Tag Archives: CPUC
Facing Regulatory Roadblocks, Uber Ramps Up Its Lobbying In California
by Chris Kirkham and Tracey Lien, Los Angeles Times
Uber now spends more on lobbyists in California than Wal-Mart, Bank of America or Wells Fargo … in the top 3% of companies and organizations. … So far in 2015, Uber has paid about $200,000 to lobbyists. That’s more than 10 times the amount spent by the limousine industry and nearly four times greater than the taxi industry’s trade group. … A PUC administrative law judge decided earlier this month that Uber should be fined $7.3 million and suspended from operating in California. Read More ›
Committee Seeks San Onofre Emails Again
by Jeff McDonald, San Diego Union-Tribune
The chairman of the Assembly committee that oversees the California Public Utilities Commission has given the agency until the end of this month to secure and turn over certain emails and other documents from Southern California Edison. Chairman Anthony Rendon, D-Lakewood, is asking Commission President Michael Picker to use his authority to demand that Edison provide internal and external emails about the failed San Onofre nuclear plant north of Oceanside. … [The] plant has become a key subject in criminal investigations of the state utilities commission. Much of the scrutiny revolves around private communications between regulators and utility executives. Read More ›
Regulator Went To Power Event In Napa
by Jeff McDonald, San Diego Union-Tribune
“To my knowledge, the Western Power Trading Forum is one big opportunity to have an illegal ex parte with any commissioner that the group can convince to come and talk to them,” said former commission President Loretta Lynch, now an attorney in private practice. “In some of the most luxurious settings, groups like WPTF wine and dine commissioners while engaging in private, backroom conversations concerning issues directly in front of the PUC. … All Californians should question whether PUC proceedings are appropriately decided, and we should all ask our legislators and the governor to stop this corrupting practice.” Read More ›
Uber Should Be Suspended In California And Fined $7.3 Million, Judge Says
by Laura J. Nelson, Andrea Chang and Paresh Dave, Los Angeles Times
Uber — plagued by problems with regulators, drivers and taxi unions around the world — took a big blow in its home state Wednesday when an administrative judge recommended that the ride-sharing giant be fined $7.3 million and be suspended from operating in California. In her decision, chief administrative law judge Karen V. Clopton of the California Public Utilities Commission contended that Uber has not complied with state laws designed to ensure that drivers are doling out rides fairly to all passengers. Read More ›
2 New Warrants Served In CPUC Case
by Jeff McDonald, San Diego Union-Tribune
The criminal investigation of the California Public Utilities Commission appears to be intensifying, with state agents serving a fresh round of search warrants at the regulators’ headquarters in San Francisco and at Southern California Edison offices outside Los Angeles. The Attorney General’s Office wants details about a settlement agreement that assigned Southern California ratepayers to cover $3.3 billion in shutdown costs for the San Onofre nuclear plant, which closed on an emergency basis in January 2012 after Edison installed faulty replacement steam generators that caused a radiation leak. Read More ›
California Electricity Rates To Undergo Biggest Change In 15 Years
by David R. Baker and Hamed Aleaziz, The San Francisco Chronicle
California regulators radically revamped the way electricity rates work in the state, approving changes Friday that will raise monthly utility bills for the most energy-efficient homeowners while giving many bigger energy users a break. … “This is a lose-lose for customers, but business as usual for the CPUC, which has once again done PG&E, Edison and SDG&E’s bidding,” [said Mark Toney, head of The Utility Reform Network, a consumer group. … Changing the number of tiers and cutting the difference between them will raise bills for the most energy-efficient households. Read More ›
Former Top CPUC Director “Disgusted” By Behavior Of Leadership
by Tony Kovaleski, Liz Wagner and Mark Villarreal, NBC Bay Area
