Legitalk:

[Speaker 0]: Alright. Well, good morning, everyone. I will officially convene the executive and legislative lit of nominations committees public hearing for Thursday, 03/05/2026 to order. We have four items on the agenda today. We will get right to it with item number one, which is a house joint resolution. This is the nomination of Holly Cheeseman of Niantic to be a utility commissioner of the public utilities regulatory authority. Good morning.

[Dr. Jan (Janice) Beecher (PURA Commissioner Nominee)]: Good

[Speaker 0]: Oh, if you can raise your right hand, do you promise where and affirm to tell the truth, the whole truth, and nothing but the truth? I do. Wonderful. The floor is yours for any opening remarks. Thank you.

[Holly Cheeseman (PURA Commissioner Nominee; former State Representative)]: Apologies. Chairman Concepcion and Duff, vice chairs Godfrey and Looney, ranking members Yaccarino and Berthel, and members of the committee. My name is Holly Cheeseman, and I'm honored to have been nominated to serve as a commissioner of the Public Utilities Regulatory Authority. I had the privilege of serving in the Connecticut General Assembly for eight years. In that time, I had the opportunity to get to know many of you working together on committees or testifying before you at public hearings on proposed legislation. My service included eight years on in the energy and technology committee dealing with the many matters in PERA's purview. In a world of rapid and often unforeseen technological change, the world of regular regulatory authorities like PURA becomes even more vital. Who among us could have predicted even five or ten years ago the amazing growth of artificial intelligence and its insatiable hunger for electricity? As our residents, businesses, and institutions become even more reliant on the technology that underpins our existence, regulators are needed more than ever. In fulfilling their duties, commissioners must be independent, judicious, and informed. They have a delicate balancing act to perform as they carry out their duties. For example, when setting rates, the guiding principle is that the level and structure of rates be sufficient, but no more than sufficient to allow public service companies to cover their operating and capital costs to attract needed capital and maintain financial integrity, and yet a pride and yet provide appropriate protection to the relevant public servant interests, both existing and foreseeable. With that principle in mind, all issues should be examined through the three lenses of performance, prudence, and accountability. I intend to bring that to my approach to the position. In my time at PURA, I've been consistently impressed by the skill and knowledge of the staff who bring decades of expertise to their jobs, and it is a privilege to work with them as we carry out the agency's work. The future will bring many challenges, but I am confident that PURA has the team with the expertise, experience, and energy to meet these challenges head on as we move forward as a state. I look forward to being part of that future with your support. Thank you for your time, and I am happy to answer any questions.

[Speaker 0]: Thank you so much, commissioner. Congratulations on your your nomination and your willingness to continue to to serve, the residents of the state of Connecticut. Just a a couple questions. As someone who has never attended a a pure meeting, can you just take me through the process of what a typical meeting might look like? The, you know, number of dockets, how how you interact with with each other.

[Holly Cheeseman (PURA Commissioner Nominee; former State Representative)]: So we have regular, Wednesday morning meetings, and, typically, there may be three or four individual items on the agenda. This week, we had a special meeting. We were rendering final decisions on a number of issues. Then we had two consent calendars, one of which was, decisions on nothing that comes before PURA is minor, but relatively minor matters. For example, if, an Internet company is putting in a conduit, it needs to file with PURA and get permission. So it may be a list of, items like that. And then under Chair Wheel's leadership, all PURA dockets now have a separate providing officer chosen by the panel. So the last item on the agenda was assigning presiding officers to different dockets that will come before us, and that's our our typical meeting.

[Speaker 0]: Appreciate that. Are they open to the public?

[Holly Cheeseman (PURA Commissioner Nominee; former State Representative)]: They are remote. But Zoom, anyone can, obviously, watch them.

[Speaker 0]: Got it.

[Holly Cheeseman (PURA Commissioner Nominee; former State Representative)]: Got it. The dockets, let's say it's a, you know, if we're looking at a rate, typically, there'll be a series of public hearings or public meetings to hear from members of the public prior to the actual real work in the in the PURA judiciary room starting. So in that way and, again, you can attend in person to the those meetings when we're actually looking at events, and everything is broadcast on either YouTube or Zoom in this age of wonderful technology. In fact, I did a lot of my homework prying prior to being, working with the governor's office awaiting my official nomination, looking at those PURA YouTube videos so I would have a very good grasp of what I had before me.

[Speaker 0]: I appreciate that. And, I know you spent eight years on the energy and technology committee.

[Rep. Dave Yaccarino (House Ranking Member)]: Correct.

[Sen. Bob Duff (Senate Chair, Executive & Legislative Nominations Committee)]: What was your relationship like with PURA as a legislator? And, you know, what do you hope to

[Speaker 0]: bring kind of that experience into being now a commissioner?

[Holly Cheeseman (PURA Commissioner Nominee; former State Representative)]: It it was in that, you know, Peru would come before us to testify on particular bills. It was not an intimate relationship, but simply because of the matters of over which the energy and technology committee has oversight, I was very familiar with the activities of PURA and the industries that they regulated. What I hope to bring, obviously, the the skills and knowledge that I acquired during my time on the energy and technology committee. My late husband and I had a public relations company that dealt with the information technology and biotech sector. So highly technical issues are something with which I feel very comfortable. And to go way back, I was also a physics minor in college, and I figured if I could master Fourier series and Schrodinger equations, then setting rates might be possibly within my skill set. But, again, I get everyone that you're gonna see today brings such individual and nonduplicative skills. And I think that's gonna be one of the great strengths of the committee going forward. You're gonna talk to our interim chair, Tom Wheel, who has many years of experience at the Office of Consumer Council, is intimately familiar with the operating operations of the agency. Interim commissioner Jan Beecher with decades of experience, even though she doesn't look like she has decades of experience, in in setting rates and regulation and Everett Smith, who brings what I think is really important private sector experience because the more minds we have looking at these very important issues that face it and bring those different perspectives, the better equipped the agency is going to be to reach the appropriate decisions.

[Speaker 0]: Thanks. And then in your your testimony, you mentioned in both Orlin and written technology and then particularly AI. And I think you use the the phrase insatiable hunger that use Can you expand a little bit on that and how how you see PURA how PURA plans to kind of balance the future needs of energy with what we currently have here

[Sen. Bob Duff (Senate Chair, Executive & Legislative Nominations Committee)]: in the state?

[Holly Cheeseman (PURA Commissioner Nominee; former State Representative)]: I think there I will preface that by saying much of this is not in PURA's control. If you simply look at the where the all of New England and the energy and electricity market, we're in a very unique position simply because of the constraints. So much of our energy is supplied through natural electricity is supplied through natural gas, and we are at the tail end. I mean, there have been numerous conversations, you know, in this building, in the building next door at a higher level about addressing that. Going forward, again, our our ability to influence that, I think there are other departments that there are departments that play a far bigger role. Department of Energy Environmental Protection, they are the agency that's going to enter into power purchase agreements. And to be frank, the people in this in this building and next door are are gonna play, I think, the much more determinative role. But as far as PURA does have a seat on the siting council, and I know any proposed let's say a data center were to come forward, that would be a decision that the siting council would have a role in. But PURA, as I say, is one member of that siting council. I think that, you know, I I like to describe sort of the energy world as a giant jigsaw puzzle. And at the moment, we have they have the edge pieces, but we have no idea how we're gonna fit those inner pieces together. And someone may come along with an invention that totally throws the puzzles off the board. I mean, there are conversations. And this is again, this is straying far from what PURA does. This is going back to my time on energy and technology. PURA is going to look at the dockets that come before us, the utilities that we regulate, electricity, gas, water telecoms. And within that universe make the decisions that we are required to do by statute.

[Speaker 0]: I appreciate that answer. I I might have another question or two, but, commissioner, I'll turn it over to some of my colleagues because I'm sure they have some questions starting with, chairman Duff.

[Sen. Bob Duff (Senate Chair, Executive & Legislative Nominations Committee)]: Thank you, and good morning.

[Rep. Liz Linehan]: Good morning.

[Sen. Bob Duff (Senate Chair, Executive & Legislative Nominations Committee)]: Good to see you today.

[Dr. Jan (Janice) Beecher (PURA Commissioner Nominee)]: Good to

[Holly Cheeseman (PURA Commissioner Nominee; former State Representative)]: see you too.

[Sen. Bob Duff (Senate Chair, Executive & Legislative Nominations Committee)]: Well, we never really get this much activity in this committee room. We're we're we're we're always happy when people stop by to say hi and listen to listen to the the work of this this committee. So, obviously, this is an important the nominees today are important. We're attracting press, and and there's more people in this room than usual. You know, we're here last year, and we're here back again this year on on basically the same subject. So you know, now we have a full complement or potentially a full complement of pure commissioners. And what has changed between last year and this year?

[Holly Cheeseman (PURA Commissioner Nominee; former State Representative)]: Apart from the fact that you have all brand new people?

[Sen. Bob Duff (Senate Chair, Executive & Legislative Nominations Committee)]: Yes. Like, how is it different?

[Holly Cheeseman (PURA Commissioner Nominee; former State Representative)]: Well, again, I was not obviously, I did not serve on the authority last year. I can say from my point of view, my perception from the outside, we have a very collaborative body. Chair wheel, although the chair and he is I think he'll discuss it in his testimony, views his role as more administrative. Every commissioner is having a chance to reside over dockets. Every commissioner's viewpoint is listened to and valued. It is not a, it's a collaborative process, which is what it should be. We are going to you know, when we have a docket before us, as I said, in in a if we're looking at rates, we will have those public meetings. We will have parties and intervenors. We will have pre filed testimony. We will have evidentiary hearings. There are thousands of interrogatories that go out to parties, drilling down into the most intimate details on expenditures, labor agreements, plant, all of those things. We'll then have more hearings. And at the end of the day, staff will present reports. We will take, motions, written evidence from other parties. And the five PURA commissioners together with staff will combine to make a decision. And I think, again, I was not there. I can't speak to the process before, but that is the process that is going to exist at PURA going forward.

[Sen. Bob Duff (Senate Chair, Executive & Legislative Nominations Committee)]: Yeah. I appreciate it. And collaboration, that was always kinda getting that in the question. So I appreciate what you said on that as well. You know, there's there unfortunately, I've seen Pure on the front page of the papers and in the news a lot. We're hoping that, you know, it goes back to page seven.

[Holly Cheeseman (PURA Commissioner Nominee; former State Representative)]: It being boring. Yes. Absolutely.

[Sen. Bob Duff (Senate Chair, Executive & Legislative Nominations Committee)]: But not that's not to minimize the important decisions that Purett makes, but it's just basically say that it's a regulatory body that should be, doing its job No. Without making headlines. And so there's a lot of different things that are happening. Obviously, there's electricity, which obviously dominates the headlines of what you all do, but there's many other functions as well. And that's a little bit of what I'm getting at too is having going from three to five is a bit of a difference. And, obviously, knowing that you were you sat in in on this side, not that side, previously, How is that how is a full complement of commissioners three to five in your in your view different than three in the past?

[Holly Cheeseman (PURA Commissioner Nominee; former State Representative)]: Well, I think apart from bringing more, more experience, more brains to the process, having more commissioners, I think, will also free us up to do some of the work that I know we've discussed with you, in terms of education to the public. I know there's a puro one zero one that exists. Members of the public really don't know what we do. And I think it would be important to explain exactly what is in our remit and the things over which we can't control. So I think education, again, with more commissioners, we we have more time, more skills to go out and do that education mission. I know one of the other subjects that we discussed with you as we're looking at performance of our utilities, adding further scrutiny to things like cybersecurity. I know there was a, I believe, a docket a couple of years ago that looked at that. But, again, with a society so reliant on technology I remember reading a couple of weeks ago, there was a cyber hack attack on a Memphis hospital system, and they had to be I mean, they had to cancel everything and and their outpatient building. So I think that's an area, again, with more commissioners, with more expertise, with more actually hours that we have available to look at areas that PURA may not have paid as much attention to before. And again, you know, we I'm saying to you, as the legislature, you have these additional members. You know? You set so much of the, you know, in terms of statutes, what PURA's responsibilities and, you know, particular issues that should be addressed, guidance coming from you in the governor's office.

[Sen. Bob Duff (Senate Chair, Executive & Legislative Nominations Committee)]: Right. Thank you, Anna. I appreciate that. And you brought up, teed it up nicely with the cybersecurity, obviously, is an important issue and something we've talked about in in my office as well. When I sent a a letter last year, 02/18/2025 to the commissioner signed by myself, our senate president, chair senate chair of the general law committee, and senate chair of the energy committee really is a very serious issue, one that does not get a lot of information and a lot of play. I do wanna underscore, obviously, the importance of working with the utilities to keep costs down and keep them hold them accountable. So I don't wanna gloss over that, but I do wanna work mention the cybersecurity issue as well and hear your thoughts on that a little bit further, if you can, on how you see. And I'm gonna ask all the nominees this as well, but how you view this issue going forward in the portfolio of really important issues of of keeping electric costs down and keeping that in check, working with utilities, but also some of the other issues that are a little less visible, but

[Dr. Jan (Janice) Beecher (PURA Commissioner Nominee)]: Mhmm.

[Sen. Bob Duff (Senate Chair, Executive & Legislative Nominations Committee)]: I think is crucial as critical as as some of the other ones I mentioned.

[Holly Cheeseman (PURA Commissioner Nominee; former State Representative)]: And and that's an excellent point. And I do believe I think it was a 2024 docket that actually looked at cybersecurity, and we had discussed informally, you know, PURA on its own can open dockets to look at that particular issue, perhaps in conjunction with other state agencies, whether it was DESP or the emergency management and homeland security to make it a collaborative process and gather the information needed. Again, if we're looking at, the the utilities and water companies, wherever, cybersecurity becomes so important for all of them. And that, again, as we look at how we draft performance based rate making, Is there a place to incorporate cybersecurity in that? I think those are all issues that we could certainly look at.

[Sen. Bob Duff (Senate Chair, Executive & Legislative Nominations Committee)]: Great. I appreciate that. Another issue and I have just two more issues, and I'll pass it along. But the other issue I have is something that's been the thorn in my side, which we've talked about as well as our double polls here in the state of Connecticut, and we just saw a report on one of our news channels about it. It's an issue in Massachusetts. It's an issue here in the state of Connecticut. And people don't notice it till they notice it. And once you notice it, you can't stop looking at them. But it is a not just a an issue of vanity. It's also a safety issue as well. And my view is that I'm not speaking of our electric providers like Eversource. I'm talking about more of the the other utilities, more of the Internet providers that do not move their wires in a timely way. We see these things year after year after year and just accumulating. Some of them sitting on blocks, some of them that could put the public in danger. We have a a really good program that is a one that we did in Norwalk and many other communities as well, one touch make ready. How will you PURA keep this issue front and center so that we not we do keep our cities and our towns in rural areas clean, but also we're not putting the public a danger. But and and really using your authority and the authority to ensure that this is because it's a cost center for them, that it is a priority for them as well.

[Holly Cheeseman (PURA Commissioner Nominee; former State Representative)]: I can't comment in terms of what might go into a future docket, but I can certainly assure you that having you having raised this as a a concern. And I believe you mentioned there had been a pilot program before.

[Sen. Bob Duff (Senate Chair, Executive & Legislative Nominations Committee)]: Mhmm.

[Holly Cheeseman (PURA Commissioner Nominee; former State Representative)]: Was that a legislative created pro pilot program?

[Dean (Committee Clerk)]: Yes.

[Holly Cheeseman (PURA Commissioner Nominee; former State Representative)]: Over to you, senator.

[Speaker 0]: Okay.

[Sen. Bob Duff (Senate Chair, Executive & Legislative Nominations Committee)]: Oh, I hope that you'll continue it because it's something that there is a bill in the energy technology committee that that we'll see how that fares, but we also need the authority. We need to push by our regulatory agency as well on these things.

[Holly Cheeseman (PURA Commissioner Nominee; former State Representative)]: Noted. Thank you. Thank you.

[Sen. Bob Duff (Senate Chair, Executive & Legislative Nominations Committee)]: And then lastly, working one of the things that we had we had also talked about was working regionally with other regulatory agencies in the Northeast and wanna get your thoughts on the record for that as well.

[Holly Cheeseman (PURA Commissioner Nominee; former State Representative)]: Well, I think we're very fortunate New England with NECCOOK, which is the New England Public Utility Commission. I was lucky to, attend the recent Narok National Association of Regulate Regulator Utility Commissioners Conference in DC, and we had a subcommittee meeting. And suffice it to say, we meet monthly with our fellow commissioners in New England, comparing notes, seeing what we can do collaboratively. Connecticut is slightly different in that in other states, the utility commission very often has the authority that deep has here in terms of entering into power purchase agreements and that sort of thing. But we certainly are always open to collaboration with other states on those areas where we can, in fact, collaborate.

