If you think the General Assembly repealed House Bill 6 – to bail out bad decisions by electric companies – then $133.6 million, and counting, says you’re wrong.
That’s how much customers of American Electric Power, Duke Energy and AES Ohio (Dayton Power & Light) had paid by the middle of last week to bail out two coal-fueled power plants, one in Indiana. And for years to come, consumers will keep paying for the bailout.
That fact seemed to get lost amid the waving palm fronds and shouted hosannas when the legislature “repealed” HB 6 in March, amid bipartisan self-congratulation.
(In 2019, Democrats as well as Republicans had voted “yes” on HB 6. Among the Democratic “ayes”: Senate Minority Leader Kenny Yuko, of Richmond Heights and Democratic Sens. Teresa Fedor of Toledo and Sandra Williams of Cleveland. Democratic Reps. Tavia Galonski of Akron, Catherine Ingram of Cincinnati, Michael Sheehy of Oregon, Lisa Sobecki of Toledo, Terrence Upchurch of Cleveland and Thomas West of Canton also supported the legislation.)
The only things that legislators actually repealed were HB 6 subsidies to bail out the Perry and Davis-Besse nuclear power plants, once owned by FirstEnergy Corp. Consumes are still paying for the coal plants.
Chances are excellent that what prompted repeal wasn’t ratepayer outrage – though there was that – but the fact that Energy Harbor Corp., the nuclear plants’ new owner, didn’t really want the nuclear subsidies after all because of a change in federal policy. The coal plant subsidies? They were and remain gravy for the other electric companies.
That is, the hands that cracked the Statehouse whip in July 2019 – when the legislature passed and Gov. Mike DeWine signed HB 6 – are the same hands that cracked the whip four months ago for HB 6′s “repeal”: The electric utility lobbies.
But the General Assembly went home for the summer on June 28 without taking any action on a couple of consumer-friendly bills.
Senate Bill 117
Sponsored by Sens. Mark Romanchuk, an Ontario Republican whose district includes Medina and Ashland counties, and Hearcel Craig, a Columbus Democrat, the bill would repeal the coal subsidies HB 6 still squeezes from Ohio’s utility consumers every month.
The Romanchuk-Craig bill is stuck in the Senate Energy and Public Utilities Committee, chaired by Sen. Rob McColley, a Napoleon Republican. (He voted “no” on HB 6.)
Utility customers who don’t want to keep subsidizing the two cash-fueled coal plants may want to reach out to McColley’s office and ask why his committee is dragging its feet on SB 117. After all, it only took McColley’s committee four months to OK anti-solar, anti-wind energy SB 52.
That’s the same committee – albeit, then chaired by Sen. Steve Wilson (a Maineville Republican who voted “yes” on HB 6) that in April 2019 unanimously approved DeWine’s appointment of Sam Randazzo to the Public Utilities Commission of Ohio. Randazzo has not been charged with any wrongdoing but has been mentioned in federal court filings related to the HB 6 scandal.
House Bill 260
Sponsored by Reps. Laura Lanese, a Grove City Republican, and Dan Troy, a Willowick Democrat, it would overturn an outrageously unfair Ohio legal doctrine.
If courts kill a utility rate increase that the Public Utilities Commission of Ohio had OK’d, the overcharges are not refunded to consumers. Instead, the utility gest to keep the money. The Lanese-Troy bill would require refunds to ratepayers.
If you favor refunds – and who with a conscience wouldn’t? – you’ll get a lot of mumbo-jumbo from pro-utility legislators. Boiled down, what they’re saying is, “Heads, utilities win, tails, consumers lose.” Big surprise.
The Lanese-Troy bill is seemingly stalled in the House Public Utilities Committee, chaired by Rep. Jim Hoops, also a Napoleon Republican. (Hoops voted “yes” on HB 6.) Ohio utility customers who don’t want utilities to keep overcharged rates may want to reach out to Hoops’s office and ask why his committee is dragging its feet on Lanese and Troy’s bill.
Naturally, utilities like the no-refund rule. Given the HB 6 scandal, that’s the best argument of all for why the rule must end in Ohio.
Otherwise, the General Assembly’s inaction calls to mind “Commodore” Cornelius Vanderbilt, the 19th-century railroad mogul, who once said, “The public be damned.”
In Ohio, it often is.
Thomas Suddes, a member of the editorial board, writes from Athens.
To reach Thomas Suddes: tsuddes@cleveland.com, 216-408-9474
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General Assembly siding with utilities, socking consumers with bailouts on coal-fired power: Thomas Suddes - cleveland.com
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