“This is criminal… This vote could possibly be blocked if enough Edison and SDG&E ratepayers raise enough hell.” – San Diego Reader reporter Don Bauder
By Miriam Raftery
October 12, 2014 (Sacramento) – California Attorney General Kamala Harris has opened an investigation into the California Public Utilities Commission (CPUC). The Sacramento Bee reports that the probe centers around rate-setting procedures and oversight of Pacific Gas & Electric Company regarding the deadly San Bruno pipeline explosion, and assignment of administrative law judges to CPUC matters. In addition, the U.S. Attorney’s office has notified PG&E of a separate investigation into private communications suggesting that the state regulatory issue was trying to help PG&E avoid tough penalties for the fatal explosion.
CPUC Chairman Michael Peevey, a former PG&E executive, announced after exposure of internal emails revealed inappropriate communications that he will resign at year’s end. PG&E has fired some executives in the wake of the scandal. But ratepayer advocates say that's not enough.
Despite Peevey’s announcement that he will not seek reappointment when his term expires December 31st, the San Diego Reader reports that astoundingly, the CPUC plans to proceed with a final vote on a plan to make ratepayers pick up the $3.3 billion cost of closing the San Onofre nuclear plant. Mike Aguirre, former San Diego City Attorney, has suggested that Peevey has shown favoritism to utilities in that matter as well.
Aguirre blasted the CPUC for “corruption” being exposed by the media. Now, he told the Reader, “the corrupt element is attempting to rush through an approval favoring the utilities for which they work. This is corporate criminal behavior.”
While the Legislature could legally vote to oust Peevey, the Legislative session for this year has ended.
Don Bauder, the Reader reporter who has long reported on CPUC scandals, posted in comments following his latest story,“This is criminal.” He concurs that the San Onofre shutdown “was management’s fault, and ratepayers should not have to pay a cent.”
Bauder offers this advice to ratepayers: “This vote could possibly be blocked if enough Edison and SDG&E ratepayers raise enough hell. Perhaps we could demand that Peevey and Florio (another CPUC commissioner) cannot vote, because of the investigations by the Attorney Genreal and the federal government into their San Bruno offenses.”
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