[Sen. Bob Duff (Senate Chair, Executive & Legislative Nominations Committee)]: Great. And I I hope to see more of that because I do think that that is an important thing for us to do because it does we have our electric utilities in three states. There's three different regulatory bodies. I think there does need to be discussion with the regulatory bodies as as well as our consumer council and others that should be working more closely and not in silos. We're small we have small states here, and that is important for consumers because I think they need to feel like there's folks working together on these things. Alright. I may have some additional questions later, but I'll hand it back over to my co chair. Thank you.

[Speaker 0]: Thank you, senator. Representative Viacarino followed by senator Looney.

[Rep. Dave Yaccarino (House Ranking Member)]: Thank you, mister chair, and good morning, Holly. And it's good to see you. It was nice speaking to you yesterday. I know we kept missing each other and all of us, but I appreciate you being here today. And I think it's a new day for for this important board. So my issue in the past, and I think going forward, we have to look forward, is sunshine and transparency, and I liked what you said about collaborating. I think it's vitally important for our ratepayers and for our utilities. You know, like it or not, we do need a strong utility, all utilities, either a phone lines or Internet or gas or, of course, you know, electricity, which which heals almost everything. But with that, could you speak, if you could, on natural gas expansion? I've been a proponent of it trying to expand that I know we're constricted by New York state. Will PURA look at that at all?

[Holly Cheeseman (PURA Commissioner Nominee; former State Representative)]: It's thank you for your question, representative Yaccarino. That is something over which PURA does not have control.

[Rep. Dave Yaccarino (House Ranking Member)]: Okay. Wasn't where you would weigh in on or not for the ratepayer?

[Holly Cheeseman (PURA Commissioner Nominee; former State Representative)]: Whether or not natural gas comes more natural gas comes into the state, I think is well above my pay grade. I know there have been conversations, I think, with our governor and neighboring governors.

[Dr. Jan (Janice) Beecher (PURA Commissioner Nominee)]: Right.

[Holly Cheeseman (PURA Commissioner Nominee; former State Representative)]: At the end of the day, it is going to be, you know, if there is more natural gas in the state, let's say there were new utility looking at it as we are responsible for overseeing our current natural gas companies, that would natural gas companies, that would always continue to be the role. But as far as waving a magic wand and either bringing or stopping more natural gas coming from into the state, that's not something that we have in our authority.

[Rep. Dave Yaccarino (House Ranking Member)]: You would just regulate it. I appreciate that. With the five commissioners compared to three, I would think it's it's much be much much better because you could collaborate on different issues, different topics. Is that what you're finding?

[Holly Cheeseman (PURA Commissioner Nominee; former State Representative)]: Well, and again, as I met believe I mentioned before, we all come with such different skill sets. And I think that will only redound to the benefit of not only the authority, but every resident of the state of Connecticut. I think the best ideas is I'm talking to people who serve in the cauldron of the legislature. The best ideas arise when you exchange views. Sometimes you have differing views, but you at the end of the day, you discuss, you look at the evidence before you, and you come to a consensus about, in purest case, what's the best decision guided by our statutory, you know, authority and requirements.

[Rep. Dave Yaccarino (House Ranking Member)]: Thank you. When you've when have you voted any dockets? Have you voted yet on dockets? Any dockets? Yes. And when you vote, is it all five members? Because there was an issue in the past with some

[Rep. Tammy Nuccio]: Oh, it it

[Holly Cheeseman (PURA Commissioner Nominee; former State Representative)]: it it has been different simply because, for example, Chair Weil and his prior role as chief legal officer for the office of consumer counsel, he participated in many of the dockets. He has recused himself as he should because he was intimately involved as a party or intervener. When I first joined, I abstained from some votes simply because I did not have sufficient knowledge of the record to render what I felt was a responsible decision. And that may be the case with other commissioners. But suffice it to say, when, commissioners, one, are, entitled feel feel they do not need to recuse themselves to vote because of a possible either a perceived bias, then we are all looking at everything that comes before us in the docket. We are participating in those initial hearings. We are reading the testimony and the interrogatories, listening to the parties and interveners ruling on motions. We are all working together where it is permissible and advisable.

[Rep. Dave Yaccarino (House Ranking Member)]: I appreciate that. When you recuse yourself, do you as a commissioner have to give a reason why you you cannot

[Holly Cheeseman (PURA Commissioner Nominee; former State Representative)]: Well, it's so it I I will give, a couple of the initial dockets where I didn't vote. And and it was basically, we will issue a course a written correspondence in the record and say, for these reasons, I will not be voting on this issue. And, for me and I believe commissioner Beecher, we had not we were not sufficiently familiar with the matter at hand to feel we could responsibly cast a vote. You know, it's as if you missed everything and then were required to make a decision about something. I certainly would not put myself in a position where I were casting a vote one way or the other if I didn't feel I was confident in the matter on which I was voting.

[Rep. Dave Yaccarino (House Ranking Member)]: I think that's responsible. But you do have to you do you do at least give a reason why.

[Holly Cheeseman (PURA Commissioner Nominee; former State Representative)]: Oh, absolutely.

[Rep. Dave Yaccarino (House Ranking Member)]: I think that's

[Holly Cheeseman (PURA Commissioner Nominee; former State Representative)]: You know? And and, you know, vice vice chair Conte worked for a utility. He is recusing himself on certain matters. As I say, commissioner interim chair, Weil, because of his position at the office of consumer counsel, is doing the ethical, responsible, and in fact, legally required thing. He is recusing himself from matters in which he was intimately involved on the other side. It's as if you, you know, the defense attorney will all of a sudden appoint a judge and he was ruling on a case. You there are many attorneys sitting on this panel. You just don't do that.

[Rep. Dave Yaccarino (House Ranking Member)]: Nice. I really appreciate that. As far as the polls, I think I I've reached out to Frontier because I'm I have a business on Route 5, and there's multiple polls. I think the companies cannot take the poll down until the other party's work is done. They won't they don't they will not remove those polls until both parties are done in case they have to go back because then it's redundant if if, God forbid, or something, they have to do work again. They have to it's a it's a process to put the poll up, put it down. So I think it's both parties, if I'm not mistaken, I see the chair nodding. I think they both have to finish their work and then move on. And I I know it's a it's an eyesore some time and it's it's it's it's I have one where I live, they put two poles, but I knew what they had to do. I knew what they're gonna eventually take the other pole down, and they did. It just they had to wait for, I think, Xfinity to finish their work. So two a couple more questions, mister chair, and thank you for your patience. With the the past culture was not the greatest, and with the staff, you know, staff is important. Like, we have great staff here. You have a lot of staff there. It's I'm hoping the working relationship and the communications with the staff, with this building, and with the utilities is something that's that's transparent, but also changing the culture. You know, like, we're close to spring. To me, I'm excited for the four new members, to be honest. Yeah. It's a new it's a new beginning as far as for pure and our rate payers and for our utilities. Hopefully, you all will work with your staff in a collaborative way and and be on a page where it's good for and I have faith, and I know you from working with you. You know? And I it wasn't that just because I know you, but you actually work hard and you're you're conscientious, and I'm sure the other members are also. But that's important to have a good culture and and and our bond we lost our our bonding rating went down last year because of inaction. And I think we can never we don't want that to happen happen. You know, it was before you, we're all there. No.

[Holly Cheeseman (PURA Commissioner Nominee; former State Representative)]: But we are as I said, we've we're committed to having a collaborative culture, and we're also committed to carrying out our duties as defined by statute.

[Rep. Dave Yaccarino (House Ranking Member)]: Like an umpire or or or a judge is calling Baltimore.

[Holly Cheeseman (PURA Commissioner Nominee; former State Representative)]: A quasi judicial body.

[Rep. Dave Yaccarino (House Ranking Member)]: Right. Just

[Holly Cheeseman (PURA Commissioner Nominee; former State Representative)]: calling Volley. Right. You know, a dockets is like in similar many ways to a court case. We will you know, people will present evidence. And, again, at to you mentioned the staff, we have such an incredibly hardworking staff who literally drill down into the finest minutiae of what is presented to us, whether it's, you know, a utility, whether it's someone looking at putting a small cell on. They are looking at every detail and giving us the information we need to make that decision that is informed by our experience, but also guided by our statutory requirements and authority.

[Rep. Dave Yaccarino (House Ranking Member)]: I appreciate that, and I'm looking forward to voting for you. And and I appreciate it, mister Taryn. Thank you.

[Holly Cheeseman (PURA Commissioner Nominee; former State Representative)]: Thank you.

[Thomas (Tom) Weil (PURA Commissioner & Chair Nominee)]: Thank you,

[Speaker 0]: representative. I figured there was gonna be a baseball reference at some point today.

[Holly Cheeseman (PURA Commissioner Nominee; former State Representative)]: I I told them I that your clerk that if I got any curve balls, I did bring my glove with

[Dr. Jan (Janice) Beecher (PURA Commissioner Nominee)]: me. So

[Speaker 0]: Senator Looney.

[Sen. Martin M. Looney]: Thank you, mister chairman. Good morning, commissioner. Congratulations on your nomination.

[Holly Cheeseman (PURA Commissioner Nominee; former State Representative)]: Good morning, senator.

[Sen. Martin M. Looney]: First of all, in terms of, I'd like to hear a little bit about your your regulatory philosophy because the, the entities that you're regulating are, in a sense, private businesses, but they are involved in something which is critically important to the, to the public. And that's why they are regulated. They are, in effect, guaranteed a market, guaranteed a rate of return. They're not really competitive businesses in the same sense that that, Ford and General Motors are competing selling cars on the same market. They're they're not subject to that kind of, of competition. And I I wonder sometimes whether or not they they realize that or they they seem to sometimes, try to lump themselves in with the general corporations. I remember back in 2020 when, the energy committee held hearings after the, storm Isaias and and was suggested to, one of the utilities at that point that it might be good to have public members on the board. And they said, well, you know, private companies don't really do that. Well, they are they're not a private company in the same sense that other private corporations are because they are a regulated utility, operating under a framework that's, provided by law. But just your your sense about the in a sense about how how vigorous do you think that the position of a regulator should be in in your circumstances now? In other words, it it's not like you're on the board of directors of, of some of a private corporation. You are regulating a public utility. I'd just like to hear your general view on on on that.

[Holly Cheeseman (PURA Commissioner Nominee; former State Representative)]: Well, I did you make a very good point. They are in a a unique position in that even in our deregulated market, they have an effective monopoly. Yeah. And I I will refer to general statutes nine six nineteen a four that rates need to be set to provide, you know, those to allow public service companies to cover the operating and capital cost to attract needed capital, but they have to be sufficient, but no more than sufficient. And that they provide appropriate protections to the relevant public interest, both existing and foreseeable. And that is the guiding principle. That should be the guiding principle. I I that is my guiding principle that simply because you are in a position to have an effect a monopoly, quote, unquote, does not mean that the regulator cannot hold you accountable and will not hold you accountable.

[Sen. Martin M. Looney]: Right. I think that's, that's reassuring to, to hear. And, a couple of other issues. One, of course, of particular concern in the, the greater new New Haven area is the longstanding problem with Avangrid and the and the English Station plant, which I remember being at a press conference with former Attorney General Jepsen in 2015 when a settlement was announced then, and then being at the same site nine years later at a press conference with Commissioner Dykes and Attorney General Tong, where a new lawsuit was announced regarding the the lack of compliance with the original settlement from nine years earlier. Just your your thoughts on that and how an issue like that should be brought into the regulatory process and looking at dockets that might be brought by by, Avangrid in the context of, of of enforcing a prior agreement.

[Holly Cheeseman (PURA Commissioner Nominee; former State Representative)]: That is a subject that is currently on our, in our purview, so I can't really comment.

[Sen. Martin M. Looney]: But you do have it within your purview to to deal with currently? There are

[Holly Cheeseman (PURA Commissioner Nominee; former State Representative)]: anything that's in a current docket. I really can't comment on.

[Sen. Martin M. Looney]: Okay. But it is in a current docket. Okay. Well, thank you. The other question I have is, it may have come to your attention about another issue regarding, UI or Avangrid about is the, the change in retiree benefits that, was also part of the representation that was made back in 2015, when the, the merger occurred without, Avangrid taking over UI and becoming part of Iberitrola about providing the, medicaid medical savings account and also a, the company paying the Medicare Part B premium for retired management employees and apparently they have decided to change that. Is that also a part of a docket, that would be for you now regarding

[Holly Cheeseman (PURA Commissioner Nominee; former State Representative)]: That may or may not come before us at some point in the future. So, again, I must, I'm not at liberty to comment on that, but I know that you have members from UI testifying

[Sen. Martin M. Looney]: today. Good. Good. And we also have some retirees from UI, I think, testifying today about that issue. Good. Well, thank you very much, and congratulations on your

[Holly Cheeseman (PURA Commissioner Nominee; former State Representative)]: application. Thank you for your questions.

[Speaker 0]: Thank you, senator. Representative Nuccio followed by representative Quinn.

[Rep. Tammy Nuccio]: Thank you, mister chair. My share is really low, and I can't make it come up right now.

[Holly Cheeseman (PURA Commissioner Nominee; former State Representative)]: Those are so annoying. Aren't they? I look extremely shorter than I am typically. Good morning, representative.

[Rep. Tammy Nuccio]: Good morning to you. And despite everything that I say going forward, I'm thrilled to see you sitting there. I know you and I have had a conversation. And I think the fact that as the chair mentioned, like these meetings are never really that popular and there's news people here. There's a lot of people here looking at that. And I think that just kind of strikes levity, to the fact that one of the top issues that we still hear in our districts all the time is the exorbitant cost of electricity. And all of the stuff that has happened in the past few years with PURA and the, very public fights outright with the utility companies. And it's something that I still hear on a regular basis is, you know, what are we doing to bring the cost of electricity down? And I do a lot of talking to a lot of people. As you know, I speak to people at, the electric companies. I've spoken to, members of PURE in the past, people on ENT and all of that, just to try to make sure that I have enough information. So when I'm voting on something, I do it in an educated manner. I think you know that about me being my seatmate for so many years. I miss you there by the way. Thank you. So I'm at a little bit of a disadvantage today, and this is something that I kind of wanted to preface before all of the, all of the people that are coming forward is in the past, you know, with ExecNoms, you know, we typically talk to, or at least I have on the many years that I've been on exec knobs now. You know, we've always talked to the candidates ahead of time. And for whatever reason through scheduling or whatever, you know, we have not had the I I can't say we, but I have not had the opportunity to speak to any of the members that are coming forward today. And I have a lot of questions for people, like, more questions than I think I can reasonably take up time for in this meeting, regarding, you know, experience and the I've been doing a lot of researching on what are the quali what are the qualifications to be a regulator and, you know, what kind of experience should you have and and what you're looking at doing. And I don't think, you know, we I haven't had the time to kind of parlay with the candidates going forward. And that's disappointing to me because, you know, I take this job very seriously and especially when we're talking about one of the top issues from my constituents. You know, I was just handed this packet as I walked in here, and we just got an email that was late last night that had the even the background on everybody. And again, you're fortunate. I know a lot more about you than I do the other candidates in that. We were just handed this information, and it's a pretty thick packet to try to sit down and go through while we're in the midst of a, of a hearing. And I just find that to be a really big disservice to us sitting here.

[Holly Cheeseman (PURA Commissioner Nominee; former State Representative)]: And I will apologize. We have been, from the beginning guided by the governor's office. I did submit my resume and testimony probably six weeks ago. I'm sorry. I did not reach out proactively. But again, we've been I've never been nominated as a commissioner before, so I wasn't too sure of the drill. And and to be frank, it's a short session. I know how busy all of you are. This is not the only committee on which you serve. I mean, you represent a new job as ranking on appropriations. I mean, I was we came before you and for a couple of meetings, but I know how absolutely crazy your calendars are. And I will speak for myself and and, you know, I think the other commissioners, we are more than happy after this meeting to engage in more conversation. I'm sorry you didn't feel you had sufficient time to review our backgrounds. And again, I was sort of taking my hand from the governor's office, and I am sorry that you felt that we did not provide you with enough information to give you what you needed to make an informed decision. And, again, sort of segueing back to my conversations before. I'm not gonna vote on something if I don't feel I have sufficient background, and I can understand your dismay that you feel you're in that position. And for that, I apologize.

[Rep. Tammy Nuccio]: I I appreciate that. You know, I'm I'm not I'm not trying to lay this at your feet. You know, I think that's something you and I both have in common. We talked about it on the floor and that, you know, I'm not voting on anything that I don't understand. And my second mantra to that is if I don't understand it, I'm gonna I'm gonna vote no. Because at least I can say I'm voting no because I don't understand it. I'm glad that we now have time from this meeting today to when all four of you come on the floor, And I hope that we can all sit down because this is a Well,

[Holly Cheeseman (PURA Commissioner Nominee; former State Representative)]: we can't all sit down together because then it's cool when we get in trouble. So we'll make time. Like Noah's Ark.

