Word Wars. Fazio and Buckbee back “Public policy changes not imposed by PURA.” Hail Gillett’s leadership on language bill description.

The tussle over explaining Connecticut’s high utility costs on monthly bills continues. Two Democratic legislators objected last month to the decision by the state’s public utility regulator, Public Utilities Regulatory Authority (PURA), to describe one of four categories of charges on consumer bills as “Public policy changes not imposed by PURA.”

State Senator Ryan Fazio (R-Greenwich) and state Representative William Buckbee (R-New Milford), ranking members on the legislature’s energy committee, have offered their support for the PURA description. Fazio and Buckbee’s Democratic colleagues requested PURA impose “investments to support reliability, emissions reductions, and affordability. Nor originated by PURA. Charge dependent on usage” on that contested fourth utility bill silo. Fazio and Buckbee dismiss that as “biased phrasing of the category that aims to persuade more than inform.”

“The label proposed by DEEP, ‘system benefits charges’, is a worse alternative than the one proposed by the legislators because it is not comprehensible to the average consumer,” the Republican duo wrote to Marissa Gillett, chairman of PURA.

“Your decision in last year’s docket deserves a lot of credit for adding transparency to consumers’ electric bill,” Fazio and Buckbee concluded. “There is no reason to change that decision, especially because it has the most fidelity the new public act that I co-authored. Consumers will appreciate your leadership on this matter.”

Published August 10, 2023.