Result, rejected
Voters rejected the charter amendment. This proposal does not create a utility commission. 673 yes (31.40%), 1,470 no (68.60%), all four precincts reporting, in unofficial results reported through November 6, 2026 at 9:58 a.m. Central. Minnesota Secretary of State
This guide was written before the vote and is kept as written. City and school district boards canvass local results November 6 to 13. The State Canvassing Board meets November 19.
Compare Minnesota city electric utilities
Background for checking comparisons made in the debate, from State Auditor data on 129 Minnesota city electric funds. Not every measure is comparable across cities. Flagged cells say why.
Pick a city to check
The first column stays Luverne unless you change it. The second column is the city you are checking.
Cities named in the Luverne debate: St. James · Jackson · Granite Falls · Marshall · Hutchinson · New Ulm · Fairmont · Austin · Worthington · Windom · Litchfield · Buffalo
Where these numbers come from, and their limits
Inputs are the State Auditor's city finance data for 2015–2023 (its latest published years) and federal EIA-861 filings for 2024. Margins, ratios, and combined-year figures are calculations from those inputs. A missing input is shown as a dash and left out. It is never counted as zero.OSA city financesEIA-861 2024
The median and the strip use only cities with a comparable value for that row. The count under each median says how many. On the strip, each faint tick is a city, the solid dot is the first column, and the hollow dot is the second.
The utility: Luverne and Marshall
| Measure | Luverne | Marshall | Median of comparable cities | Spread |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| Electric operating revenue, 2023 | $8.26M | Not comparable* | $3.42M121 cities | |
| Population, 2023 | 4,942 | 13,897 | 2,478125 cities | |
| Operating margin, 2023 | 13.9% | Not comparable* | 8.0%121 cities | |
| Transfers out, share of revenue, 2023 | 5.8% | Not comparable* | 2.9%119 cities | |
| Transfers out per resident, 2023 | $96 | Not comparable* | $40119 cities | |
| Transfers out, share of revenue, 2019–23 combined | 9.0% | Not comparable* | 3.3%121 cities | |
| Revenue per kWh, 2024 (federal filing) | 10.76¢ | 6.93¢ | 11.87¢119 cities | |
| Electric customers, 2024 (federal filing) | 2,348 | 6,925 | 1,350120 cities | |
| Bonds owed vs. a year of revenue, 2023 | 1.79× | Not comparable* | 0.00×121 cities |
- * Marshall, electric operating revenue, 2023. Not comparable. State Auditor data for this city combine the electric and water funds and miss some transfer years.
- * Marshall, operating margin, 2023. Not comparable. State Auditor data for this city combine the electric and water funds and miss some transfer years.
- * Marshall, transfers out, share of revenue, 2023. Not comparable. State Auditor data for this city combine the electric and water funds and miss some transfer years.
- * Marshall, transfers out per resident, 2023. Not comparable. State Auditor data for this city combine the electric and water funds and miss some transfer years.
- * Marshall, transfers out, share of revenue, 2019–23 combined. Not comparable. State Auditor data for this city combine the electric and water funds and miss some transfer years.
- * Marshall, bonds owed vs. a year of revenue, 2023. Not comparable. State Auditor data for this city combine the electric and water funds and miss some transfer years.
How to read these measures
- Operating margin, 2023. Calculated as operating income divided by operating revenue.
- Transfers out, share of revenue, 2023. Calculated as electric-fund transfers out divided by operating revenue. Payments booked as an operating expense (PILOT) are not transfers and are not included, so a low or missing transfer does not mean the city received nothing.
- Transfers out per resident, 2023. Calculated as transfers out divided by 2023 population. Residents are not the only payers. Businesses, institutions, and customers outside city limits also pay electric bills, so this is not a burden per payer.
- Transfers out, share of revenue, 2019–23 combined. Five years of transfers out divided by five years of operating revenue. Smooths out one-year jumps.
- Revenue per kWh, 2024 (federal filing). Total retail revenue divided by total kWh, all customer classes together. An average, not a bill.
- Bonds owed vs. a year of revenue, 2023. Electric-fund bonds outstanding divided by one year of operating revenue.
The city side, 2023
How much of the city budget comes from utility transfers, and what the tax rate looks like.
| Measure | Luverne | Marshall | Median of comparable cities | Spread |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| Electric transfers out vs. the tax levy, 2023 | 17.2% | Not comparable* | 7.9%119 cities | |
| Transfers from all enterprise funds (including liquor), share of city resources, 2023 | 10.6% | 2.7% | 4.3%125 cities | |
| City tax rate, 2023 | 66.8% | 59.7% | 61.6%125 cities | |
| Levy per resident, 2023 | $560 | $589 | $517125 cities | |
| State aid (LGA) per resident, 2023 | $315 | $195 | $343125 cities |
- * Marshall, electric transfers out vs. the tax levy, 2023. Not comparable. State Auditor data for this city combine the electric and water funds and miss some transfer years.