[Rep. Tammy Nuccio]: I will make time. Be sure I have time on my calendar. Because, again, this is one of the most important things that I hear from my constituency. And, you know, I wanna be able to go back to them and tell them about the changes that are happening in PURA and how, how they can expect to see that benefit them. And I think there's a lot of work that has to be done between, PURA and the public, as you mentioned, and also the, the entities that you're regulating because there's just been so much blood in the water. You know? I agree.

[Holly Cheeseman (PURA Commissioner Nominee; former State Representative)]: And I I think, you know, as I mentioned, the the opportunity to do more do more in terms with education and outreach. And I actually did just receive my electricity bill. And I think one of the things that's important to point out, looking at the current charges, supply Mhmm. Not in our purview. Yep. Transmission, federally regulated. Local delivery, yes. That's where we can play a role. Public benefits charges. So the ability of PURA to affect rates is definitely there, but there are other issues that affect the the bill that arrived in my mailbox the other day over which PURA has no control. And that's where I think the education the ability to do that education piece is going to be so important and to which I and I'm sure other commissioners are looking forward.

[Rep. Tammy Nuccio]: Yeah. I I agree with you. You know? And and, again, having done a lot of research on it, you know, I I realize the parts that you guys have a piece in. And I know you mentioned the public benefits fee. And, again, I think those these are conversations that we need to have in whether or not PURA becomes an activist agency or how it's looking at implementing these things and, you know, what is that impact on the general rate payer?

[Holly Cheeseman (PURA Commissioner Nominee; former State Representative)]: And I know, there was a legislative, directive to the Office of Consumer Council to look at those public benefit, charges. And I believe they're submitting a report to you, and we obviously, look forward to that report.

[Rep. Tammy Nuccio]: Do you think PURA has the ability when you are looking at things like that, right, to come back and say, this is not the right place for this to be?

[Holly Cheeseman (PURA Commissioner Nominee; former State Representative)]: I don't believe that's PURA's role.

[Rep. Liz Linehan]: Okay.

[Rep. Tammy Nuccio]: Alright. So you don't really evaluate whether or not what ends up in the public benefit fee? What is in

[Holly Cheeseman (PURA Commissioner Nominee; former State Representative)]: the public benefits charge is what's in the public benefits charge. PURA does not dictate what's in the public benefits charge.

[Rep. Tammy Nuccio]: And so that would be legislative then.

[Holly Cheeseman (PURA Commissioner Nominee; former State Representative)]: I think that's a fair assessment.

[Rep. Tammy Nuccio]: I appreciate that. So, you know, I I just wanna say that again, I'm very happy that you're sitting there. I have a lot of faith in in you and the work that you do. Overall, I think just for general consensus today, I'm gonna be a no on all of this just because I you know, just because of the process and not really being able to be fully educated on the candidates that are coming before me. There are a lot of candidates that we get that we get their resumes and we talk to like, we know about, like, you know, the board of eds and stuff like that. But this role, this one role for you four coming forward, I think, is of paramount importance and should be reviewed. We should be talking about qualifications, education, and really kind of, representing our constituents there. And I look forward to the next few weeks where, hopefully, I will have a meeting from all four of you for at least an hour to sit in my office and discuss all of this.

[Holly Cheeseman (PURA Commissioner Nominee; former State Representative)]: Well, I appreciate your candor, and I appreciate your willingness to engage in further dialogue. Thank you, representative.

[Dr. Jan (Janice) Beecher (PURA Commissioner Nominee)]: Thank you.

[Speaker 0]: Thank you, representative. Representative Quinn.

[Rep. Quinn]: Thank you, mister chair and commissioner. Congratulations again. Thank you. I am very pleased to see you sitting there. Though oftentimes, we were on opposite sides of issues during the time we served together, I always knew that your comments came from a place of knowledge that you had researched, and I know that you're going to bring that work ethic to this position, and we're happy to have you there.

[Holly Cheeseman (PURA Commissioner Nominee; former State Representative)]: Thank you, sir.

[Speaker 0]: Thank you, representative. Representative Fiennes.

[Rep. Irene Haines]: Thank you, mister chair. Good morning. Thank you for being here. Thank you for being with us, Holly. We appreciate you very much. Just a quick question. You you know, you spoke of the delicate, balancing act that you are going to have to maintain there at PURA and, you know, working with the general public and the ability to, you know, their lack or or their lack to be able to pay or they are paying for, you know, that kind of thing. So that's one piece. And then, obviously, working with the utilities and making sure that they are made whole, at the same time providing the service that we all expect from them. So that truly is a balancing act. Is there anything that you've seen thus far, or is there an you know, a lot of what you're educating us this morning already as far as what Purview, PURA has. Is there any statutes or regulations that in that balancing act that we can help with as far as helping PURA do the job or the better job that we all want you to do?

[Holly Cheeseman (PURA Commissioner Nominee; former State Representative)]: I don't feel it's really my place to advise the legislature on what it should or should not do. What I can say that PURE is happy to be a resource if you were considering legislation and you said, well, do you what do you think the effect would be? Would this have any effect, you know, in in what you're doing going forward? That's a role I feel we should play. But I don't personally, I do not believe it's my job to advocate to the legislature. You are the decision making body. We'll offer advice if asked.

[Rep. Irene Haines]: Alright. Well, you can plan on me asking, but thank you so much for being here. Appreciate you.

[Speaker 0]: Thank you, representative. Senator Martin.

[Sen. Henri Martin]: Thank you, mister chair. I am wearing a bow tie today because, for the record, this is, Steve Messer's birthday on Saturday. And since we are not gonna see, we are we had a commerce meeting earlier, and this was going to be our last meeting before his birthday. So we decided to surprise him and wear bow ties in his honor. So if you see him today in the building, just say, wish him a happy birthday. So congratulations, Holly.

[Holly Cheeseman (PURA Commissioner Nominee; former State Representative)]: Okay. Thank you, Senator.

[Sen. Henri Martin]: I'm I'm very when I saw your name nominated or rumors of your name being nominated, I think I I was pretty pleased to know that someone of your caliber and your your character was going to be joining PURA. And I know without a doubt you're gonna be making the best decision for the the people of Connecticut, those that are you know, rate payers, for electricity here in

[Holly Cheeseman (PURA Commissioner Nominee; former State Representative)]: Thank you very much.

[Sen. Henri Martin]: So, you know, your work ethics speaks volumes of who you are and just the respect that you've earned within us as your colleagues as well as the governor's office too.

[Holly Cheeseman (PURA Commissioner Nominee; former State Representative)]: So Thank you.

[Sen. Henri Martin]: So, Holly, you know that we're in a unaffordable crisis here here in the state of Connecticut, and we know that energy has everything to do with contributing to that on affordability. So how do you see yourself helping in that capacity or in the capacity you're gonna have right now? How do you see yourself as a commissioner for PURA in maintaining the energy cost and in developing energy here in the state of Connecticut?

[Holly Cheeseman (PURA Commissioner Nominee; former State Representative)]: Well, to to the second point, PURA doesn't have a role in how energy develops in the state of Connecticut. As I think I mentioned before, many public utilities, the sort of procurement piece and the public utility commission piece are are conjoined in Connecticut, to the Department of Energy Environmental Protection. They will enter into power purchase agreements. They are doing all of that. In terms of affordability, as I mentioned before, those areas where PURA can have an effect on rates, rest assured that we will follow the statutory guidelines and ensure that any utility receives sufficient, but only sufficient money to support its the carrying out its delivery of whether it's water or electricity.

[Sen. Henri Martin]: Yeah. I think the the the public and I think maybe a lot of legislators here in the in the building believe that PURA has a lot to do with the affordability of of the cost of energy here in the state. And without, I guess, your the the Puro's ability to help maintain those costs? Because, you know, the having this how can you help, I guess, in

[Holly Cheeseman (PURA Commissioner Nominee; former State Representative)]: I I and I think it

[Sen. Henri Martin]: shouldn't be the adequate supply.

[Holly Cheeseman (PURA Commissioner Nominee; former State Representative)]: Right. Exactly. But, again, just looking at the electricity bill with the supply transmission public benefits over which we have no ability to affect how much people are paying. That area which we can control, we will make sure that we are only allowing the utility the money it is statutorily required to receive, and that's the role we can pay. We will not be all of us are cognizant of our responsibility. All of us receive a monthly electricity bill. But, again, the role of the regulator is to, as I cited in the general statute, that the level and structure of rates be sufficient, but no more than sufficient to allow public service companies to cover their operating and capital costs to attract needed capital and to maintain financial and egg integrity and yet provide appropriate protection to the relevant public interest, both existing and foreseeable. I invite anyone on this committee to look at a PURA docket and see the hundreds, if not thousands, of interrogatory questions that will go out when we look at a rate case. We receive spreadsheets with alphabets, you know, alphabet plus cells looking at every single expenditure of the utility. We have divisions within PURA. We have the office of consumer counsel who are typically interveners, the attorney general's office, the department of energy environmental protection, other parties ensuring that we put the most direct scrutiny on every cost that's presented to us to ensure that what we allow in rates is absolutely valid and is sufficient, but no more than sufficient. Our role is to keep the lights on, but not hand out candy. And it's a it is a delicate balancing act because we are so reliant on these services. And, again, as we're looking at this if you look at what happens in this building in terms of dictates to the utilities, All of that will show up in what we're looking at when we set the rates. But no one on PURA takes less than seriously our responsibility to do just that, provide sufficient, but no more than sufficient capital revenue. We have a whole unit that looks at nothing but rates and revenue. We have units who scrutinize, as I said, every single element that has to be presented in the rate case. We had an a technical session yesterday looking at water quality forms. Water companies now have to remove things like PFAS. There are, I believe, seven or eight forms that water companies are going to have to submit to us to receive payment for those systems they've put in place to remove PFAS. This is not an easy process for them to do, but we take it seriously enough that we're saying if if we are going to allow this to be put on rates, you have to fill out every single one of these boxes before we will even consider it. This is how seriously we take our job. This is how seriously our staff take our job. And believe me, we are not going to approve rates that aren't presented before us in the appropriate way with a with sufficient evidence behind them that this has been a cost that has been prudently, and that's another prudently incurred. Was this a wise way for you to spend your money? If it wasn't, then it's not gonna show up in the rates. Prudence is a huge guiding factor when we look at what is coming before us. And believe me, we take this seriously.

[Sen. Henri Martin]: Thank thank you, Holly. So, Holly, how you yourself, what do you think I hear you your your your statement regarding Puros, you know, some of this is not up to Puro to maintain the affordability of the state of Connecticut. What would you do and your and or Puro do? What can you all do collectively to bring down energy costs? What how can you contribute to that? I know that you guys can help maintain the the the distribution side and overseeing the utility companies, etcetera. But if if it's legislatively, then what would you guys all suggest that we do as a body? Because for for me, and I think for a lot of us in this building is how can we make Connecticut better? And and a big answer to that is we need to control energy cost. We're gonna be looking for the for answers. I'm assuming that Pure is gonna be part of that answer. So what would you suggest that we as a body how do we address affordability, energy affordability?

[Holly Cheeseman (PURA Commissioner Nominee; former State Representative)]: I don't wanna disappoint you, senator Martin, because I respect you.

[Dr. Jan (Janice) Beecher (PURA Commissioner Nominee)]: But I think you're asking PURE to

[Holly Cheeseman (PURA Commissioner Nominee; former State Representative)]: solve a problem that is not Kira, to solve a problem that is not within our power. We we are going to look at those areas where we have oversight, where we can play a role. And, again, guided by that statute, produce rates that are sufficient, but only sufficient. At that narrow conference I attended, that was the overriding subject in every panel. It was affordability. And we're not just talking New England. We're not just talking California or Alaska or or Hawaii. It was every state in the union. I believe even the president mentioned rate payers the other day. There is a recognition across this country that for a variety of reasons, including inflation, which was very high for many years, that affected everyone, including the companies that supply our power. I know when my husband goes to Home Depot and comes back and says, I can't believe I paid $7 for the box of nails that I paid a buck for five years ago. The things that may solve the energy crisis, the the affordability crisis are not, unfortunately, under the control of PURA. If somebody comes up with great small rod modular reactors that we put at Millstone and solves the the solid holy grail of fusion, This is a totally different conversation. And I wish I could say that some of these people being nominated to serve today have that magic formula, but we don't. And I wish we did because it would be a very different Connecticut in in which all of our residents and businesses were doing business. What we can control is that piece that we can control, And I'm afraid I'm gonna have to leave it at that.

[Sen. Henri Martin]: Okay. Thank you, Holly. Thank you, mister chair.

[Speaker 0]: Thank you, senator. Representative Gottfried followed by senator from Farrah.

[Rep. Bob Godfrey (Vice Chair)]: Thank you, mister chairman. Congratulations again.

[Holly Cheeseman (PURA Commissioner Nominee; former State Representative)]: Thank you.

[Rep. Bob Godfrey (Vice Chair)]: We had a nice conversation a couple of weeks ago about You did. All of this. I'm so glad that you've been appointed to the to to PURA, and you're joining our colleague, of course, David Arcani, who's been there a few years now, a good friend of mine from Danbury.

[Holly Cheeseman (PURA Commissioner Nominee; former State Representative)]: It's funny to think David is the longest serving PURA commissioner. He's been there for, what, eighteen months? Yes. Yeah. He's an old guy.

[Rep. Dave Yaccarino (House Ranking Member)]: And he yeah.

[Rep. Bob Godfrey (Vice Chair)]: He's the old guy, and he still looks like he's 12. I know. That that's another discussion altogether. We were very disappointed when he moved from Danbury to Brookfield, but other than that, he's been doing a great job. And and and as we chatted, you know, I'm old enough to remember when Elagrosso created the predecessors to PURA. We've changed the names and that kind of thing over the years, ironically, because the price of telephones were too high as what what prompted it. But the discussion we have, the understanding that you're not an administrative judge court, and you're not supposed to be neutral. You're supposed to represent consumers, and you do a great job of that. And we've given you the power limited as you have correctly observed to be able to do that, to be able to help out. Now over the we've made mistakes over the year. I would won't go back to the role of administration's decoupling of supply and delivery. I certainly was not happy with the 2017 bailout of Dominion, which went to ratepayers and was a big part of the problem with the the public benefits a couple of years ago. I voted against that. It was a bad idea then. It's kind of a bad idea now. But the changes in the personnel and the the membership, I think, are gonna go a very long way of reviving that idea that you're not there to be a supplier's or a delivery organization or or company's helpmate. You're there to represent consumers within that very limited power that we have granted you. I'm so happy your in your remarks that you realize that that you have, I think, helped educate us and the public on the the role of PURA, which is very important because people do not exactly they they think you you know, PURA controls electric cost. No. It doesn't. So you just have to maintain that statutory balance, that statutory power that we give you, the authority we give you in order to protect consumers. So it's it's and I'm, of course, happy to see anybody who leaves the legislation to continue planning public service. That's that's a very big deal. So I I'm really happy you're here. I mean, we had I I knew you your entire time in the in the in the house of representatives. We served together for all those years. You're thoughtful. You're logical. You're consumer friendly. Like David, you've represented constituencies and understand the link between government and the public, which sometimes with some appointed officials who haven't ever faced an elect election, been part of their experience, this understanding of communication with the public. And I think you're gonna go a long way to help demystify the, the work that Pure is doing. And and, you've you've what? You've been there a few months now. Right?

[Holly Cheeseman (PURA Commissioner Nominee; former State Representative)]: I started November 3.

[Rep. Bob Godfrey (Vice Chair)]: November. So you you've really we you've really been thrown into the pool and and and hope that you swim in. I think you're doing a terrific job.

[Holly Cheeseman (PURA Commissioner Nominee; former State Representative)]: And I have great fellow paddlers.

[Rep. Bob Godfrey (Vice Chair)]: How about that? And go Yankees. But, so so congratulations. Thank you. You sir you certainly have my support, and I'm just delighted you are an appointee to PURA. Thank you.

[Holly Cheeseman (PURA Commissioner Nominee; former State Representative)]: Thank you, sir. Thank you, representative.

[Speaker 0]: Thank you, representative. Senator Rivera.

[Sen. John W. Fonfara]: Thank you, mister chairman. I don't know if is it representative Cheeseman, Holly, commissioner Cheeseman.

[Holly Cheeseman (PURA Commissioner Nominee; former State Representative)]: Holly sounds good to me. Thank you, senator.

