Assemblyman Anthony Rendon, the new chair of the Committee on Utilities and Commerce, said his utilities oversight hearing next month will look at whether members of the Public Utilities Commission colluded with the operator of the now closed San Onofre Nuclear Generating Station.
Rendon (D-Los Angeles) said he received a letter from an electrical workers union calling for public hearings into Southern California Edison’s activities prior to reaching a settlement on how much ratepayers should pay to cover the cost of closing down the malfunctioning nuclear power plant.
Assembly Speaker Toni Atkins also received a similar letter, he said.
Rendon said the letter did not prompt his committee meeting, since he is obligated to hold an annual oversight meeting, which was already planned for next month
However, Rendon said transparency is important to him since officials from five of the nine cities in his east Los Angeles district have ended up in prison for some kind of corruption.
Rendon said he does not plan to question the settlement reached over how much rate payers should pay for San Onofre’s shut down. He said he is more focused on ensuring utilities meet Gov. Jerry Brown’s energy sustainability goals.
The Utilities and Commerce Committee hearing will be held March 16 in Sacramento.
Government oversight of public agencies in general was lax before term limits were lengthened in 2012, Rendon said.
“I think the shortened term limit era when legislators only had six years to serve in office — I think oversight slipped during that period,” he said. “We saw in the State Parks Department a tremendous number of problems there that could have been caught with better oversight by the legislature, and now we’re seeing problems at the CPUC that I think could have been caught with better oversight as well."
