Prince George’s Councilmember Calls for Investigation into Electricity Bill Spikes After Storms

Prince George’s County Councilmember Edward Burroughs III introduced a resolution on February 24, 2026, after residents across the county reported sudden and steep increases in their electricity bills following recent winter storms and prolonged cold weather. The action came amid calls from households who said billing spikes arrived immediately after service disruptions.

Burroughs filed the resolution to prompt an investigation into the post-storm billing patterns and to request involvement by the Maryland Office of People’s Counsel. The resolution explicitly seeks a formal review of the circumstances that produced the higher charges, tying the timing of the increases to the county’s recent weather events.

Residents in neighborhoods across Prince George’s County, including both urban and suburban ZIP codes, told local officials they saw bills jump without advance notice after outages or other storm-related service interruptions. Those reports were the direct impetus for Burroughs’ measure, which he introduced to the County Council on February 24.

In asking the Maryland Office of People’s Counsel to participate, Burroughs is directing attention to a state-level consumer advocate as part of the oversight process. That office has statutory authority to represent residential utility customers in matters before state regulatory bodies, and the resolution frames the spike investigation as requiring that kind of external scrutiny.

The timing of the resolution places the issue squarely before elected county leaders immediately after the winter weather episode. Burroughs’ filing signals that the County Council will have to weigh potential remedies for residents who received unexpectedly high electric bills during a period of hazardous cold and storm-driven disruptions.

The move also raises questions for utilities that serve Prince George’s County about billing procedures during emergencies and how rate adjustments, estimated reads, or outage-related charges were applied to accounts during the storms. Burroughs’ resolution asks officials to establish a record of those practices so county legislators can assess whether additional local or state action is needed.

By anchoring the investigation request to residents’ complaints and to a specific state oversight office, Edward Burroughs III has put immediate pressure on both county policymakers and state consumer advocates to produce answers about the cause and scale of the electricity bill spikes after the county’s winter storms.