[Sen. John W. Fonfara]: Congratulations on your appointment. And knowing you as I do as the former ranking on finance and our work together in that regard, I know that you bring, as you've demonstrated here today, great commitment and diligence and effort to this job, and and we need that. You know, PURA and formally the DPUC used to be the place where people went to retire.

[Holly Cheeseman (PURA Commissioner Nominee; former State Representative)]: I'm on chapter, I think, six or seven of my life, and I have no plans to retire anytime soon, senator.

[Sen. John W. Fonfara]: I'm glad to hear that. And and a reason for that was because it was a day when the saying that energy I think Tony Villillo remembered this, that energy was too cheap to meter. Those days are over, and this is a serious issue. When I start on energy, nobody wanted to be on the committee. I don't know how much that if that's changed, but it should change.

[Holly Cheeseman (PURA Commissioner Nominee; former State Representative)]: Oh, I it was actually when I was I had my first conversation with representative Claritus. What committees do you wanna be on? Finance revenue and bonding and energy and technology. We're there from the beginning, and they stayed that way through the end.

[Sen. John W. Fonfara]: So to give you an idea, not that you need one, but for those watching or listening, yes, PURA has a lot of responsibilities, none probably getting the attention that electricity does these days. But there are many areas that that the commission oversees and regulates. But not too long ago, the DECD commissioner said that electricity prices are an existential threat to the economy of the state of Connecticut. And I don't know how much more serious can be said than that in reflecting the importance of electricity in Connecticut. And I would just say that I think in one of the thing I think that your being on the hot seat first today would probably mean shorter time for others who were

[Holly Cheeseman (PURA Commissioner Nominee; former State Representative)]: I'm taking one for the team. Yes.

[Sen. John W. Fonfara]: I think that's true. But still, I think that you and your fellow commissioners have an opportunity to decide whether much like being a legislator, you can be a one who initiates or you can be one who responds. And it's my hope that the four of you will be in a role of of initiating much more than responding. You have to respond. A rate case comes before you have to respond. But I think the job has so much more potential to it in terms of addressing as an advocate for issues that that you do have responsibility for.

[Holly Cheeseman (PURA Commissioner Nominee; former State Representative)]: And I I I don't mean to interrupt, but we did on the issue of affordability. PURA did of its own open a docket on affordability called the EASE docket and took in testimony from a number of parties. We have open dockets on medical protection. I mean, obviously, this is something, to to your point, initiating things. That ease docket was purely on PURA's initiative. So I I take your point that there is room for us to explore areas that are perhaps not traditionally, you know, in terms of regulated utilities, but that may address some of the concerns of this committee.

[Sen. John W. Fonfara]: You've said here today, and I've heard this before, how limited in terms of the entire electric bill that PURA's responsibilities are specific to. I don't think that's true. As an example, distribution, no question. But transmission, which people like to say is fed federally regulated and not our purview, What is regulated is the rate, but the decisions of what is being built in transmission is not federally determined. It's determined by Connecticut and by the utilities and and PURA in terms of what you see is needed. And so that's an area that PURA could weigh in on considerably. It has chosen not to, but it could. Supply is very much in your purview because Pure is one of the parties that that says yes to what the auctions produce along with OCC and the AG, I believe, are the parties. But the manner in which we procure is very, very inefficient. It is politically protective. So no one in this building or in the governor's office gets blamed when rates blame when rates go up. That's not fair to ratepayers. We could do a lot better right down the road in Norwich, sort of near your stomping grounds. They for various reasons, but one of the reasons why they have the lowest rates in Connecticut at at CMEC and, I think, six or seven towns, including one commissioner's, Duff's Town, is because of the way they procure versus us. And PURA could weigh in on that issue. It hasn't, but I wish it would. With with respect to public benefits, there are a number of things in public benefits that have come out of PURA that could be reexamined. Not all of them, but some could. Secondly, the system that distribution transmission in particular, highly, highly inefficient. It's 50% efficient. That means that we build the system towards the peak, and yet it's like a six lane highway that we use three lanes 90% of the time. And we've done nothing as a state to affect that. You just finished a docket on the UI rate case. UI has had smart meters on their second generation of smart meters. And in 2007, we passed legislation to require that any wood on demand would get a smart meter. 2007, almost twenty years, and meaningful time of use rates to to reduce peak demand. We've never made UI use those meters for anything other than knowing when outages happen or to shut someone off. And Eversource, which resisted smart meters for decades, now says they embrace them, but there's no agreement on how to move forward in that regard. And smart meters are useless if you don't have meaningful time of use rates. Why is that important? Because when you keep building that additional lane to the highway that only gets used a few hours of the year, you're costing rate payers enormous amounts, and our rates are much higher because of that. So it's true, Holly, that can we can PURA on its own decide to say we're gonna bring more natural gas into Connecticut? No. I I get that. But there are other parts of the bill that you could have a substantial role either directly or indirect including, I believe, was senator Martin's question about what could we do here. PURA is an organization with your staff that has the reason we created in the first place, it was created in the first place, was because of the complexity of the issues. This building does not have that capacity. We need active engagement with PURA on what we can do in terms of legislation and working collaboratively. And I hope that you and your colleagues will take advantage of that, help us as a body to do a a better job in the areas that we can influence. And so I'd love to hear your response and, obviously, those who'll come after you regarding whether you choose to be one who responds to things that come to you solely or initiate and proactively engage in this issue that, as the commissioner of DCD said, is a existential threat to the economy of the state of Connecticut, which I would say also a threat to many seniors who are on fixed incomes, others who have low income. And one last point I'd like to make. I apologize, mister chairman, for taking up so much time. You know, we have embraced, for good reason, solar in this state, for many reasons, environmental in particular. But but we continue to build solar in Connecticut, which every time a house has solar on its roof, that's money that is being taken out of the system for paying for the wires, the poles, and the entire electric system. And sales and revenue from the utilities is declining every year because of that. Costs are not declining. And so so when a person has solar on their roof and no longer paying into the system, everybody else's kilowatt hours price just went up. And then some people can't afford it, and so they go on hardship. So you're squeezing the middle to the point where this death spiral is gonna lead to incredibly high rates. And why is it important that we haven't done anything on time of use rates or meters is because solar discharges in the middle of the day when it's not needed. We're not investing in batteries and storage to any great degree to shift that usage to reduce the peak and and to make the value of solar much, much greater than it is today. That could happen today by PURA to address that issue and invest in and lastly, I would say this is my last point, mister chairman, and I I will welcome the the we talk about how rates were mentioned quite a bit here today. Utilities are compensated by their rate base times a a determined number that PURA sets. But it could be compensated on lowering electricity costs by making the system more efficient, something called system optimization regulation versus which is even more effective than PBR, performance based reg right. So reward the utility for how they are helping to lower rates, how they can increase the load factor, which is the efficiency level of the system. And that is squarely in PURA's backyard, if you will. So I I think you have a lot of tools, Holly, and your fellow colleagues, and I hope that they will use them because the people of the state of Connecticut, they don't know where to turn. And if there's one area, it's not perfect. But if there's one area, it's where you are. Thank you.

[Holly Cheeseman (PURA Commissioner Nominee; former State Representative)]: Thank you. And I wanna thank you for mentioning this the word tools. And I don't wanna steal too much of commissioner Beecher's thunder, but she often references the need to sharpen the tools in our toolbox. And I think that's where that analogy would play out. I just, you know, there are traditional ways of setting rates and of regulating that, but there are also other ideas out there. And again, that is where I feel this new body with its different skill sets can play a role. I invite the senator to look at our solar successor program, which has just been released, if I'm correct. Yes. That may it I would be interested in your view of that. Again, simply because of the nature of my position, I am limited to a certain extent about what I can say. But, again, sharpening the tools in our toolbox, are there different tools out there in the rate setting and regulatory environment that we could bring to the state of Connecticut? That is definitely within our purview because we do take what we do very seriously, and I consider it such an honor to have been nominated by the governor to have the chance to continue my public service to the residents of Connecticut in this very important role. And I wanna thank you all for your time today.

[Sen. John W. Fonfara]: I should say that I'm I am very hopeful with your nomination and the others that will be speaking before us today with the potential going forward. I truly am. Thank you, mister chairman.

[Speaker 0]: Thank you, senator. Any other questions or comments from committee members? Just looking online. Don't see any hands up. Commissioner, there's one question before you leave. We ask of every nominee. Is there anything in your past you believe might be embarrassing to this committee, to the governor, to the state of Connecticut? No. Wonderful. Congratulations. Thanks again for stepping up, and continuing again your work.

[Holly Cheeseman (PURA Commissioner Nominee; former State Representative)]: Thank you for your time.

[Speaker 0]: Thank you. Right now, we're actually get just gonna stand at ease for a few minutes.

[Rep. Dave Yaccarino (House Ranking Member)]: Dave,

[Committee Staff (Assistant Clerk)]: you ready?

[Speaker 0]: Alright. We will call the meeting back to to order. And next item on the agenda, we have another house joint resolution for review. This is the nomination of Janice Beecher of New Bern to be a utility commissioner of the public utilities regulatory authority. Good afternoon now. If you can raise your right hand, do you promise, swear, and affirm to tell the truth, the whole truth, and nothing but the truth?

[Dr. Jan (Janice) Beecher (PURA Commissioner Nominee)]: I do.

[Speaker 0]: Wonderful. The floor is yours for any opening remarks.

[Dr. Jan (Janice) Beecher (PURA Commissioner Nominee)]: Thank you so much. And I did write my testimony as good morning. It is this afternoon. So thanks for the reminder. Good afternoon, chairman Concepcion and Duff, vice chairs Godfrey and Looney, ranking members, Yacharino and Berthel, and members of the committee. My name is Jan Beecher, and I'm honored and humbled by the governor's nomination to serve on Connecticut's public utilities regulatory authority. I appreciate the opportunity to introduce myself and engage with the committee about this appointment. I've dedicated my entire professional life to studying and supporting public utility regulation because it's a vital institution affecting society and people's everyday lives. I've researched, written, edited, taught, and practiced in this interdisciplinary field since 1983. I started my career as a utility commissioner assistant in Illinois while earning my doctorate at Northwestern University. My most recent positions were director of the Institute of Public Utilities at Michigan State University and editor in chief of the academic journal utilities policy. The institute where I worked, delivers basic and advanced continuing professional education programs on the why and the how of public utility regulation. We also, provided applied research. I served as as the lead instructor on the fundamentals of regulation, rate making, rate design, ethics, and the water sector. My research interests include regulatory structures and practices, infrastructure funding, finance, and governance, and incentives for utility performance. I produced numerous publications, including the article on the prudent regulator and a coauthored book on risk principles for public utility regulators. I was appointed I was an appointed member of the US EPA's Environmental Finance Advisory Board and Michigan's twenty first Century Infrastructure Commission. We relocated to New Britain in early twenty twenty two for family reasons and immediately felt at home here in Connecticut, in part because of prior interactions I had had here. I continued my work remotely, but eventually expressed my interest in nonpartisan public service. I hoped to contribute positively to meeting the authority statutory remit by bringing institutional, technical, and substantive insight and inquisitiveness to our deliberations across the utility sectors. Regulation is necessary to ensure prudent and efficient performance in the provision of critical infrastructure and access to essential services at just reasonable, and sufficient rates and returns. The charge to the new panel was to hit the ground running. We are forward looking and committed to working collaboratively collaboratively among ourselves and our exceptional staff and constructively with our diverse stakeholders. We can meet this moment to advance open, objective, informed, and effective regulation in the public interest. My experience at Pierce thus far has exceeded my expectations about applying myself and learning more in this privileged role. I am grateful for your consideration and would be honored by your confirmation so that I can continue to serve the state to the best of my ability. I look forward to answering your questions.

[Speaker 0]: Thank you so much. Congratulations. Thank you for for being with us and for your willingness to step up and and serve on the authority. You're obviously extremely well qualified. I don't think I've seen in someone's resume quite so many publications listed. So congrats. This is that's great. Can you talk a little bit about your work in Michigan and in Michigan State a little bit? I I know you touched about on it a little bit in your written testimony, but just curious so we can just expand a little bit on that.

[Dr. Jan (Janice) Beecher (PURA Commissioner Nominee)]: Sure. Thank you. I actually started there as director in 2002, but I had actually been also involved in some of their programs prior to that. So, the regulatory policy community in The United States has had a network, small network of university support, centers, you know, supported supportive university centers. And Michigan State had a long standing role in providing the continuing professional education part part of that to to the regulatory community. So even though we were located in Michigan, it was it's a national program. And so we had the opportunity to train and work with reg commissioners and reg and regulatory staff and other stakeholders from from all over The US for many, many years. We were actually founded there in 1965.

[Speaker 0]: Wow. And then, you know, when we had commissioner Cheeseman who just obviously testified, she mentioned that the public doesn't really know enough of what the work that PURA PURA does, which I completely agree with her. I didn't know what PURA was before I came up here to the capital. Can you you know, how do we better educate the public on what PURA does, what their responsibilities are, what they do and what they don't do?

[Dr. Jan (Janice) Beecher (PURA Commissioner Nominee)]: That's a great question, and I think it's something that, like a lot of the questions that we're talking about, are not necessarily unique to Connecticut because the the field can appear quite arcane. You know, we've got our own language. We've got our own rules of the road, and that can be difficult to communicate. And, yeah, maybe at a long time ago, these issues were out of the public eye and and there was less engagement. I think those days are over. I think we have to be engaged and we have to be able to communicate. We have to be open and transparent and accessible to the public. I think we can do I think we can always do more. Right? We're we're we can we can communicate through our orders, you know, more clearly. We can engage with the public. Some of it might be our role. Some of it might be OCC's role, other agencies. There's various opportunities for outreach and engagement, but I think the system works best with a with a well informed public. And and so to the extent that we can improve our outreach, I think that's a great idea.

[Speaker 0]: Appreciate that. And you've been serving since November as well?

[Dr. Jan (Janice) Beecher (PURA Commissioner Nominee)]: I I I I beat commissioner Cheeseman by what? A week week and a half or so.

[Speaker 0]: That's great. And and again, I asked this to commissioner Cheeseman. Can you just take me through the process, like, of of the dockets that you've been assigned to?

[Dr. Jan (Janice) Beecher (PURA Commissioner Nominee)]: Sure. Well, like commissioner Cheeseman, some of the early ones because we started I actually gave my last lecture on a Monday, and on Tuesday, I was on the bench partly to help round out the the the number to make sure that we were you know, we we we would, again, keep things moving along. But, of course, I had to recuse myself. I had to abstain because, you know, you really can't can't vote until you have a full understanding of a record. So, we have a as, you know, as was also explained, we have a full range of issues that come before us from relatively concise, you know, issues to full blown rate cases that last many months with a lot of complexity. So, you know, we we we we start with statute and then we we have sort of a reactive role as has also been mentioned that utilities file for relief, right, or or other entities. They file for relief from the authority. And so the process then we open a process by which we deliberate you know, we collect evidence. Right? We look at we look to the law. We look to policy, and we, you know, we render a decision based on that record and consistent with the law.

[Speaker 0]: I appreciate that. Thank you for clarifying. With that, I'll turn it over to chairman Duff.

[Sen. Bob Duff (Senate Chair, Executive & Legislative Nominations Committee)]: K. Thank you, mister chairman, and, good afternoon now. And thank you for the opportunity to meet with you, privately as well, before this hearing. Some of the same questions that I had, and you don't have the experience of of maybe the past. But in your experience today in working together and trying to work collaboratively with your other commissioners, Can you just, again, kinda walk us through how the dockets or how the the work is separated amongst commissioners, how that how your how it's working with staff down at the point from three to five, because it is a different dynamic now. And while I know people weren't there, the the question's a pretty simple one, which is how are you know, how is it all kinda playing out?

[Dr. Jan (Janice) Beecher (PURA Commissioner Nominee)]: Yeah. I I have to say it has it's been a great experience so far. You know, when you start a new job, you always wonder what it'll be like because there's there's uncertainty. And as I said, this has exceeded my expectations, and it's in large part due to the caliber of the colleagues that I have there, as well as the caliber of the staff. And, we wrestle with issues, and we, and the and I think regulation works best through a deliberative process. That's how we arrive at a public interest solution, and I think we're doing that very effectively. So in a formal sense, as as you've heard a little bit about, there is an assignment of a presiding officer, and we do that jointly. We make those decisions jointly. Chairman Weil is very inclusive in that process, and so we decide that that's an administrative job. And sometimes you might wanna preside over something. Frankly, sometimes you want somebody else to do it so you can actually focus on the case from another angle because that's an administrative role. It's a a you know, to keep a a hearing on track, right, and and develop the record. So, I think all of us are very interested across in the issues across the sectors, and that's gonna be very beneficial to PURA's work because we, we are not inclined to say overspecialize in just one area. And and so, again, that will enrich the, the the, evidentiary and deliberative processes because we'll all, you know, be, again, working on the issues jointly. And the and, again, we truly deliberate. We we we don't walk in with answers. We walk in with our questions, you know, when we when we meet. And in fact, one of my messages today was gonna be that it's always been my view that the power of regulation isn't the power of questions. And so we're we're bringing perspectives. We're bringing experience, but we are we're working together at a process to help arrive at at decisions. And it's not easy. It takes it takes effort, and it it's and we're fortunate again to have just an exceptional staff to support us in that process.

