Public Utilities

Several of the largest public utilities in the state will send purchasing representatives to the Ventura County Business Opportunity Fair, to be held Sept. 20 at the county fairgrounds at Seaside Park in Ventura. Southern California Edison Co., GTE California Inc., Southern California Gas Co. and AT&T Co. will be exhibitors at the business-to-business fair. Company officials will speak during a workshop titled "How to Do Business With Public Utilities."

SACRAMENTO - Almost 5 million Southern California Edison Co. customers in hundreds of cities and communities across the southern, central and coastal parts of the state will be hit with higher electric bills early next year and bigger hikes in each of the following two years. The decision, which Edison says will add an average of $7 a month to residential bills for the first year, covers Edison's costs to provide service, which amounts to about half a ratepayer's bill. Other costs for buying fuel and contracting for power deliveries fluctuate and are passed directly to consumers.

Oasis Technology Inc., a Camarillo software firm, has carved out a niche producing systems that track and analyze customers' calls to public utilities. Last year, Oasis began helping Southern California Gas Co. computerize information about such calls. That project is continuing, reports Oasis President George Baldonado, and additional contracts have recently been received from the state's two local telephone companies, Pacific Bell and GTE California.

The California Public Utilities Commission is poised to open an investigation into the troubled San Onofre nuclear plant, a process that could result in ratepayers getting reduced utility bills in the future. Some Southern California Edison and San Diego Gas & Electric ratepayers have complained that it's unfair for them to be paying to operate a plant that is not functioning. Commissioners will vote next Thursday on a proposal to open an investigation into the unexpected outage at the plant, which by then will have stretched on for nearly nine months.

New power plants for California, already awash in excess generating capacity? Definitely a bad idea, but not one that's coming from the state's power utilities. The California Public Utilities Commission must be sensible and courageous enough when it meets next week to abandon a once-useful but now-obsolete regulatory policy, and encourage the more efficient energy infrastructure that California needs.

Anaheim Public Utilities General Manager Edward Aghjayan has announced he will retire in December. Aghjayan has overseen the operation of Anaheim's $348-million public utilities budget and 330 employees for 10 years. Under Aghjayan, the utilities company won the Energy Innovator of the Year award seven times from the American Public Power Assn. and 12 community service/resource efficiency awards from the California Municipal Utilities Assn.

Anaheim Public Utilities officials, who are accused along with other municipal power producers of manipulating the energy market during the state's power crisis, on Tuesday offered what they said was proof of their innocence. The city released a letter from the California Independent System Operator, the state power grid controller, saying it has no evidence to corroborate the allegations or conclude that Anaheim acted improperly.

The Environmental Protection Agency has decided to give the nation's largest public utilities up to 21 years to remove dangerous levels of lead from household drinking water. In a regulation scheduled for release today, the EPA will prescribe a regimen of chemicals and water-service line replacements to reduce the lead level. Public health experts criticized the long compliance schedule for not showing enough of a "sense of urgency."

After-Tax Profits Down: The Commerce Department reported that corporations' after-tax profits fell 1.7% in the first quarter of 1989, the biggest decline in more than a year. In a report indicating earnings are slowing down along with the economy, the department said after-tax profits dipped to a seasonally adjusted annual rate of $171.6 billion during the first quarter, down from $174.5 billion during the previous three-month period. Decreases in profits were widespread within manufacturing industries, while earnings in trade, transportation, public utilities and other non-manufacturing industries also fell.

For more than eight months, ratepayers of Southern California Edison have been paying $54 million a month - a per-customer average of more than $10 - for a nuclear power plant that has been delivering no electricity. This situation should never have been allowed to drag on for so long. Part of that $10-a-month cost was imposed several years ago when Edison, the majority owner of the San Onofre Nuclear Generating Station, purchased new steam generators for the plant. At that time, it sought and was granted a special rate increase to cover the $671-million cost, the argument being that ratepayers would benefit from safe, reliable electricity.

