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PURA, Connecticut’s Public Utilities Regulatory Authority, was instituted to regulate the state’s energy sector, principally two companies – Eversource and United Illuminating – neither of which are energy producers.
The head of PURA, Marissa Gillett, has secured her reappointment, but her job specs have been changed.
We were told in a recent Hartford Courant story, “Gillett has been at the center of a firestorm as the utilities have filed lawsuits in a contentious atmosphere for an agency that in the past was known for being low key and not making headlines… Eversource and United Illuminating filed a lawsuit against PURA, saying that Gillett was deciding issues unilaterally by freezing her two fellow commissioners out of the decision-making process, an allegation PURA and Gillett’s political supporters deny.”
Some Gillett supporters in the General Assembly had inadvertently dotted the “i” and crossed the “t” of the suit’s claim by producing a bill, now in limbo that, if enacted, would in the future grant Gillett unilateral authority to set the price of electricity in Connecticut, a clear admission that she had not the statutory authority to unilaterally make decisions affecting the price of energy when she did unilaterally decide to impose price controls on the two energy distribution companies..
In Mid-December – see “The High Cost of Energy, Three Strikes and You’re Out?” -- Connecticut Commentary noted that “under the direction of PURA, Chairman Marisa Gillett is able to deny energy distributers cost increases that, like all business taxes, are passed along to its customers – virtually everyone in Connecticut,” and later in January -- see PURA Head Butts the Economic Marketplace – the blog made note of the “firestorm” and lawsuit: “Eversource and United Illuminating filed a lawsuit against PURA, saying that Gillett was deciding issues unilaterally by freezing her two fellow commissioners out of the decision-making process, an allegation PURA and Gillett’s political supporters deny.”
These difficulties, we are now told, have been “settled” through a pre-trial agreement. According to the agreement, Gillett will retain her position, but PURA will be changed.
Prior to the agreement, Governor Ned Lamont rose to the defense of his handpicked head of PURA. The Courant reported, “I think she’s the most experienced utility regulator the state has ever had,” Lamont told reporters at Newington town hall Tuesday after an unrelated news conference. “She knows what she’s doing. She’s been there six years. She’s holding Eversource accountable. I think that’s what you want from your commissioner, working in tandem with her fellow commissioners. I appreciate that Eversource and UI think she’s holding them too accountable, but she’s doing her job, and I hope the legislature supports her.”
The concessions made in Lamont’s most recent deal can only be regarded as a capitulation in the face of the suit brought by Connecticut’s two energy distributors.
“Asked what legislators who are on the fence [concerning Gillett’s continuance in office] are telling him,” the Courant has reported, “Lamont said, ‘That PURA has never been so much in the news and that maybe we should lower the temperature and change people. But I would argue that PURA is in the news because the utilities are putting on a full-court press to get our chairman changed.’”
Then too: “Gillett was in the news again recently regarding email exchanges that were obtained by The Hartford Courant through a state Freedom of Information request. Gillett said in an exchange that she sent state Rep. Jonathan Steinberg of Westport ‘an overly formal response’ to one of his emails that discussed a utility concept ‘because I’m concerned about getting FOI’d.’”
All the embarrassing e-mails likely would have come to the surface in a trial that likely would have been decided in in favor of those bringing to court the now dead-ended suit.
It is certainly well known that Lamont’s talented wife, Annie Lamont, has hauled into the family treasury more money than her husband. She is an accomplished venture capitalist, pretty much the opposite of Gillett. And so, it is not too fanciful to imagine their pillow talk on the eve of the now concluded “deal.”
Annie: Ned dear, not to be too critical, but you do understand as a former businessman that companies operating in a free market – long may it stand – do not pay taxes from their profits. They collect the additional costs from those purchasing their products and services and pass it along to the taxing authority. That would be you and Ms. Gillett.
Ned: Well…
Annie: And you do understand as well that the costs associated with regulations are treated in the same manner. Companies do not pay the costs of regulations from their profits. They collect these costs from their customers.
Ned: Well…
Annie: Eventually, those who bear the brunt of taxes and regulatory costs wake up and smell the festering lilies. No one remains for long a political imbecile when they are overcharged for their imbecilities. That appears to be what has happened in the last national election. And you should fear the same happening here in Connecticut.
Ned: Could you turn out the light please?