[Sen. Bob Duff (Senate Chair, Executive & Legislative Nominations Committee)]: Right. And I I I thank you for that. I mean, any of this policy is not easy. And I I served as vice chair and chair of the energy and technology committee for many years, and senator Fonfera did as well. And you first come into the building, you may not even like, many of us come in with our own experiences. You don't know. You become more of an expert in in various issues. And I think that's and that's how we we craft policy based on our own experiences and based on what we're trying to do and how you learn and and and experiences and everything else. And and we do rely at at times on regulators to help us with that because there's there's things or nuances that we may not be aware of. But so we, you know, we try to have a collaborative relationship but understand the independence also of of the regulatory body as well, which, you know, leads me to some of the questions I asked our previous nominee with regards to other issues besides electric, which is an important one. And I'm gonna get to some electric some of the roles I think PURA does have in a second. But you you all I think you have a a broader kind of a license of things to do than has been done maybe previously in a sense of, like, we're talking about cybersecurity and and working with the utilities and other entities on that because the threats today are different than they were five years ago, ten years ago, three years ago. How would you how would how would you approach that from your vast experience yourself in working on under a regulatory umbrella, to ensure that electric and water is not just the water the water's flowing and electricity's on, but in some of our most important assets that we have in the state?

[Dr. Jan (Janice) Beecher (PURA Commissioner Nominee)]: Yeah. I think that's a great question. And I I think it's really incumbent on us to think holistically. And when we so when we think about where maybe in the past, we would have only talked about reliability. And maybe that's what your question implies. Now we have to think about re threats and resilience. And so I think I think it these are the sort of questions that, that we can be asking, and we can be engaged with other, as appropriate, you know, other entities in the state that have their insights about these issues. But I think more planning that again includes includes resilience from whether they're kinetic or cyber threats, I think, is very, very important these days. There fortunately, there are networks that specialize this and, you know, and experts, expert networks, that utilities, you know, are also part of, individually in their technical, you know, sectoral areas. And one of the things we can do as regulators is ask them how they are engaged and how are how are they changing policies and practices, you know, as part of some proceeding appropriate proceeding. We could ask them, you know, how are you approaching this given your expertise? One of the things I like to say about regulation is we don't run utilities. Right? We we try to in regulation, we try to, motivate them. We try you know, we we have incentives. We have systems of accountability. We have performance standards. So, we we need to ask those good questions at the appropriate time.

[Sen. Bob Duff (Senate Chair, Executive & Legislative Nominations Committee)]: Thank you. I I really appreciate that answer, and I think that was I think that's assuring to all of us who are looking at these things. And we and as as you think about this, and you talked about talking to other states, how how does PURA do that? How does PURA talk to other states on this issue, electricity reliability? Because, again, there's so as we talked about in my office, there's there's FERC, there's ISO New England, there's PURA, there's OCC, there's deep there's, you know, so many different layers to anything. And I can go on and on about the other layers in our our electrical grid. How how do you how do how does UC PURA working in a regional way on cybersecurity, electric liability, and some of the other challenging issues?

[Dr. Jan (Janice) Beecher (PURA Commissioner Nominee)]: Yeah. I think I think, as commissioner Cheeseman mentioned, we are part of the New England, regulatory group. We're part of the national group as well. So we can tap into those. Our staff can also be, and they are, part of those networks too, and that helps us because it supports us with that in those insights. There it's, you know, certainly with within the purview of of state commissions to collaborate on these things and talk and compare notes and find ways to, you know, to to support policy making across borders. I think that's actually gonna be more important. I think that's one thing I have found about, you know, living in New England now, how important actually that regional perspective is. Not just in terms of the structured markets, but but in terms of those opportunities to solve solution solve problems, you know, and find solutions in a collaborative way. There's things you could do formally, but there's a lot you can do informally. And I think it's a matter of, of, again, being an active participant in in both the dialogue. There's also educational opportunities as you get through these organizations. I think that helps us a lot.

[Sen. Bob Duff (Senate Chair, Executive & Legislative Nominations Committee)]: Thank you. I would imagine the amount of time it takes you to go from one end of Michigan to the other end of Michigan is a little different than what it takes to go from one end of Connecticut to the other end of Connecticut.

[Dr. Jan (Janice) Beecher (PURA Commissioner Nominee)]: Especially especially if you go to the Upper Peninsula, it takes

[Sen. Bob Duff (Senate Chair, Executive & Legislative Nominations Committee)]: a while. Exactly. So it's a different it is a different you out out west and, know, you're in the same state for six or seven hours. And here in Connecticut, I you could be down to Washington five and a half hours or up through Maine in five and a half hours, so go through many states. So it is a different perspective, which is why the regional cooperation does make a difference. And and I think it helps our ratepayers when they know that we are we are talking and we are working together. It may not always agree and may have different needs, but there's there's some sort of collaboration there. Because, again, you have a company multiple companies that may be in more than one state in our region, and we need to make sure that everybody's singing from the same song to a certain extent. At least we all know what everybody's saying. You know? Agree. It's probably a better way to put it. Again, on the on the double polling issue, and I'm fully aware that the legislature passed an issue on a a a to do a pilot program that's one touch make ready, but we put it in the hands of of PURA and with the Office of Consumer Council as well to help us with this issue. And, again, from a safety issue and also from a issue of of it not being just left there because of the fact that these are cost centers. Talk a little bit about, if you can, some of these issues that are, again, not always the top issues, but when you talk to constituents in your in your neighborhoods or they say, why are these things being neglected? Why they some are falling on people not people, but some are falling. They could hurt people. Some do probably. We've seen, you know, thousands and thousands of them in in our state, in Massachusetts. How does how does PURA kinda handle some of that? And we're we're still working on taking some more legislative action, but but we've handed some of this to the to you all.

[Dr. Jan (Janice) Beecher (PURA Commissioner Nominee)]: Yeah. I like that question. Whenever I hear the word safety, it gets it gets my attention. Right. And in fact, one time I looked at commission mission statements across the country, and safety was the number one term, actually, that came came up because, you know, we have this lot of lot of common phrases and one of them safe, adequate, reliable service. Now we've expanded that a little bit in some ways. But, yes, I I think I think when we as we think more and more about performance of utilities and the dimensions of performance, safety is an aspect of that. And I think there is, you know, commissioner Cheeseman used the word, prudence. It's one of our core principles in regulation. You know, we we'd like to see prudent performance and certainly prudent performance includes risk management, includes safety. So, again, as part of our broader regulatory authority and and investigations of all kinds, You know, I think I think these are good questions to ask. And even just being here and being out listening to the public at public comment hearings, it it raises our awareness and sensitivity to issues, you know, as as you're doing here. So that we, you know, we can start asking those those good questions. And, you know, in in a way that, you know, is is meant to be is meant to be a way to reach a public interest solution on these things.

[Sen. Bob Duff (Senate Chair, Executive & Legislative Nominations Committee)]: No. I appreciate that because, you know, part of our job here is is is as a committee is to vote today on your all of your nominations. But the job's not done because sorry. Our job also is to report back to our our caucus members, those four caucuses, to say, what what do we think? How did it go? What questions do you have? Should we vote yes or no as in the in both chambers? So, you know, this is just a step in that place. And when people ask us, well, what did they what do they think about this year or is that issue or another issue, we can say, you know, you're sensitive to these issues because you hear it in the public or you're sensitive because we've raised the issue, and we're representing a 100,000 a 100,000 constituents or 25,000 constituents or whatever. But these are very important issues to us. So so I appreciate that. Last thing I just wanna mention or just ask you is that, you know, while while there are some issues that PURA doesn't touch, especially on the electric side, PURA does approve supply rates. It it's kind of a sometimes it's a formality, but they do put a stamp of approval when the utility companies come in and say these are gonna be our rates for the the spring or for the, I'm sorry, for the winter or for the summertime. Is that correct?

[Dr. Jan (Janice) Beecher (PURA Commissioner Nominee)]: Yes. And I I think, you know, chairman Weil can can answer, you know, that in in greater detail.

[Sen. Bob Duff (Senate Chair, Executive & Legislative Nominations Committee)]: No. That was it. That was all I had. Okay. And then the if if a utility company, a gas that does gas, if they want to expand their gas from, say, one I'll take Norwalk, you know, one end of the road to the end of the road, PURE would have to approve that because there's a the rates it's built into the rates that go back to the community to pay for that. Is that correct?

[Dr. Jan (Janice) Beecher (PURA Commissioner Nominee)]: As part of the distribution system. Correct?

[Sen. Bob Duff (Senate Chair, Executive & Legislative Nominations Committee)]: Okay. And, yeah, there's so it's an expansion or even maintenance too. Correct? So that would go back to ratepayers.

[Holly Cheeseman (PURA Commissioner Nominee; former State Representative)]: Yes.

[Sen. Bob Duff (Senate Chair, Executive & Legislative Nominations Committee)]: Okay. And also in parts of transmission as well. Correct?

[Dr. Jan (Janice) Beecher (PURA Commissioner Nominee)]: In intrastate Yeah. Yeah. Yes.

[Sen. Bob Duff (Senate Chair, Executive & Legislative Nominations Committee)]: Okay. Thank you. Thank you, mister chairman.

[Rep. Dave Yaccarino (House Ranking Member)]: Thank you. Representative Iaccarino followed by senator Louie. Thank you, mister chair. Good afternoon good afternoon, miss Beecher. I appreciate being here and stepping up. I'm looking at your very impressive resume. But when you were at Michigan State, the director of, I guess, was it the regulatory paper or or board or wasn't a utility, was it?

[Dr. Jan (Janice) Beecher (PURA Commissioner Nominee)]: The, oh, the institute?

[Rep. Dave Yaccarino (House Ranking Member)]: Yeah. The institute.

[Dr. Jan (Janice) Beecher (PURA Commissioner Nominee)]: Yeah. It was it's an academic center that exclusively exclusively worked in continuing education and research.

[Rep. Dave Yaccarino (House Ranking Member)]: With that, what could you take away what did you take away from were you there a long many years? Or

[Dr. Jan (Janice) Beecher (PURA Commissioner Nominee)]: About twenty three years.

[Rep. Dave Yaccarino (House Ranking Member)]: And your research, did you have findings that will help you in your new role? I mean

[Dr. Jan (Janice) Beecher (PURA Commissioner Nominee)]: Yes. I think so. Because so I've always been an applied researcher, and so and the issue of affordability has come up a couple times today. And so one of my pet projects is I actually track consumer prices and expenditures for utilities to see, you know, what they look like nationally at least. And and I do think, you know, one of the things I'm enjoying one of the many things I'm enjoying about this current position is trying to bring some of my research background to to this to this role. I'm always curious to know what you know, if there's evidence in an area or scientific, you know, research going on in an area, I'd like to know about that, especially if it's happening in our state or in our region. You know, can we tap into that knowledge? So, you know, the the wonderful thing about teaching is that you you first of all, you it puts you on the spot and and you wanna try to at least be one step ahead of the people you're teaching and and then you learn from their questions. So year after year and program after program, I had the benefit of hearing just wonderful insights from the the professionals who would come to us for, you know, to participate in training and that just enriched me over the years and my understanding of regulation and my understanding of how it works how it works in different jurisdictions. And so it's a it's a lifelong learning process, and I'm still I'm still learning now.

[Rep. Dave Yaccarino (House Ranking Member)]: I appreciate that. Could you apply well, could you apply any of that to your job as far as looking at you can't lower rates, but to work with the regulatory board to look at things that work and maybe in Michigan or other states that could help our ratepayers, it's really not your you you can't lower rates, but look at a policy that we could actually potentially create or working with utility companies. I I said to the miss chi Holly Cheeseman, the past board, unfortunately, did not have a good working relationship with our our, utilities, all the utilities for that matter, which eventually created a downgrading of the from Wall Street for a bond rating. We so with your experiences, we're looking at regulatory systems, how they work, but also working with our utility companies. Is that something you look at or we'll be looking at?

[Dr. Jan (Janice) Beecher (PURA Commissioner Nominee)]: I'll I'll answer. I I like the rate making question because one of the one of the things I would highlight is we started to put on a rate making course several years ago. And so in that course, I had a wonderful team teacher who is a CPA, and we would look at each of those elements of of rates. You know, the, the rate base, the rate of return, the expenses, the depreciation, the taxes, and so on. And I have found it really helpful then in the role to sort of draw on that and and and and that's that that's been extremely helpful to me. And when we talk about affordability and we talk about rates, the way I think about it is that we are constrained as you've already heard, but we're not powerless. And I would say the way I I see myself approaching this going forward is, first of all, is the cost not only reasonable, is it as low as possible relative to commitments and, you know, essential performance? And then senator Pfannferer, you kinda stole my thunder because you used one of my favorite terms, optimization. Because I really would say I would ask the same question. Are we optimizing our the infrastructure that we have to to utilize it in the most effective way? And there are as you as you implied, there are models. There are tools to do that. And then the third thing we could look at in terms of affordability is cost allocation and rate design, because there are there are alternative approaches there. And how can we, you know, look to that that element of the rate making process to try to be, you know, as thoughtful as we can be about the impact of rates on customers. And the way we engage with utilities is to find ways to, you know, or, you know, I think by process, invite their ideas. Again, we don't manage them. Right. We and so, utilities have a high degree of freedom to bring proposals forward, and and, for consideration by the by PURA. And I suspect they are as aware as we are of the, you know, the the these issues, the cost issues and the affordability issues.

[Rep. Dave Yaccarino (House Ranking Member)]: I'm sure they are, but I I would I'm sure this board will work much better with utilities than in the past. I think it's vitally important. Like I said, I say it all the time. Like it or not, we do need a strong utility for our our reliable electricity, reliable heat, relay reliable cooling, reliable safe, clean water, and, of course, telecommunications. And I think it's incumbent on the board, and I believe I face it all for you and then and, commissioner Okonte to do that. We, you know, we just need to collaborate, have transparency, and, and and work together. That's I I I I my hope my life is working together. That's what should be your job and all your jobs, actually, for the betterment of our ratepayers and our our utilities. So any comment or no? Yeah.

[Dr. Jan (Janice) Beecher (PURA Commissioner Nominee)]: I think we all have a shared interest in the public interest. You know, earlier the topic of infrastructure came up and I always use the term public infrastructure, regardless of who owns it, because it's all in service to the public. And we have to always remember that and how critical it is and how essential these services are. And, and utilities do play a special role in society. There's no no doubt about that. And, so, yeah, I think that I think that is a guiding a guiding consideration.

[Rep. Dave Yaccarino (House Ranking Member)]: I think the four you have really good skill sets, different skill sets, which is good for a board. And it was, of course, commissioner Contee of a fifth skill set. I appreciate you stepping up, and I plan on supporting you. And, thank you, mister chair.

[Speaker 0]: Thank you, representative. Senator Looney.

[Sen. Martin M. Looney]: Thank you, mister chairman. Good afternoon, commissioner, and congratulations on your nomination.

[Dr. Jan (Janice) Beecher (PURA Commissioner Nominee)]: Thank you.

[Sen. Martin M. Looney]: You know, I think that if, if someone went to AI and asked the AI to, produce the resume of an of an ideal, utilities commissioner, it would spit out yours. And I that's, extraordinarily impressive. And, your list of publications, I think is just, I commend you on being such an active scholar in this area directly related to your current appointment down through the years. It looks like a lot of your academic research and and publications had to do with appears with water regulation. And I'd like to just ask you, I don't wanna put you on the spot, but if you recall kind of the holding or the or the salient point of a couple of the articles that just intrigued me from the title, one was a socio technical perspective on integrated urban water systems that you published back in, in 2022. What was what was that about? If you can digest it in a in a brief, number of words.

[Dr. Jan (Janice) Beecher (PURA Commissioner Nominee)]: I guess I should have brought a copy of my resume. So I I'd have to look at this the specific one. I know in a the some of the best

[Sen. Martin M. Looney]: with Jay Burton.

[Dr. Jan (Janice) Beecher (PURA Commissioner Nominee)]: With I was just gonna say it was with It

[Sen. Martin M. Looney]: was in the Elgar companion to urban infrastructure government innovation

[Dr. Jan (Janice) Beecher (PURA Commissioner Nominee)]: There it goes.

[Sen. Martin M. Looney]: In cases. That's it.