SACRAMENTO - California is poised to more than double its targeted electricity output from rooftop solar panels. The state Public Utilities Commission on Thursday tweaked its rules to authorize an increase in the number of residential, commercial and government buildings that can participate in a program that allows solar users to lower their electricity bills by getting credit for excess power sent back to the grid. The move raises the maximum total capacity of all the state's rooftop solar systems to about 5,200 megawatts from a current 2,400 megawatts.

SACRAMENTO -- The state Senate has rejected a bill that would have required utility regulators to make public all investigation orders, accident reports and related documents. The bill, SB 1000, by Sen. Leland Yee (D-San Francisco) fell two votes shy of the minimum of 21 needed for passage. The bill was prompted by the Sept. 9, 2010, deadly explosion of a Pacific Gas & Electric Co. gas pipeline in San Bruno, south of San Francisco. The blast killed eight people and leveled 35 homes.

SACRAMENTO - Legislation that opponents fear will strip the state Public Utilities Commission of its power to regulate Internet phone services in California put the commission on the spot, and it punted. For the second consecutive meeting, the commission Thursday postponed taking a stance on the proposal that would prohibit the PUC and other state agencies from regulating phone service using Internet connections. The commission, meeting in Fresno, had been expected to oppose a Senate bill written by state Sen. Alex Padilla (D-Pacoima)

SACRAMENTO — Members of the California Public Utilities Commission are criticizing a bill that would strip their agency of authority to regulate basic telephone services. Meeting Thursday in San Francisco, the five-member board expressed doubts about proposed legislation backed by AT&T Inc. and Verizon Communications Inc. The measure, SB 1161, would ensure that state agencies have "no regulatory jurisdiction or control" over telephone calls that involve sending voice signals over the Internet.

The Los Angeles County Board of Supervisors violated the law last year when it shut the public out of a meeting with Gov. Jerry Brown that had been called to discuss the county's new responsibility to deal with felons, according to a finding issued last week by the district attorney's office. Realignment, as it is known, is a landmark shift in how Californians lock up, supervise and pay for thousands of criminals and parolees, and some of the supervisors have sought to sway public opinion on the issue with warnings of coming crime spikes and assertions that the state is leaving the county without adequate funding for the shift.

Naivete at times can be charming, but when used maliciously by a sophisticated lawyer in the furtherance of his questionable aims, it is reprehensible. Rosenfield compares auto insurance (where, according to him, a third of every premium dollar goes to overhead, salaries, and profits) with public utilities (which spend only 5 cents on administration). Public utilities don't have any expenses to acquire new customers; since they are monopolies in their service areas, we must come to them.

Picking the pockets of Orange County citizens is not confined to high-risk investments, niggling tax increases and "innocent" new user fees. Consider the whopping 65% rate increases Southern California Water Co. is seeking over the next three years. That translates into an 18% hike for water customers in the first year (1996) alone. The company lists nine reasons related to increased operating costs. Unlike monopolistic businesses such as public utilities, in private enterprises like newspapers--with which I am involved--such factors are no novelty.

With bills for pretty much everything steadily rising, some people try to keep a lid on monthly costs by opting for "measured" phone service. What that means is they're charged a fixed rate for a limited number of local calls, plus a per-minute rate for any additional calls. If you don't use your phone a lot, it can be a really good deal. Too good, apparently. Or so the bean counters at AT&T seem to have concluded. Beginning March 1, the company's base rate for measured phone service will jump $3 a month to $15.37 from $12.37 — a nearly 25% increase.

Gov. Jerry Brown could have a big impact on business and residential energy bills and the California economy by making as many as three appointments this month to the state's top regulatory body, the Public Utilities Commission. At least two appointments to fill current vacancies in the five-member panel could come as early as Friday and could start to give the PUC its most pro-consumer majority since the days of the energy crisis a decade ago. A third member, Nancy Ryan, must step down Jan. 20 if her appointment last year by then- Gov. Arnold Schwarzenegger to a regular six-year term is not confirmed by the state Senate by then.