How to read these measures
- Electric transfers out vs. the tax levy, 2023. Calculated as electric-fund transfers out divided by the certified property-tax levy.
- Transfers from all enterprise funds (including liquor), share of city resources, 2023. Calculated as transfers from every city enterprise fund (electric, water, sewer, liquor, and others) divided by governmental revenues plus those transfers. The State Auditor data do not split this by fund, so it is not an electric-only figure and not the amount exposed to Luverne’s three-utility proposal.
- City tax rate, 2023. Calculated as certified levy divided by tax capacity. Lower can mean a bigger tax base, a leaner budget, or utility money standing in for taxes.
- State aid (LGA) per resident, 2023. Local Government Aid divided by 2023 population.
Tax rate and levy figures start in 2017.
Nine years, not one
Single years mislead. Transfers jump when a council moves reserves for a project.
Operating margin by year
Luverne (solid), Marshall (dashed). Operating income as a share of operating revenue.
Transfers out by year
Luverne (solid), Marshall (dashed). Electric-fund transfers out as a share of operating revenue. Cities that book their payment to the city as an expense (Austin, New Ulm) will look low here. Marshall is left out because its State Auditor fund combines electric and water.
How Minnesota utility commissions are built
Who governs each city electric utility in a 59-city review, from charters, ordinances, and the state association.
Minnesota cities use three models. The council runs the utility itself, an appointed commission runs it, or, in Austin and Blue Earth, an elected commission runs it. The state's municipal utility association describes its 124 city electric utilities as nearly evenly split between councils and commissions. This 59-city review has 37 appointed commissions, 2 elected commissions, and 20 systems controlled by the council.
A reserved customer seat is a separate question. None of the 59 set aside one seat for a particular class of customer, and none was built with some seats filled by voters and others by appointment. The closest is Hutchinson, whose charter allows, but does not require, one appointee to be a non-resident owner of a business that is a utility customer. Hutchinson's council can also reject any rate change by a four-fifths vote.Minnesota Municipal Utilities AssociationCity of Hutchinson
This is a non-random sample of 59 cities, about half of the state's 124 municipal electric utilities. It includes larger commission utilities, southwest Minnesota neighbors, Buffalo, and a range of smaller systems. It cannot establish how common either arrangement is statewide.
The association's count of 124 is smaller than the 129 city electric funds in the State Auditor data used above. The auditor's list covers 2015 through 2023 and includes funds that are not retail utilities today, such as funds with no retail customers in the 2024 federal filing and a system its city sold in 2023. Those funds explain part of the difference. The published lists do not explain the rest.
| How the utility is governed | Cities | Which cities |
|---|---|---|
| Council-controlled | 20 | Benson, Chaska, Kasson, Litchfield, North St. Paul, Ortonville, St. James, St. Peter, Thief River Falls, Truman, Two Harbors, Tyler, and Waseca. Jackson (commission supervised by the council). Anoka, Fairmont, Granite Falls, Lake City, Mountain Iron, and Redwood Falls (advisory boards or commissions). Luverne today is also council-controlled and is not counted in the 20. |
| Elected commission | 2 | Austin and Blue Earth. |
| Appointed commission | 37 | Adrian, Alexandria, Blooming Prairie, Brainerd, Buffalo, Delano, Detroit Lakes, East Grand Forks, Elk River, Ely, Fosston, Glencoe, Grand Rapids, Hawley, Hibbing, Hutchinson, Lake Crystal, Lakefield, Lanesboro, Marshall, Moorhead, Mora, Mountain Lake, Nashwauk, New Ulm, Owatonna, Princeton, Rochester, Sauk Centre, Shakopee, Sleepy Eye, Spring Valley, Springfield, Virginia, Willmar, Windom, and Worthington. |
Before you quote a number
Austin and New Ulm book their payment to the city as an expense rather than a transfer, so their transfer figures look low and are left out of the medians. Marshall's state data combines electric and water. Other cities may do the same without being flagged here. Bills and city money compares a defined city-support measure instead.
No statewide data shows how many customers live outside city limits, how much tax-exempt institutions pay, or how the bill splits between homes and businesses.
This page uses Luverne's federally filed 10.76¢ per kWh so every city is measured from the same dataset. A price figured from Luverne's 2024 audit is higher, about 11.91¢, because the audit divides more revenue ($8.79 million, including $583,455 of service income that is most likely a capacity payment from the wholesale supplier) by fewer kilowatt-hours (73,828 MWh, against 79,268 MWh in the federal filing). The records do not explain the difference in kilowatt-hours.U.S. Energy Information AdministrationCity of Luverne