A former high ranking member of the California Public Utilities Commission spoke out for the first time since retiring from the agency last fall. In an exclusive interview with the NBC Bay Area Investigative Unit, he called the actions of some of the CPUC’s former leaders “disgusting.” For more than a decade Richard Clark held one of the agency’s most critical positions as Director of Consumer Protection in the Safety Division. He said his decisions to draw an ethical line with Pacific Gas & Electric Company contradicted a culture of improper access and influence. Read More ›
Report Calls For CPUC Reforms
by Jeff McDonald, San Diego Union-Tribune
The California Public Utilities Commission for years has based multibillion-dollar decisions not on public debate or evidentiary records but rather on secret meetings and influences by the companies it regulates, an independent report has found. … Consumer advocates said the Strumwasser & Woocher report highlighted the need for legislative reform of commission practices. “Backdoor deals have completely corrupted the commission’s process,” said Thomas Long, senior attorney at The Utility Reform Network. “In private meetings that have become the norm at the commission, utility claims go unchallenged.” Read More ›
Report Blasts Secret Talks Between Utilities, CPUC
by Jaxon Van Derbeken, San Francisco Chronicle
The ability of Pacific Gas and Electric Co. and other utilities to engage in back-channel talks with top California Public Utilities Commission officials unfairly skews decisions in favor of big-money interests, and the practice should be banned in rate cases, a review requested by the state agency concluded Monday. Such back-door communications became notorious last year when e-mails showed that a PG&E executive had engaged in a secret campaign to obtain a preferred judge in a $1.3 billion rate-setting case before the utilities commission. Those and other back-channel contacts — known as ex parte communications — are the focus of federal and state criminal investigations. Read More ›
Appeals Court OKs Record Penalty Against PG&E
by Vanessa Blum, The Recorder
A California appeals court on Tuesday upheld a $14.35 million fine levied against Pacific Gas & Electric Co. by the California Public Utilities Commission for providing false information to the commission in the wake of the 2010 San Bruno pipeline explosion. … “Although the amount is large, so is the real and potential harm caused by PG&E’s inaction,” Justice James Richman wrote in a decision joined by J. Anthony Kline and Marla Miller. “PG&E does not argue that it lacks the ability to pay the fine.” The company said in a statement Tuesday evening that it does not plan to appeal the court’s ruling. Read More ›
Key CPUC Reform Gets Unplugged
by Jeff McDonald, San Diego Union-Tribune
When parties believe the commission has failed to follow the law in making a decision, their only option is to make that case to the commission itself, not a judge. If the commission rejects the challenge, the case can be taken to a state appeals panel, which may review the matter. … The utilities commission is in a rare position among government agencies, in being entrusted as an impartial arbiter of its own decisions. If a City Council makes a decision that runs counter to the state Government Code or other laws, a citizen can take the matter to court. Read More ›
Grand Jury Probes PG&E’s Relationship With State Regulators
by Jaxon Van Derbeken, San Francisco Chronicle
The latest grand jury investigation was opened after last year’s disclosure of e-mails between PG&E and the state utilities commission, which prompted probes by both state and federal prosecutors. Some of the e-mails showed a PG&E executive lobbying commissioners and their staffs for a preferred judge to oversee a $1.3 billion rate case. Others indicated that PG&E thought then-commission President Michael Peevey was dangling favorable state treatment in exchange for the utility’s backing for his pet fundraising and political causes. Read More ›
Utilities Agency Reforms Still Pending
by Jeff McDonald, San Diego Union-Tribune
More than eight months later, no employee discipline beyond [chief of staff Carol Brown’s resignation] has been made publicly known, and some of those involved in questionable communications have been promoted. New commission president Michael Picker, a former aide to Gov. Jerry Brown whose nomination is pending Senate approval, has engaged in backchannel communications himself, as reported by U-T San Diego in March. … The commission is still evaluating the 65,000 or so PG&E emails to figure out which employees may have violated rules against inappropriate communications. Any discipline is likely to be kept confidential, [an agency spokeswoman] said. Read More ›