[Dr. Jan (Janice) Beecher (PURA Commissioner Nominee)]: Thank you for helping me out. So mister Burton is an engineer. I've had the great opportunity to coauthor with colleagues from the finance perspective, from the accounting or, you know, engineering perspective. In this case, it was an engineer, and that was an invited piece as part of a a handbook. And, yeah, we were asked to sort of tackle this issue of how to think about infrastructure as almost an educational piece, you know, to think about water more holistically. We've got water supply. We've got wastewater collection and treatment. We've got even ecological and recreational waters. And so there is sort of a theme that's emerged in the last few years. One water. Right? Because it it does tend to behave that way in in nature. And so, yeah, I was trying to trying to sort of like provide a framework. A lot of my work is around conceptualizing and framing up issues to hopefully make them more digestible.

[Sen. Martin M. Looney]: Great. Thank you. And there are a couple of more I'd like to ask you about too. They're all on the relatively on the same topic. One was privatization of water services in The United States. It was authored by the Committee on Privatization of Water Services, National Research Council, and that was way back. That was 2002. I don't know if that's, if you're thinking on on that back then is still relevant to to now. But there were two others also a privatization monopoly and structured competition in the water industry. And is there a role for regulation? That was in, Excellence in Action Water Utility Management in the twenty first century. And then ethics of water privatization, navigating rough waters, ethical issues in the water industry. So I think these are certainly relevant to some of the issues we're dealing with today. So it's just any any thoughts you might recall from those publications and those highlights in your research there.

[Dr. Jan (Janice) Beecher (PURA Commissioner Nominee)]: Sure. Well, the first one was a great honor because that's through the National Academy of Sciences. So it's a a terrific, opportunity to work with some of the best scholars in the and applied researchers in the country, that that resulted in a book. The ethics chapter was or that was a chapter in a book. And so, I made a good decision, at one point in my career. I guess it was I wanna say in the the the late the late eighties. An opportunity opened up at Ohio State University and at the National Regulatory Research Institute which was the sort of the sister institute of the one at Michigan State and they focused more on research. And this job opened, I was a regulatory generalist. This job opened up to look at water. And we used to call it the stepchild industry, believe it or not. And I said, you know, I'm gonna go look at water as if it's every bit as important as telecom, electricity, or natural gas. And I'm gonna just I'll write about it like whether anybody cares or not, I'm gonna write about it as if it's the most important. So I started applying the issue the perspectives that we all think about in economic regulation as we, you know, often think about electricity or, you know, energy issues and so on. And I started applying it to the water sector. So it gave me a tremendous advantage. I think I was on the ground floor of thinking about water as a utility in terms of the economics of regulation. And so that's why I think I was, I was fortunate enough to get these opportunities to write about it and write about, you know, well, what what is the difference between a public and private entity? Because water does have a different structure. It's it's more localized. There's more utilities across the country and so on. So it has structural and economic differences. And that's partly what drove me to it because I just find that very interesting. I like to compare across the sectors and learn, you know, from that from that understanding. So those were some of the some of the the ways, you know, some of the opportunities I had to sort of write about it. Mostly to explore, you know, key characteristics and differences.

[Sen. Martin M. Looney]: And just in in in general, as I asked commissioner, Cheeseman, of course, being a utility regulator, it's sort it's a somewhat unusual, somewhat hybrid position in the sense that, you are regulating a, a business, but as a business that operates in a structured setting, It has a monopoly market for the most part. It has guaranteed returns, guaranteed customer base in many cases. So in many cases, the utilities seem to want to think of themselves as if they are completely private businesses. But they're not, as I mentioned to Commissioner Cheesman back in, 2020, in a hearing before the Energy Committee, one was asked about, wouldn't it make sense policy sense to have public representation on your board? And when you're filling executive said, well, no, that's not really the tradition in private corporations, but, but, they're really not in the in the in the same sense. It's not General Motors competing with Ford. It's, it's operating a business, but in a highly regulated market with a guaranteed customer base and, and certain guaranteed rates. So it's really, it's not as if you're, casting yourself, out into the world, selling your product against all others, in the same field. So just your, your thoughts on the, just the uniqueness of the, the fact that I think you're quite sensitive to that, that we've talked about it. The, the fact that this is a, a public service that's being delivered by these private businesses.

[Dr. Jan (Janice) Beecher (PURA Commissioner Nominee)]: Well, I I really love this question. If you open up a lot of economics textbooks, there'll be a chapter in there about the problem of monopoly. Right? Or the or the problem of market failure, which is really not it it really just means that markets don't work well in the conventional sense, you know, that that it is not a typical business in that way, a competitive business. So a a framing that's often used is that regulation substitutes for the marketplace. And I had a mentor once who said, not only does it have to substitute, it has to be a tough substitute. Why? Because competition is tough.

[Sen. Martin M. Looney]: Right.

[Dr. Jan (Janice) Beecher (PURA Commissioner Nominee)]: And so I think I think we see that. So I also though a corollary I add is in in some ways, it is also substituting for government ownership or operation because that's an alternative model. And and for so for example, in transportation, we tend to see that, you know, I took the train here. Right? And the you know, so an Amtrak kinda kind of, you know, is is one way we that model is another way we provide, critical infrastructure. So we have this whole whole range of things, but they do operate with that exclusive franchise when when we accept the the, the fact that there's monopoly of especially over the distribution level. I would say a phrase, I prefer to guaranteed return is a reasonable opportunity to earn a fair return. That's sort of the mantra when we teach this stuff. So despite the monopoly character and the regulated character, utilities still do bear some risk. And that's by design because it drives performance. Drives performance, hopefully, for their shareholders, but hopefully for their, with their rate payers as well. It drives the achievement of service that provides value to to the rate payer, to the society, to the state. So so, yeah, that's sort of the that's the delicate balance within which we work is is finding fine tuning. And one of my other sort of pet theories about regulation is about standards, accountability, and incentives. And whether it's old school or modified regulation, some of the new ways we're and some of the as commissioner Chisholm mentioned, you know, the new tools in the toolbox are sharpened tools. It's really a it still fundamentally comes down to what are the expectations about performance? How do we hold utilities accountable for that? And what incentives do we provide? And those could be, you know, positive or negative performance incentives. It depends on the collective wisdom of the authority.

[Sen. Martin M. Looney]: Good. Well, thank you. And just a couple of things on the, other matters I asked, mister Cheeseman. I don't know to the extent that you can, comment, but on the, the issue regarding, Avangrid's determination to, to reduce retiree health benefits, which were represented, as part of the, guarantee that they were given back in 2015 at the time of the merger, of UI with, with Avangrid and then also the, the long standing issue of the English station in New Haven and the problem with that with that. And as I as I mentioned, there was a a settlement between the utility and and the state back in 2015. And more than ten years later, we're still still dealing with that that that issue. So I don't know to what extent that you'll be grappling with those, but they are are both of, you know, major concerns as they impact the the Greater New Haven community.

[Dr. Jan (Janice) Beecher (PURA Commissioner Nominee)]: You know, as as commissioner Cheeseman said, these are issues before us, so we we can't comment on specifics. I do hope to be a regulator who's well informed by, you know, by, obviously the record before us, but also, you know, any, you know, past policies, commitments, legislation, anything like that, that that that we need to be aware of. I think we need to be well educated regulators going forward.

[Sen. Martin M. Looney]: Great. Thank you, commissioner. Congratulations on your nomination. I'm happy you happen to move to Connecticut at an an opportune time for us.

[Dr. Jan (Janice) Beecher (PURA Commissioner Nominee)]: Thank you. I'm happy to.

[Speaker 0]: Thank you, senator. I see senator Berthel online.

[Sen. Eric C. Berthel (Senate Ranking Member)]: Good afternoon, mister chairman. Thank you for recognizing me. Commissioner, congratulations again on your appointment to the your nomination to the PURA board. I also enjoyed the conversation we had offline prior to this this official hearing today. I'd like to go back to very quickly, I just have one one, I guess, kind of long question, if you will, but back to what the the good house chair spoke to regarding making the public more informed and about PURA and their involvement. So, you know, over the past several years, PURA, of course, has increased its efforts to explain its work through, you know, various communications vehicles and the PURA one zero one presentations. I guess I'd like to have you speak, if you would, for a moment about how important it is for the public to understand PURA's work and and whether or not it's time or it's not time for PURA to have more or less engagement with the public. That would be my my first question.

[Dr. Jan (Janice) Beecher (PURA Commissioner Nominee)]: Thank you for that. Yeah. I think I mean, we're we're we make very weighty decisions at the authority. And so the public education process also relates to building public trust in what we do. So I I think I firmly believe in that. I think there is good dialogue to be had about what we can do and we are having that dialogue by the way. But I also think I I I would like to include the office of consumer council in that in that consideration as well because in some respects, they have additional freedom that we don't have because we have to adjudicate decisions, they may have more freedom to interact with the public and answer their questions more directly. So for example, when we have a public comment hearing, we we generally we we can't speak because we cannot prejudge or appear to prejudge any kind of a of an issue. It doesn't mean it doesn't help us. It helps us tremendously. But the OCC may have more freedom and possibly, you know, other other entities as well. So, but yes, the more we can make I I and I enjoyed our conversation. I think the the more we can make our, our decisions, our materials, our our communications, make them accessible and listen to the public in terms of how to do that, I think that would be very helpful.

[Sen. Eric C. Berthel (Senate Ranking Member)]: Yeah. Okay. Thank you. I I appreciate that. And I I appreciate your your answer. You know, during our conversation offline, you know, I I think I and I have this this very similar conversation with the other three nominees that are before us today as well that I really think it should be a a high priority of of PURA going forward to create a really fun, easy to understand, easy to consume, you know, take it down to to, you know, to a a a very basic level of understanding as to what There's a lot of anger out in the public about why aren't you fixing this, that kind of conversation. So I I I hope that I hope that you'll all have the opportunity to to embrace this idea and move forward. And I guess I think you might have you might have answered part of this next question in your comment a moment ago, but it's a two part question. And it it really is what what role does public participation play in PURA proceedings? And can an average person truly participate in a meaningful way? And then the second to that would be to what extent should PURA consider public opinion when making its decisions? And I understand fully before you before you respond to that, that there are certain things you you all are not allowed to talk about because of the legality and and, you know, making sure that we we are preserving confidentiality and trust between yourselves and those that you interact with. But I'm just wondering how the how the public because I get a lot of questions and a lot of a lot of anger directed at at my office because people think that that PURA is not listening to them or they don't understand how to be involved. How do we get the public more involved so that you can make perhaps more informed decisions about what is, affecting consumers today?

[Dr. Jan (Janice) Beecher (PURA Commissioner Nominee)]: Thank you for that. Yeah. You raised a couple of really critical issues there. I mean, you know, members of the PURA have to they they have to sort of operate according to the like, a code of judicial ethics. And Sure. And part of that code is not being swayed by, by opinions and and political forces, you know, but to focus and step focus our work on the law and on the record. That said, I was really impressed by the first public comment hearing I attended because it was it was early in the process. Sometimes this is not not always done early. It was early enough in the process to to, again, to raise our awareness. Consumer council was also there. Their their office was represented there so they could also listen. And as was described by commissioner Cheeseman, we operate according to this interrogatory model where we ask a lot of questions. And so that comment period certainly can inform us in the types of questions that we carry forward as we build the record in that case. So there is a connection, that I think is very good. And I have always also had the belief that the more voices we have, the more enriched is the record before us. So finding ways to do that with effective representation is is something that that I think we need, we benefit from. We have some very, very skilled interveners who come before us and bring bring alternative perspectives to us. You know, obviously, consumer council, but the office of the AG, our own internal office that, you know, plays that that that role, that prosecutorial role in a way. And and and, yes, other other, other interests will come forward and present evidence before us, which again enriches that record on which we can decide. So, you know, it used to be, you know, at one time in regulation, it was just consumers and utilities. Right? It's a now much diverse it's a much more diverse set of perspectives looking looking at our issues. So I don't think it's easy, and I think there's always gonna be a degree of frustration. Utility bills are a lot like taxes. Right? They're not they're just they're not fun. I I found a study a few years ago that said they elicit even less passion than shopping for insurance rates. And I I kind of agreed with that that it's just it's it's gonna be hard to make this fun, but if we can make it a little more understandable and ensure fairness in the way we approach it, I think that's that's helpful.

[Sen. Eric C. Berthel (Senate Ranking Member)]: Yeah. Commissioner, thank you so much for that that that, really, terrific answer. I I I think I would just close my, remarks with you to say that, that I hope that you'll take all of that into consideration what you just spoke to because I think it's it's exactly spot on when when you also take under consideration once you are all officially seated and and confirmed and all of that, This whole big PR push, if you will, and and and even a marketing push for PURA, I think it will serve it will make all of you be able to serve in your capacity even more effectively. And and the public will will go, I think, with the right approach, will look at PURA as not something that they completely misunderstand or they think is acting in in some sort of nefarious way or what have you. Maybe that's the wrong word. But but instead, they will look and say, these are the people who are are charged with doing this work, and are listening to what I have to say. And I and I would agree. I think the I I just just got my latest utility bill from Eversource, and I kinda cringed when I saw the envelope in the in the mailbox. But so I fully understand that. And and whatever you got whatever you all can do as this newly constituted board of commissioners, I I hope that you'll you'll make it a priority to make sure that the public is informed and the public is involved. So thank you very much, mister chairman. Thank you for a few minutes.

[Committee Staff (Assistant Clerk)]: Thank you.

[Speaker 0]: Thank you, senator. Any other questions or comments from committee members? Senator Fauci.

[Sen. John W. Fonfara]: Very briefly. I'd as I said earlier, I think the folks following commissioner Cheeseman doesn't need to hear my long speech. But I would just ask you as an academic where you didn't have to decide. You could opine based on your research. How do you find that difference so far?

[Dr. Jan (Janice) Beecher (PURA Commissioner Nominee)]: That's a wonderful question. I have to admit in in preparation for today, you know, I I thought about hard questions you might ask, and we had wonderful assistance in that process. And I thought I would probably have to say I'd I'd if you called me last year, I'd coulda had a different conversation with you. Right? So I respect the boundaries of this role very, very much. It is a shift, but I think that's true for every single one of us, because the just the nature of the job. So I feel like I said, I I I feel I bring more questions than answers. And even in my frankly, even in my academic role, I was very sensitive to the fact that I was working with a diverse group of of regulators, you know, with diverse challenges and and and and so on. And so I was always very cautious about expressing opinions. Although we would we would say, you'll probably hear from some of our opinions, but we wanna hear back from you. In other words, as we're teaching. Right? Or if we're offering up a viewpoint, it's not meant to indoctrinate. It's meant to engage. And so but I generally have always for throughout my career, I've sort of practice being very conscious about that exact thing, you know. And and if I do raise an opinion, I I hope for it to be from an evidence based and a well informed perspective and recognizing that others may see things very differently. One of the things, you know, in my in my editorial role, I would often come across the word, the right way something like this, the right way to price or the right way and I would always kind of, like, line that out because it's really about whether whether a policy or practice aligns with stated objectives. That's a different standard. Right? So the so it's, so that so that norm you you have to be cautious about that normative language whether you're you're in academia or in regulation. So in some ways, the the roles are are actually compatible in that sense. That makes sense.

[Sen. John W. Fonfara]: Yeah. I I just hope that listening to you here today that I I hope you don't leave that approach, to where you were because we need not only the inquisitiveness, but the right way. And if you approach it if you do your job, that way will be well served, in my opinion. Thank you, mister chairman. Thank you, senator. Any other questions or comments from committee members? Let me just check

[Speaker 0]: online. Seeing none, commissioner, there's one question we ask of every nominee. Is there anything in your past that you believe might prove embarrassing to this committee, to the governor, to the state of Connecticut? No. Wonderful. Thank you so much for spending, all day pretty much with with us today. So congratulations. Alright. Moving right along. Next item on the agenda. This is a senate joint resolution. This is, the nomination of Everett Smith, the third of Greenwich to be a utility commissioner, the public utilities regulatory authority. Good afternoon. If you can press the button to turn the mic on and raise your right hand, do you promise, swear, and affirm to tell the truth, the whole truth, and nothing but the truth? I do. Yes, sir. Wonderful. The floor is yours.

