MDN Menu

MDN Home

Journalist's Creed

Print

MDN Help

  Exit  

MDN.ORG: Missouri Digital News

MDN Menu

MDN Home

Journalist's Creed

Print

MDN Help

  Exit  

MDN.ORG Mo. Digital News Missouri Digital News MDN.ORG: Mo. Digital News MDN.ORG: Missouri Digital News

Help  Close

Utility Regulation Election Proposed

JEFFERSON CITY - Utility regulation would be turned over to a statewide elected group under a proposal presented Monday to the Senate Financial and Governmental Organization Committee.

Curently, the five-member Public Service Commission is nominated by the governor and confirmed by the Senate.

The commission, known as the PSC, regulates the state's utilities such as electric and phone companies.

Sen. Doyle Childers proposes increasing the commission to nine members elected from each of the state's nine Congressional districts.

"The membership of the commission is reflected in our telephone or electrical bills," Childers said, "and it is important that the new commissioners are elected by the people who pay the bills".

Under Childer's proposal, commission members would serve four-year terms. Currently, the appointed PSC commissioners serve six-year terms.

"The people who serve on that commission will be elected and responsible to the voters rather than being appointed with no entity as a counter balance to protect the consumer", Childers said.

The salary of each commissioner elected to the office would be one and one half times that for a member of the general assembly. According to Childers, "that is less than the current number are being paid."

Childers was the only witness to testify on the bill. Nobody testified against the his proposal.

The committee chairman did not schedule a vote on the proposal, but Sen. Bill Clay, D-St. Louis, said he was interested in the idea.

Clay said direct election of PSC members might make the commission more consumer-oriented.