Flawed Energy Bill Clears House, Speaker Indicates Fix Later in Session

HARTFORD – State Rep. Bill Buckbee (R-New Milford), Ranking Member of the legislature’s Energy & Technology Committee, voted against Senate Bill 7 An Act Strengthening Protections for Connecticut’s Consumers of Energy. Buckbee and many of his colleagues opposed the bill because several of its sections required further vetting.

“We have a 40-section bill. There’s a lot of room for error when legislation is strung together at the last second. I appreciate the intent and unanimous passage in the Senate, but there were glaring issues in the language that needed to be addressed and there wasn’t an opportunity for us to do so on the floor, making it impossible for me to support the bill as its currently written,” said Buckbee.

During debate on the bill, Buckbee pointed to several pro-consumer points he agreed with that will take effect over the coming years. Greater oversight in the form of new reporting and operation requirements of the state’s distributors will be phased in. Additionally, Buckbee had proposed a study of gas leak detectors – an important consumer protection measure that will earn greater legislative consideration based on its findings – which became section 40 of the bill.

According to the committee’s Charmain, Rep. Jon Steinberg (D-Westport), several sections of the bill will be changed in subsequent legislation. For instance, the definition of hydro needed to be adjusted to account for Connecticut’s smaller, river-based operations. This fix, however, was not made to the bill.

Since the current legislative session is quickly ending, and any new amendments put forth by the House would have sent the bill back to the Senate for further action, the flawed piece of legislation was put up for a vote. It passed by a final tally of 115 to 33.

“It’s disappointing that the bipartisanship that we usually see on bigger pieces of legislation was lacking, at best. It would have been great if we were able to provide immediate relief to ratepayers, like removing the gross receipts tax and lowering everyone’s utility bills. There are people in each community throughout Connecticut that are struggling with energy costs. This bill falls short, leaving those concerns unaddressed,” said Buckbee.

The legislature is expected to take up the state budget on Monday afternoon. For the budget to be enacted, there is an accompanying piece of legislation that implements the budget line-items. Buckbee expects energy-related policy to be included with the implementer bill, effectively altering the language of Senate Bill 7, which has yet to be published.

The legislative session concludes on Wednesday, June 7^th.

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