[Everett Smith III (PURA Commissioner Nominee)]: I will also change good morning to good afternoon, and I'm thankful it isn't good evening, but it it might be sooner or later. Good afternoon, chairman Concepcion McDuff, vice chairs Godfrey and Looney, ranking members, Yaccarino and Berthel, and members of the committee. Thank you for the opportunity to appear here today. My name is Everett Smith, and I'm a lifelong resident of Connecticut having been born in Greenwich Hospital. I'm especially appreciative as my late father, Everett Smith junior, was a state representative rep representing the Hundred And 49th District for two terms. So I know the value of your time given the many demands of your positions. I'm honored to be nominated to serve as a commissioner of the Public Utilities Regulatory Authority. Energy and infrastructure have been the center of my career for over forty six years. During my time as an investment professional, I have worked across geographies in North America, Latin America, Europe, and Asia, across the capital structure, senior lending and corporate finance, private equity, venture capital, and project finance for leading institutions. Importantly, during that time, I have always I've always tried to stay ahead of the energy industry's evolution in order to capitalize on change. When I began my career, utilities were vertically integrated companies within a highly regulated industry. As time moved on, I followed those companies and the industries that evolved to private power, went overseas to build power generation facilities in faraway places, and I later transitioned to clean energy and sustainable infrastructure. This has been an interesting journey, and I look forward to continuing it by helping PURA and Connecticut tackle tomorrow's energy challenges. As I previously submitted a detailed discussion of my background and being respectful of your time today. Today, I will just highlight several areas, that are most relevant to my work at PURA. When I graduated from college a long time ago, I joined Chemical Bank's Energy and Minerals Group on the basis of my summer work in the street division of Connecticut Natural Gas Company, which did new residential hookups and leak detection and repairs. Seven of my ten years at Chemical were spent in the utility group, where we were the lead bank for most investor owned utilities in The US. During this time, a significant focus was tracking and analyzing the actions of public utility commissions and their impact on each utility's credit quality. As the industry began its shift to private power, I joined GE Capital to focus on financings for investor owned utilities and their unregulated private power affiliates. Later, as GE followed The US utilities overseas, I moved to Singapore as the managing director of Asia Pacific and represented GE in co developing, financing, and owning the first independent power plants in China, India, Indonesia, and The Philippines. Subsequently, I moved back to The US to run the international business, overseeing an 80 member team covering Latin America, Europe, and Asia with a focus on investing in power, infrastructure, and telecom. In 2005, I realized that as early stage companies developed new clean technologies, they would need massive amounts of project and structured capital to deploy those technologies. To capitalize on this opportunity, I joined an investment firm focused on renewable energy projects and concurrently joined a venture capital group focused on early stage clean tech companies. 2012, I started Golden State Capital Partners, a sustainable infrastructure investment firm, and co developed and or invested in 56 distributed solar, wind, and renewable natural gas projects in The US and Canada, as well as investments in residential solar and energy storage. I believe this diversity of experience will provide a sound foundation for my work at PURA. I understand utilities and the issues they face as well as the key issues critical to ratepayers, including affordability, reliability, and resilience. I am hopeful I can balance the needs and objectives of both these stakeholders to reach fair and reasonable outcomes. I'm also hopeful I can contribute beyond the daily regulatory supervision to considering new approaches to energy and infrastructure in Connecticut as they will be critical to meeting our current and future challenges. Thank you, and I look forward to your questions.

[Speaker 0]: Thank you, commissioner Smith. Congratulations on your your nomination and your willingness to to step up and serve on the authority. I just really have just a couple of questions. You have such a unique background spending so much time, out of the country and working on on issues in other countries. I'm just curious how you plan on bringing kind of that experience into into your role as commissioner of PURA and taking some of the kind of the positive things that that other countries are doing.

[Everett Smith III (PURA Commissioner Nominee)]: Sure. Well, I would say as as a at a high level, I think my overall experience, allows me to bring a a general and solid, understanding of, business and economics, of energy and infrastructure. And in having worked with utilities both in The US and overseas, I I really believe I know how they think and and how how they go about doing things. The work overseas isn't as relevant to PURA, I don't think, other than, when you're building a $3,000,000,000 project in Indonesia. You spend a lot of time thinking about pretty complicated issues. You think about the capital cost. You think about budgets. You think about well, you think about politics, local partners, foreign corrupt practices acts. I mean, you think about a lot a lot of things that you don't have here. But it, but but overall, it just it has given me an ability to know what questions to ask, how to evaluate situations, how to deal with an unforeseen and, you know, unpredictable circumstances. So I think it's really just the broad broadness of the background.

[Speaker 0]: I appreciate that. We've talked a little bit about the increase of members from three to five, having four new ones, really five when you you take into account that commissioner Akonti has just been there for for a little over a year. Do you see the the kind of the new being so new as a positive, or or are there some issues that you might experience with not having anyone there that has, kind of intimate knowledge or a lot of experience in in PURA?

[Everett Smith III (PURA Commissioner Nominee)]: Well, I've been there seven weeks, which hard hardly makes me an expert. I do have some long tenured colleagues who've been there for several months, however. I think that being new is a great a great opportunity to bring new perspectives and to think about things in new ways. What it also brings is the challenge of understanding, in some cases, cases and dockets that have been going on for years without hundreds, if not thousands, of interrogatories and things like that. So where I I think I could be most helpful is on a go forward basis where I could participate from the beginning. I think governor Lamont hit the ball out of the park with the selection of the folks to my right. As as you've heard, every single person here brings a different perspective, a different experience, different education. And it's just it's just a terrific group. The number of times I've called up commissioner Beecher and asked her questions, she's she's like a work walking encyclopedia. The Holly and and David understand the legislature, which is a mystery to me. And

[Sen. Stephen Harding]: and, you

[Everett Smith III (PURA Commissioner Nominee)]: know, that's, again, a terrific, terrific compliment to my skills. What I understand is business. What I understand is trying to get things done in the best way possible. And, I think what I also bring is, I tend to be out of the box and and like to pursue innovative thinking around around things. And I kinda look at our situation. And one thing I know is if we keep doing things the same way tomorrow that we're doing them today, we're not gonna change anything. So we've gotta find new innovative solutions to our problems.

[Speaker 0]: I appreciate that. I might have another question or or two, but in the interest of time, I will turn it over to representative Iaccarino followed by senator Looney.

[Rep. Dave Yaccarino (House Ranking Member)]: Thank you, mister chair. A pleasure meeting you today, mister Smith, and I appreciate you stepping up. I I said it and you just said it again. It's just a well rounded group of five individuals that I think will move our state forward. There's gotta be bumps. There's nothing can be perfect, but you all bring a good perspective academically, but also really practically, especially what I read about you. Just your experience with utilities and overseas and and domestically. What you just testified or you just gave your statement, but I I would think you're gonna have a great working relationship. I've said it all day, but with the utilities, because you've you've had to do a lot of projects that were moving and and and fast and and having that attitude to get it done, but to get it done for everybody, I would think is

[Everett Smith III (PURA Commissioner Nominee)]: Yeah. Well, as I said, I think one one of the benefits I have is, well, I have a track record working with utilities, and that doesn't mean I'm gonna be pro utility. It doesn't mean I'm not gonna do my job. But it does mean that that, as I said, I understand the way they think. I think I can have some credibility with them. Not that they would do this, but I also have a pretty good BS meter. So, you know, I I understand what they're saying, and and I understand the facts. And, you know, I just think that I can kinda hold them to account.

[Rep. Dave Yaccarino (House Ranking Member)]: Well, Well, the facts speak for themselves, which is a good thing. Mhmm. I I've been a proponent proponent of natural gas. I think a lot of us are. But also and I don't know if you could answer this or you might not even want it, but nuclear reactors as module pods, I think it's something that we'll see in the next, I think, five or six years, if not sooner. Could you weigh in on that at all, or you don't want it?

[Everett Smith III (PURA Commissioner Nominee)]: Well, I I I will start by just saying my career is so long that when I started, the utilities were just loading fuel into all the large reactors in America today. One of the things that worries me is all those reactors are so far past their original useful useful lives that I don't know if that, you know, may lead to some sort of problems down down the line. My first assignment at Chemical Bank was on the team that worked at General Public Utilities after they melted Three Mile Island Corp and, faced bankruptcy. So I've seen what can happen with one one quick problem. On the other hand, I think nuclear is a great a great solution. I don't think the old the the nuclear plants of old weren't great solutions. They were big. They were everyone was different. They they had massive cost overruns, which had to be, eaten by the rate payers. But I think, you know, standardizing things, small modular reactors, could be a great solution. They're carbon free. You can just sort of distribute them, and I'm a big fan of distributed power. I think the the future absolutely is to distribute power even more granularly than we do today. So I just think it's a matter of getting there. Right. You know, as you said, it's not a solution for today. It's a solution probably for five or six years from now if we're lucky.

[Rep. Dave Yaccarino (House Ranking Member)]: I think so. Saying that we we know we we all want affordability, and I know the whole board wants affordability, but there's only so much supply that to go around. So to senator von Faro's point, there are ways that maybe you and your other fellow commissioners could look at potentially lowering our rates. I look at Wallingford the next town near me. They have their own utility. I'd love to see other towns do that. I don't think it's practical today. I don't have any say on that or well, I think for electric, it's they have a great they they they're procure over a year, you know, ahead of time. They're they're very good at buying their their their energy. And I think the state is we haven't done a good job actually

[Sen. Henri Martin]: Mhmm. Carrying.

[Everett Smith III (PURA Commissioner Nominee)]: So I'm sorry. Could you just

[Rep. Dave Yaccarino (House Ranking Member)]: So Wallingford Electric. It's a town of North North Connecticut. Wallingford, Connecticut. They have their own elect utility, right, in Walling.

[Everett Smith III (PURA Commissioner Nominee)]: So it's a municipal utility.

[Rep. Dave Yaccarino (House Ranking Member)]: Municipal utility. They procure, I think, over a year in advance, and we're we seem to always be behind the ball as far as procuring energy. I know sometimes you win, sometimes you lose, but with your expertise, you you've done a lot in in the world.

[Everett Smith III (PURA Commissioner Nominee)]: Well, I think on energy procurement, Pure Pierre does have a a person who works with utilities to procure supply. It's a rolling basis. So I've been down to meet him. It kind of surprised me that there's there's a person who buys all the electricity. And my first question was what happens if he gets hit by a bus? And I think that's the kind of thing we have to think about. That's another thing, by the way, that I think I bring as an investor is I I constantly think about risk, and I constantly think about downside protection. And what do we do and what's the impact? Right. So so I think, to answer your question, though, he rolls the the purchases of electricity, and, that hopefully evens it out over time.

[Rep. Dave Yaccarino (House Ranking Member)]: Well, with your expertise, will you try to utilize your role with that procurement, or if that's out of your purview?

[Everett Smith III (PURA Commissioner Nominee)]: I right now, I would say it's out of my purview. I think it's, you know, it's it's a pretty specialized thing. You need to understand the markets. You need to be in the markets. I believe and and, again, I've only had one conversation on this topic. I believe PURA works with an outside consultant who helps and then they interface with utilities and everyone agrees on on the purchases. So but I'm willing to do whatever I can to help. I'm I'm not a a wholesale markets expert. Right.

[Rep. Dave Yaccarino (House Ranking Member)]: We would need somebody on the bench. Speaking of baseball, we need another bench player for that because if just if it's really just one person, which I find that hard to believe, I hope it's not. Mhmm. We're we're we're in a little trouble.

[Everett Smith III (PURA Commissioner Nominee)]: Yeah. I I can't imagine the stress of being the person who's buying electricity in Connecticut when the prices go up.

[Rep. Dave Yaccarino (House Ranking Member)]: So Well, no. I appreciate your stepping up. You have a wealth of experience, obviously, a great team of I think it's gonna be a very good team, but also our we have some line workers here that done a really good job for our our state, and and so let's all work together. In the past, we didn't work together. People didn't work together. I think we really need to work together.

[Everett Smith III (PURA Commissioner Nominee)]: Sure. Well, and I would add, you know, I'm all about partnerships. And I think what's happened with the relationship with the utilities is it's degraded so badly, we don't have the opportunity to be partners. And you can be partners without, again, while maintaining the rigor around how much money they make. Everything I've ever done in my career has been around partnerships. When we went to Indonesia, we partnered with Edison, the parent of Southern California Edison, and we, you know, had partnered with the EPC companies who were building these things. And, you know, they're making money, so you find ways to keep people honest, but you bring the strengths of each party together to get something done. So I think we need to maintain that that spirit of partnership with utilities if we're gonna if we're gonna solve these problems.

[Rep. Dave Yaccarino (House Ranking Member)]: Agreed. I appreciate that. Looking forward to supporting you. Thank thank you, mister chairman.

[Speaker 0]: Thank you. Senator Looney.

[Sen. Martin M. Looney]: Thank you, mister chairman. Good afternoon, mister Smith. Thank you very much for your being willing to take on this this appointment, bring your experience to bear here and complementing that of the other, nominated members. One thing I'd like to, ask, that Commissioner Beecher spoke about this too, and you mentioned it as well. It is sort of a, utilities are sort of hybrid entities. They are private businesses, but they operate in a in a regulated market, almost a monopoly market to some extent. How do you evaluate, what is the within the safeguards in which they operate, when the the limited framework in which they operate, what is how do you evaluate what what's an acceptable degree of risk within that circumstance? Now what how would you define risk

[Everett Smith III (PURA Commissioner Nominee)]: though for the purposes of the question? Well, I guess, operational risk, financial risk?

[Sen. Martin M. Looney]: Yeah. Financial risk and also just making sure that the not just the not just the shareholders, but also those who rely on on the, the utilities functioning as they should, will be served and protected.

[Everett Smith III (PURA Commissioner Nominee)]: Well, I think it it comes back to that you have to have this balance. You know, you need the balance between, you know, getting the job done right and keeping the cost down. And and that's a very hard balance to achieve. We have a lot of aging infrastructure, a lot of aging equipment. It all needs to be replaced. I mean, in Greenwich, the gas the gas lines were put in in the 1920s for the large part. I mean, they're extraordinarily old. So, again, it's just I think you just have to work with utilities, understand what they're proposing to do, make sure it's reasonable as the prudent word was used that I hear every day several times in my job now. And then try to just try to do the best you can while maintaining the lowest cost possible. And I hope that answers your question.

[Sen. Martin M. Looney]: Thanks. And how many years in the aggregate did you spend living abroad when you were doing your international work?

[Everett Smith III (PURA Commissioner Nominee)]: I was in Singapore for three years, and I worked I had teams from Japan to Australia across to India, and I split my time between all those countries. And then I handled the rest of the international business for about three years, I think, out of Stanford, Connecticut.

[Sen. Martin M. Looney]: I see. Okay. Good. One thing I'd like to ask you about a follow-up on representative Iaccarino's question about about nuclear power. Obviously, it seems that in many ways that we're gonna need more of that, but in a different form, maybe, as you said, it turned out to be so unwieldy to big to build a big nuclear power plants, and it takes took so long to bring them online. And, it's, it's something if you commit to one, you're not gonna actually have the power from that from many years from the time you make the decision to actually go ahead and build it. And now there's the discussion about the small the smaller modular ones. One of the other area in terms of economic development and and I think in your specialty as a, you know, as a as a business expert, there's been discussion about trying to to build on the business of of data centers and and and someone to be able to have, you know, direct connections into into nuclear power, perhaps. And but they're also major users of power. And just in in terms of your overall view of the of the, what is the the advantage or disadvantage of putting a lot of eggs in the basket of trying to have data centers in your state since they are huge consumers of power.

[Everett Smith III (PURA Commissioner Nominee)]: Sure. Let me answer that, and then I'd like to come back to nuclear if I could. So when I look at the data data centers, and I'm not professing to be an expert, you know, what I see is I see a lot of states throwing a lot of economic incentives to to them to attract them to their states. And and I first of all, I don't get that. I mean, you bring a data center in, you're gonna get a lot of construction jobs. And then after a one or two year period, guess what? You're gonna have a couple security guards and a few other people. So So I really don't understand the economic development aspect of a data center. I don't personally believe they would necessarily throw throw off radiating influences on building up little businesses like you you often hope that big business is gonna spawn new start ups and things. I I don't see that happening. And frankly, we can use and benefit from data centers in Connecticut if they're built in Virginia or Iceland. I mean, it doesn't matter. So so I start with a premise that I don't really understand the attraction of data centers. But then you get into the use of water and you get into the use of electricity for the data centers, and now you're creating two new issues for the the state that they reside in. Water is obviously for cooling. And, you know, I think it's an evolving situation around how do you power data centers. The new thing is bring your own generation. So you're gonna put inside the fence generation, colocated with a data center. That's a great solution. But what I don't understand there is that probably that that generation is gonna be natural gas fired. So all of a sudden now you put another demand for natural gas on your system. So maybe you're just transferring the problem from needing a lot of electricity to needing a lot of natural gas. So I so I think it's it needs a lot of study. It it sort of goes hand in hand with other large loads and how do we address large loads. And I think this is where chairman Beecher can be invaluable to us because perhaps new rate structures are needed, because you have to be careful with large loads and data centers. You're not dumping that cost off on the other rate payers. And we have to be careful in Connecticut when they put a data center across the state line or in another state that somehow that isn't causing problems for us in Connecticut. And I I think it's a terrifically complicated situation. On the issue of nuclear, again, I I just would bring up, you know, from a risk perspective, let's just talk about millstone for a minute. I'm beginning to try to understand the whole millstone situation. I don't say I do, but I think it gives us 20% of our power. And one of the things I think about is what do we do if millstone goes down? And it could go down because it's an older plant and maybe it has an issue or it could go down because another nuclear plant elsewhere in the country has an issue that is sort of systemic and affects many. And so I think we need to think about that sort of dependence. But say putting that risk aside, I also look at Millstone, and I don't understand why it gets so much criticism because it's base load, it's carbon free, it sits there and can generate power day in and day out for a nickel. And I think it's a nickel. I'm not sure. Which, you know, in today's competitive day ahead market is seems like a very high price, and we're losing 2¢, let's say. But on a long term basis, I don't know, it seems to me 5¢ power is not that not that bad. And we probably need more generating sources with long term stable contracts in our in our energy mix so that we don't have the volatility. So somehow, Millstone has a story to it that I don't understand. It's in public benefit charges. It goes up and down, creates all sorts of controversy, and I personally don't get that. And that's one of the things I hope to learn.

