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CPUC invites public to reform confab

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California consumers concerned with the California Public Utilities Commission and its handling of the failed San Onofre nuclear plant will be able to sound off at a public meeting scheduled next month — albeit in San Francisco.

The commission is hosting a public meeting Aug. 12 to offer ratepayers a chance to weigh in on a series of recent findings and proposed reforms aimed at improving its oversight of California’s three for-profit utilities.

The gathering will be a meeting of the Commissioner Committee on Policy and Governance, a panel that includes sitting Commissioners Michel Florio and Liane Randolph.

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The regulators are scheduled to discuss the findings from a recent independent report that criticized the commission for allowing thousands of ex parte, or private, communications between utility officials and the regulators who judge the merits of rate hikes and other applications.

They also will discuss a draft code of conduct and a separate report from a top aide to Gov. Jerry Brown who recommended key reforms to improve utility regulation.

“The Commissioner Committees, Commissioner Code of Conduct, ex parte assessment and the modernization project are all part of the CPUC’s initiatives to create a more open, transparent and accessible agency,” the commission said in a news release. “Members of the public and practitioners are encouraged to attend the meeting.”

Regulators are spending more than $5 million of ratepayer money on criminal-defense attorneys to answer subpoenas and other inquiries from state and federal investigators who requested emails and other records from commission officials.

Commission President Michael Picker last week told the chairman of the California Assembly Committee on Utilities and Commerce that he could not “interfere” in an open proceeding by complying with the lawmaker’s request for internal emails related to the San Onofre case.

Customers who were served by San Onofre are being charged more than $3 billion for the power plant, which closed in January 2012 amid a radiation leak.

The meeting is scheduled for 1 p.m. at the commission offices, 505 Van Ness Ave.

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