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RIDGWAY, CO–U.S. Rep. Jeff Hurd voted Wednesday to approve the House budget, a sharply contested piece of legislation with sweeping implications for Medicaid, food stamps and local renewable energy tax credits.

Most notably, the budget eliminates billions of dollars in energy tax credits that utility co-ops like San Miguel Power Association have relied on for projects across their service region. These include solar microgrids to boost community resilience, battery backup systems for emergency services and building upgrades for energy efficiency.

“Assuming that the tax credits aren’t put back into this budget bill, we can say goodbye to everything in the planning stages,” said Ouray County Commissioner Jake Niece. “We can say goodbye to those battery systems that are planned in Ouray County and the rest of the San Miguel Power service territory. Everything that Terry spoke about that keeps our electrical grid strong will be weaker with the loss of those tax credits that we removed last night.”

Niece spoke in Ridgway alongside local leaders, business owners and co-op representatives at the town’s new resilience hub, the Decker Room — a facility powered entirely by a solar microgrid made possible through energy tax credits created by the Inflation Reduction Act (IRA).

“Both Jeff Hurd and the Trump Administration have prioritized American energy dominance,” Niece said. “And energy dominance means harvesting energy from the sun, wind, geothermal energy and nuclear sources — all things that the IRA clean energy tax credits incentivize.”

For rural counties like Ouray, those credits have helped communities upgrade to modern renewable systems at little or no cost. But Niece said the broader implications of the budget bill go beyond energy.

“That budget bill will increase the federal deficit by $2.3 trillion, cuts $267 billion from SNAP and food stamps, cuts $700 billion from Medicaid — and all to extend tax cuts to the richest 1% and to increase military spending,” he said.

Josh Shipley, owner of Alternative Power Enterprises, a Ridgway-based solar installer, said the cuts threaten his business.

“This last year we did $700,000 worth of work on projects that benefited from the ITC [Investment Tax Credit], that we expect to not see moving forward,” Shipley said. “$200,000 worth of ITC money — what that means to a company my size in an area like this — it’s completely detrimental. We will more than likely not survive it.”

The IRA credits supported $90 million in planned renewable energy investments for San Miguel Power Association. If the budget passes, those projects have just 60 days to break ground.

Ted Compton, board president of the La Plata Electric Association, said the IRA marked a historic shift in federal policy for rural energy.

“The IRA as a whole, with its tax provisions included, is probably the most impactful federal policy for rural electricity since the 1936 Rural Electrification Act,” Compton said. “It’s a big statement, but I think if you think about it a little bit, you’d be hard-pressed to disagree. The things that are happening because of this are things that haven’t happened at such a pace since 1936.”

Without the credits, Compton warned, rural communities could lose out on both reliable and affordable power.

“We are starting to realize the value and impact that they can have with these fiscal tools,” he said. “It will be a huge step backward for rural co-ops and communities to lose this federal support, and I believe it creates a real risk to these communities for the reliability and affordability of their electrical supply.”

While Hurd previously supported the protection of energy tax credits, his vote on the House budget eliminates them entirely as the bill now moves to the Senate.

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