Abercrombie: Hawaii Public Utilities Commission Has Months-Long Backlog
“The PUC (Public Utilities Commission) dockets are backed up for months, if not years,” says democratic candidate for governor, Neil Abercrombie.
The comments came at a gubernatorial forum Wednesday night.
Hawaii’s ‘s “primary purpose is to ensure that regulated companies efficiently and safely provide their customers with adequate and reliable services at just and reasonable rates, while providing regulated companies with a fair opportunity to earn a reasonable rate of return,” according to its most recent .
Basically, if you are dealing with anything under the umbrella of utilities in Hawaii (electricity, telecommunications, to name a couple), you will probably get to know the PUC staff pretty darn well.
So. Is the commission’s docket in as dire shape as Abercrombie says?
It seems so.
Civil Beat contacted Carlito Caliboso, chairman of the PUC, to find out just how efficient (or inefficient) the commission is. But Caliboso’s lips were sealed.
“I don’t want to comment on those types of campaign speeches,” said Caliboso. “I think we are diligently working on all of our dockets.”
He did, however, provide Civil Beat with the table below.
These numbers send a mixed signal. Dockets pending after each fiscal year grew steadily in the early 2000’s until 2004-2005, when the commission completed close to double the number of cases from the previous year, 575. However, since 2006-2007, the pending cases have again started to pile up.
According to the PUC for fiscal year 2008-2009, “As of July 1, 2008, 257 pending dockets were carried over from prior years, and 338 new dockets were opened during the fiscal year. Thus, during the fiscal year, a total of 595 dockets were before the Commission for review and consideration. Of the 595 dockets, 324 or approximately 55 per cent of the dockets were completed by the end of the fiscal year.”
A 55 percent is usually an ‘F’ on a report card. Maybe at best a ‘D-‘. So far, Abercrombie’s claim is looking pretty good.
As an example of the length of the , Civil Beat looked at the Hawaiian Telecom Services Company’s claim, filed on Jan. 4, 2010. Their process was completed Sept. 22, approximately eight and a half months later.
It is important to note that the docket process is similar to court proceedings. It takes time. But, Abercrombie didn’t say that dockets don’t take time to work — he said the PUC was backed up.
Assuming that the Hawaiian Telecom case is typical (it’s the case that Caliboso directed Civil Beat to look at), it seems fair to say that a 55 percent completion rate coupled with cases that drag on for months, is enough evidence to declare that the committee has been “backed up for months, if not years.”
Abercrombie was right.
