which supplies 200,000 customers in eastern Oregon, says rates will go up 15-20%. Avista, the gas company for southern Oregon, is projecting a 10-15% increase.

PGE is also talking about 15% increases, on top of the increases we've already had over the past few years.

When will these rate increases hit? Natural gas prices would increase in November and electricity rates next year (I'm guessing the start of the year). Just when people need electricity and natural gas the most so that their homes aren't freezing. And if next winter/spring is anything like this year, we could see the need for heating homes lasting much further into the year than normal.

How scarce is firewood going to become? How polluted will our air become due to all the fireplaces going? How many stories are we going to hear on the news about families dying from carbon monoxide poisoning because they used a grill inside for heat - or the elderly dying from the cold?

I certainly don't know how we're going to afford any increases in our electricity - we already went without heat for much of last winter because of the cost. I already see us buying a lot more wood for the fire than we did last year. And I'm doing more than considering buying new heaters to be used in the apartment instead of the extremely inefficient heaters that come with the unit. It may cost for the heaters, but will make a huge difference on our electricity bill.

How much more obvious to people does it need to get that we absolutely have to do everything we can to elect Obama to the White House, Merkley to the U.S. Senate, and Dems to Congress and state legislature? I don't know that our poor and middle class can survive much more of this. I know our family can't.