(07/02/2009) After months and even years of expressed frustration with the Long Island Power Authority, last week Assemblyman Fred W. Thiele Jr. proposed sweeping changes in how the utility is governed and managed.
The bill is the result of several hearings that were held in the LIPA service area over the past few years. “It’s comprehensive and took some time to draft,” Mr. Thiele said yesterday. Although he has assembled a bipartisan group of co-sponsors in the Assembly, he said it was not likely that he would be able to generate support in the State Senate, now locked in a struggle for control, during this session.
The bill would require rate increases to be approved by the state’s Public Service Commission and require public hearings and comment for a minimum of 60 days. LIPA’s previous increases were not subject to such scrutiny because of its status as a nonprofit entity.
Mr. Thiele is also calling for an election of LIPA’s board of trustees by each town and city in the utility’s service area. The current board is appointed in Albany by the governor and leaders of the Legislature. A total of 16 trustees would be elected with a chairman appointed by the governor.
Gordian Raacke, a LIPA watchdog and the executive director of Renewable Energy Long Island, had not seen the bill as of yesterday, but praised its intent. “To bring LIPA’s management closer back home to Long Island was always something we wanted.” Likewise, he was very supportive of better scrutiny of rate increases.
He was also pleased that the bill included provisions for renewable energy and a requirement that the utility divest itself of an 18-percent stake in a nuclear power plant upstate.
When Mr. Raacke was part of the utility’s citizens advisory panel, “we sued LIPA over that issue to force it to sell off its 18-percent share. It was something [the Long Island Lighting Company] had when LIPA took over.” The original company was split in two with LIPA receiving the company’s transmission and distribution lines and meters and Brooklyn Union Gas, a company now called National Grid, left in charge of its power generating plants.
Brooklyn Union Gas did not want the liability of the nuclear plant, according to Mr. Raacke, and LIPA did not negotiate a better deal. “We hoped they would then try to sell it, but they didn’t.”
Mr. Thiele proposes that LIPA sell its interest to help pay off the utility’s debt, which it inherited from LILCO’s aborted attempt to open a nuclear facility at Shoreham.
During hearings on the state of the utility held this year, Mr. Thiele said three issues came to the forefront: lack of transparency and accountability, LIPA’s debt, and its failure to promote alternative affordable energy options.
The bill would allow local governments to offer financing to its residential and commercial taxpayers for the installation of renewable energy sources on their property.
“What I particularly like,” Mr. Raacke said, “is any proposal that would strengthen the deployment of renewable energy technologies. It’s a good thing, much needed.”