SB 689

This bill provides for funding for a consumer advocate and makes various

changes to statutes administered by the Public Service Commission.

Consumer advocate funding.

The bill requires the PSC to require

investor-owned electric and natural gas public utilities (energy utilities) to provide

funding to a “consumer advocate,” which is defined as the Citizens Utility Board that

was created by the legislature in 1979 and subsequently dissolved and reorganized

as a nonstock, nonprofit corporation. All actions of the consumer advocate that are

funded under the bill must be directed toward a duty to represent and protect the

interests of residential, small commercial, and small industrial energy customers of

the state. The bill requires the consumer advocate to annually file with the PSC a

budget, which the PSC must approve if it is consistent with the foregoing duty and

covers reasonable annual costs, including salaries, benefits, overhead expenses, an

operating reserve, and any other costs directly or indirectly related to representing

and protecting the interests of the foregoing customers. However, the bill allows the

PSC to approve the budget with conditions and modifications that the PSC

determines are necessary. If the PSC fails to take final action within 60 days after

a budget is filed, the PSC is considered to have approved the budget.

The bill limits the total annual funding for the consumer advocate to a

maximum of $900,000. Each energy utility's share of that total is based on an

individual energy utility's proportionate share of residential, small commercial, and

small industrial customer meters in the state, which each energy utility must

annually report to the PSC. The bill requires the PSC to ensure in rate-making

orders that energy utilities recover the funding from their customers. The PSC must

apply escrow accounting treatment to energy utility expenditures for the funding.

The bill prohibits the consumer advocate from using the funding for lobbying

or defraying the cost of participating in proceedings involving the rates or practices

of municipal utilities and no other public utilities. The bill also limits the amount

that the PSC may compensate the consumer advocate for participating in PSC

proceedings. Under current law, if certain requirements are satisfied, the PSC is

allowed to compensate participants in proceedings who are not public utilities.

Under this bill, the PSC may grant no more than $100,000 annually in such

compensation to the consumer advocate.

Energy-related changes.

The bill does all of the following:

1. Allows an applicant for a PSC-issued certificate that is required for a project

involving a high-voltage transmission line to agree with the Department of Natural

Resources to extend the deadline for DNR to take action on certain water-related

permit applications that are also required for the project. Current law allows a

similar agreement for an applicant for a different PSC-issued certificate that is