PaulAdrian's Blog

            The drumbeat to reform the state’s electric market was silenced Monday evening on a point of order.

            Although consumer advocates thought Senate Bill 482 could have been stronger, Tom “Smitty” Smith of Public Citizen says, “We thought, on balance, this bill should have passed.”

            “It was better than no bill at all,” Smith said.

            But no bill at all is what the state will get.

            Representative Jim Dunnam of Waco, a Democrat generally thought to be a friend of consumer advocates like Smith, raised a point of order late Monday evening that effectively killed the bill without a vote.

            A ‘point of order’ is a technical problem that must be repaired before a bill can become law.

            The Representative complained that the bill had not been correctly referred back to the conference committee for a previous repair to a previous point of order he had raised on Saturday.

            On Monday evening, when he voiced concerns, the end of the legislative session was minutes away. There was not enough time to make another repair.

            Unless the Governor calls a special session, that means Texans will not get any additional protections in the electric market for at least the next two years. The legislature meets for six months every other year.

            The end result:

            Five years after much of the state opened its electric market to competition; the average price of power throughout Texas is up 50%. In the nation, the average price of power is up just 22%.  Texans complained to legislators in droves about the high rates they pay for power.  Legislators vowed to take action. They made electric market reform a top priority.

            According to Rep. Phil King, Chair of the Regulated Industries Committee, the proposed bill would have:

·        Guaranteed a rate cut for those paying the most

·        Authorized the PUC to review and adjust electric rates

·        Eliminated the use of credit scoring

·        Protected low income residents from disconnections

·        Required the structural separation of TXU into four smaller companies

·        Given the PUC the ability to punish market power abuse with fines up to 1 million dollars a day

 

            King said, “It is disappointing that one member chose to kill this bill, which provided rate reductions for electric bills, real consumer protections, and more stringent oversight of public utility buy-outs."

            Senator Troy Fraser, Chair of the Business and Commerce Committee, was equally frustrated.

            He wrote the original version of Senate Bill 482 and shepherded the effort to get it approved in the Senate.

            Fraser said, “"It is unfortunate that the large electric companies and a few disenchanted House members were blinded by the profits from high electricity rates and speaker politics and were successful in killing this consumer-friendly legislation.”

            So far, Representative Dunnam has not returned my calls to explain why he killed the bill.

 

            So what do you think?  Should the legislature, after six months of work, and countless hours of testimony been able to pass a bill to fix the electric market? Let us know – yea or nay – on the job done by your politicians to address that power bill you get every month.