Two utility-related bills are still alive at the state Legislature after last week’s make-or-break Crossover Day.
Another didn't make it.
The first survivor is a telecommunications deregulation bill that was rocketing forward until Gov. Sonny Perdue signaled concerns earlier this month, putting it on temporary hold.
The second is a response to budget pressures on the state Public Service Commission.
It would require utilities to pay for consultants that the PSC hires.
The failed bill would have helped a group of electric cooperatives build a new coal plant by making it harder to appeal state air permits.
HB 168, the surviving deregulation bill, has become one of the most intensely lobbied measures of the session.
It's backed by AT&T and the state’s rural telephone companies. Cable companies oppose it.
AT&T says the bill would level the playing field by freeing AT&T from state regulatory requirements that don’t apply to its competitors.
Rural phone companies, meanwhile, would get to keep a state subsidy that an earlier version of the bill would have eliminated. Under HB 168, the rural companies could tap the fund for up to 20 more years, but they would have to agree to more regulatory oversight in order to get funding.
The bill would require the rural companies to cut the size of the fees they charge companies such as AT&T to connect into their systems.
It also would create a new 10-year state subsidy to ease the financial pain of that.
The Georgia Cable Association says that would tilt the playing field toward AT&T and require cable companies to subsidize competitors.
Perdue weighed in early in March.
His concerns included the bill’s language on consumer complaints.
Current law says that the state Public Service Commission can “resolve” consumer complaints about AT&T. Under the bill, the PSC could “receive” those complaints.
Sen. David Shafer (R-Duluth), chairman of the Senate Regulated Industries and Utilities Committee, is working with the governor’s office on the bill’s language.
The telecommunications bill could move out of the Senate this week, but it may have to go back to the House or into a conference committee.
The second surviving utility bill, HB 1233, would require utilities to pay expert witnesses for the PSC. Those witnesses are critical to the commission’s ability to assess rate increase or other utility requests.
Utility companies such as Georgia Power already pay to support commission regulatory costs, but the money comes through the state and goes up and down with the state’s budgets.
The budget for expert witnesses has fallen sharply in recent years.
Under HB 1233, utilities would cut checks to the PSC witnesses directly, instead of paying into the state general fund.
The bill cleared the House and could begin its way through the Senate next week.
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