[Sen. Martin M. Looney]: Well, thank you, commissioner, and, again, look forward to your service on the approval board. Thanks again.

[Speaker 0]: Thank you, senator. Senator Berthel.

[Sen. Eric C. Berthel (Senate Ranking Member)]: Thank you, mister chairman. Commissioner, congratulations again on your nomination. And also as I previously mentioned with the prior nominee, I appreciated the time that we had to to speak offline about your experience and joking quite a bit about you going from actually digging the trenches and putting in the pipes to the very much more sophisticated roles that you've been in through the course of your career. The the question that I'd like to ask you is very similar to what I previously asked of the the prior nominee, and that is, I guess, maybe it's not a question. I'm gonna I'm going to assume that you you agree with this. But if you could just, for a moment, tell me how you feel about the public participation and the education of the public with respect to the work that PURA does and the decisions that you make. I'm I'm guessing you might have heard the the the the back and forth between the prior nominee and and I a few moments ago.

[Everett Smith III (PURA Commissioner Nominee)]: I did. Well, first of all, in that in that back and forth, you used one word, which I think is a part important word, and that was fun. You said, how can we just help people understand PURA and make it fun? I've only had a chance to glance at at PURA, sort of slide deck on, you know, who was PURA. And I I tell you, it's like getting hit with a sledgehammer. It's there's there's nothing fun about it. I think we need to I think we need to get out there and have some fun and help people understand what we do, how we do it. We need to help people understand that we're all on the same team. We're, you know, we're on their side. We're, you know, we're not the enemy. And I think that takes outreach. It takes, you know, we do have these public hearings which are kind of these stiff processes where I haven't been to one actually, but, you know, you hear the public, you're not allowed to react. We need more interaction in other forums. So I'm all for that. I think that you gotta communicate, you gotta be transparent. You gotta have people understand the issues and why what you're doing is the best outcome you can get because, you know, things aren't always perfect.

[Sen. Eric C. Berthel (Senate Ranking Member)]: Thank you very much. I appreciate and I I anticipated you would you would say all that. Thank you for confirming that. And and, again, I'll I'll just leave leave you with this that I I hope that this new new board will fully will truly fully embrace this incredible opportunity you have to to bring the public more into your conversations and understanding. As I said a moment ago, the the not only is it a great opportunity, but I think it will help you all to to be much more appreciated in this very difficult role and also for the consumer to to to, again, as you just said, not look at you as the enemy, but actually as, you know, one of the the important watchdogs in this whole process. So, again, congratulations. Thank you for stepping up, and, and, good luck to you. Thank you, mister chairman.

[Speaker 0]: Thank you. Thank you, senator. Senator Fauci.

[Sen. John W. Fonfara]: Thank you, mister chairman. Congratulations, commissioner. Wish you and the others, great success in your new position. I'm intrigued by your background. And I wonder to the extent that if you were to apply the skills that you've developed in your many stops in terms of as an investment manager, How much of Connecticut's electric system would you advise your clients to invest in? Well, let me ask the question before you respond. Supply. You said you went down there with one person.

[Everett Smith III (PURA Commissioner Nominee)]: Well, I think. I'm not sure. There's hopefully more.

[Sen. John W. Fonfara]: Not many. Not on not on your end. It's not a very sophisticated process. It's an auction. It's a series of auctions that then get blended together to produce a rate. I don't think you'd advise your clients to invest in that system.

[Dr. Jan (Janice) Beecher (PURA Commissioner Nominee)]: I'm not

[Sen. John W. Fonfara]: asking to you don't have to respond to that. I'm just telling you that I don't think you would.

[Everett Smith III (PURA Commissioner Nominee)]: I I think, I I'm not sure how in what fashion my client would be investing, but it's it'd be certainly, be exposing themselves to commodity price risk, and I think you gotta make sure your client understands the the the fundamentals of that. Personally, I'm an infrastructure guy. I would tell the I would tell the client to invest in distributed resources. I'd tell them to I would tell them to invest in utilities. I think the Connecticut's utilities are

[James Crowe (UI retiree)]: are are

[Everett Smith III (PURA Commissioner Nominee)]: sound are sound companies.

[Sen. John W. Fonfara]: In this case, you don't you wouldn't have an option to choose another. We need supply.

[Dean (Committee Clerk)]: Mhmm.

[Sen. John W. Fonfara]: And the question is, you you are in some ways an adviser for the public in the system that they are they have no choice in going another direction. They need electricity to come through those wires and the cost of that. And so I I think that it's not a matter of whether we have supplies, a matter of how do we procure it in the most efficient and effective way cost effective way. And it's my position. This is far from that. With respect to transmission and distribution, 50% efficient. 50%. And in the Midwest and other states, 60 approaching 70% efficient. Some of that is our customer mix. Big factories in the Midwest that run twenty four seven. Mhmm. We don't have a lot of that in Connecticut. We're not New Jersey. And so that's an issue. But as I mentioned earlier with commissioner Cheeseman, the fact that we don't do much at all to move power to or usage to high demand periods to reduce that, the DUC curve, if sure you've learned already what the duck curve is, and it continues to get worse in Connecticut. But in addition and and public benefits, which not all, but much of what's part of public benefits that the public is so outraged about has nothing to do with the generation and delivery of electricity. And it's my opinion, those should not be on the bill. However, you mentioned about data centers. The value of data centers is is the best, most efficient purchaser of power. It's twenty four seven, and they're paying the bill. Mhmm. We need data centers in Connecticut. We need other other sources of of using power that is efficient in terms of how many hours they're operating, and data centers is probably the best at it. You're right. Not a lot of jobs when once it's built. But in terms of to we need I know this is completely counter to what we've been taught, but we need more kilowatt hours in the system, not less. Because the governor likes to say, we need more taxpayers, not more taxes. And he's right. But we need more kilowatt hours, not less, because every kilowatt hour, when you have fewer, they're more expensive for those who are paying the bill. And that's a mindset that I would hope all the commissioners would keep fresh in their thoughts because we're going in the opposite direction on that. And so I'll just hopefully, that is a perspective that and one last question if I could, mister chairman. I don't know many of the staff at PURA, and sometimes staff can be suppressed in terms of their ideas and their concepts. And other times staff could suppress ideas and concepts. And to the extent that you have staff that is the former, I hope they're encouraged to the extent that is the latter. I hope the leadership and all of you will do your best to either encourage staff or to find staff that gets the best. You get the best of them, and they get the best of you. Thank you. All the best to you.

[Everett Smith III (PURA Commissioner Nominee)]: I don't know if I should respond, but I'll happy to respond. Please. So on on the staff side, I would say one of my biggest worries when I walked in the door was that I was gonna find a big morale problem given all the problems you you peers had for the, whatever, past year. And I can say there really isn't a morale problem. I think it was it was good when we got there, and it's just gone up much higher since we got there because the whole atmosphere has changed. Chairman Weil is, wheel, sorry, is is open. You know, he he's sort of fun. People get a kick out of him. I think he's really lifted spirits, and I think they like him because he has credibility. He knows what he's talking about. I can ask him a question, and he'll, like, go back in time and give me some docket number and tell me why something happened. It is it's incredible. So I think that the staff morale is terrific. And and so, and then the second thing I would say on that point is that, we are working hard to have a much more inclusive process. I kind of think of Pure as an investment firm where you kind of have an investment staff working on things, then you have a toll gate and you talk about it, and then they do some more analysis. You have a toll gate. So when it gets to the investment committee or in this case, it would be the commissioners, everybody should be in agreement because you've taken toll gates along the line. You've taken everybody's thoughts into a consideration. You've thought about all the issues, and you've worked your way all the way through the process. And that's the way, Pierrot's beginning to operate. Perhaps it operated that way in the past. I don't know. But I think that's that's empowering to the staff. They get a chance to say what they think. And, again, that's just just good from Raul. On some of your other issues that you or points you made, surprisingly, I agree with almost all of them. I think the infrastructure

[Sen. John W. Fonfara]: That's not usual.

[Everett Smith III (PURA Commissioner Nominee)]: I don't know. The using the the increasing the capacity use of the infrastructure is critical. That's much better for us than building another asset. If if I could get your email, I'm happy to send you a paper that Jigger Shaw wrote last week. He was the former head of the Department of Energy loan office, and that's one of the points that he and his colleague make. It's all about using the capacity of the infrastructure more fully in order to avoid new costs. So I I could not agree with that more.

[Sen. John W. Fonfara]: Thank you. All the best.

[Speaker 0]: Thank you, senator. Any other questions or comments from committee members? Let me check online. Seeing none, commissioner, we do have one last question we ask of every nominee. Is there anything in your past that you believe might prove embarrassing to this committee, to the governor, to the state of Connecticut? No, sir. Wonderful. Thank you so much. Appreciate it. Alright. Moving right along, last, item on the agenda for the public hearing portion is another senate joint resolution. This is the nomination of Thomas Whale of Matt Madison to be utility commissioner and chairperson of the public utility utility regulatory authority. Good afternoon.

[Thomas (Tom) Weil (PURA Commissioner & Chair Nominee)]: Good afternoon.

[Speaker 0]: You can just raise your right hand. Do you promise, swear, and affirm to tell the truth, the whole truth, and nothing but the truth? I do. Wonderful. The floor is yours. Thank you.

[Thomas (Tom) Weil (PURA Commissioner & Chair Nominee)]: I have a lot of pages here, but just because I'm blind, I had to have really large font. Good morning, and thank you, chairman Concepcion and Duff, vice chairs Godfrey and Looney, ranking members, Yaccarino and Berthel, and members of the committee. My name is Tom Wheel, and I'm honored that governor Lamont has nominated me to serve as commissioner and chairperson at the Public Utilities Regulatory Authority. I appreciate this opportunity to before appear before the committee today and discuss my interest in serving the role. I was born in Connecticut. I went to school here, got married here, raising my children here, and I'm honored to have had the opportunity to serve the people of Connecticut for the past several years in my roles at the Office of Consumer Counsel and during the past few months at PURA. I started my legal career as a public defender in Massachusetts. In that role, I learned quite a bit about evidence, legal procedure, courtroom courtroom decorum, and how to interact with opposing counsel with decency and fairness. From my clients, I also learned about the hard realities of existing in an economy that one simply cannot afford. Working in the private sector later in my career taught me a lot about managing projects and people and making careful choices under the pressures of competition. These two experiences were helpful to me when I joined the OCC where the mission was to advocate for affordable rates and excellent service, but with recognition for business necessities. Through five and a half years of practicing before PURA, I developed a technical understanding of the utility business model and a familiarity with the legal and practical standards of utility rate making. I believe my experience would be valuable in serving as a commissioner at PURA. As you know, the role of PURA is to determine outcomes that align with the legislature's direction, whether through setting rates that are sufficient but no more than sufficient to allow for companies to recover their reasonable costs, ensuring that companies maintain managerial, technical, and financial expertise, or evaluating whether operations and infrastructure appropriately serve the public interest. Those determinations are derived through careful and objective evaluations of competing viewpoints and are ultimately informed by the diversity of perspectives among the PURA commissioners themselves. I believe that my knowledge and experience would complement the expertise of other commissioners and that I would meaningfully contribute towards PURA's mission as we navigate increasingly complex and impactful issues in electricity, natural gas, water, and telecommunications. The chairperson is responsible for overseeing the administrative functioning of the agency, and I take that responsibility very seriously. Over the past few months, I've worked with my fellow commissioners to foster a culture of open communication between staff and agency leadership as we've implemented changes to the internal and external operations of PURA to facilitate our transition to an independent multi member agency. If confirmed, I would continue to treat the chairperson's seat as a purely administrative one and work with my fellow commissioners as one of five coequal leaders. Thank you for your consideration today, and I welcome any opportunity to address any questions you may have.

[Speaker 0]: Thank you, commissioner. Congratulations on your nomination, not just to appear, but to to to chair the authority as well. You know, one of the biggest, I think, criticisms of your predecessor was her leadership style and everything I've heard and everything I've heard from from your fellow commissioners is is very that you're very different. Just wanna comment on what you how you would describe your leadership style.

[Thomas (Tom) Weil (PURA Commissioner & Chair Nominee)]: Sure. I think my leadership style is perhaps annoyingly collaborative. I think maybe one of the criticisms I receive is that I bother all of my co commissioners with lots of decisions to to make and and encourage conversations. I, I I do try to engage with staff pretty frequently and expect a lot of conversations out of them, and they've been wonderful. I I really I'm not a comfortable I'm not a person who's comfortable sort of being in the limelight and, and sort of taking on the, the persona of sort of a leader. I think I'm much more comfortable thinking of myself as a team member. And I do, I know this is sort of a trope or a cliche, but I do see the function of a leader, particularly of an agency like ours, as I find myself as more sort of in service to the agency than sort of the other way around. I think I I might I view my role as sort of a liaison between the different components of the agency that sort of may need something from one another. Certainly, I do a lot of communications between the commissioners and the staff to make sure the commissioners are getting what they need and vice versa. So I think, again, very collaborative, I think, is is how I describe my leadership style.

[Speaker 0]: No. I appreciate that. And, Senator Farren, a couple of the commissioners had mentioned, the staff and, as you just, alluded to. You know, obviously, it's critical to have a a staff that has skill and knowledge and experience, to help out, especially with with some new new commissioners. Has there been any turnover or a lot of turnover, in the last year or so?

[Thomas (Tom) Weil (PURA Commissioner & Chair Nominee)]: I think, in the last year or so, I think I've seen the numbers. I can't speak to them kind of off the top of my head. I've only been here since October. I think since October, we've had two retirements and, one person who transitioned to another agency. We do have a lot of vacancies. We got 10 vacancies right now. We're actively recruiting, recruiting for eight of them. We gotta get those other two sort of in the

[Rep. Dave Yaccarino (House Ranking Member)]: Sure.

[Thomas (Tom) Weil (PURA Commissioner & Chair Nominee)]: In the process. I it's my understanding, you know, I worked just downstairs from PURA in the same building where the office of Consumer Council is. I know a lot of the staff from appearing before PURA over the years and that, you know, you just get to know people from being in the same hearing room every day. So I think that there were, you know, varying periods of turnover. I think around the pandemic or sort of 2002 or sorry, twenty twenty two, twenty three. I think there was kind of a big period of turnover turnover for PURA. I'm not sure of the reason for that or whether it coincided with the much discussed silver tsunami of that time. But we're we're certainly hoping I I anyone who wants to leave, if staff are listening, please come talk to me. We wanna keep you. We're not not interested in in increasing turnover at all, certainly.

[Speaker 0]: No. I I appreciate that. And, you know, you mentioned staff staffing numbers, eight vacancies. How does that affect the the dockets that that come in?

[Thomas (Tom) Weil (PURA Commissioner & Chair Nominee)]: I'm glad you asked because we are I mean, it's it's important for, I think, the public to be aware that right now, at least for the last year or more maybe, PURA is I can't speak to the history kind of before 2020 when I started working in the building, but PURA is maybe busier than it has ever been before. And again, I don't have I recognize I don't really have the historic perspective to be certain about that. But we've got I think we last time I counted, I think there were five active rate cases at PURA, which is only about a year ago. We are working on it was sort of a big deal that we had two simultaneous rate cases. So the the amount of work has really increased exponentially. And we are we've got the same resources that we've had for a long time. We've kind of been floating, as I understand it, around a headcount of about 80 for for a long time, at least five years. Will just sort of threw out there. I recognize that I'm not in front of the Appropriations Committee, but the DPUC prior to the integration with Deep had, I think, around 150 or 160 folks when it was an independent agency. So, I think, like, it's certainly the the staff are under a lot of pressure. There's a lot of work. People are doing an incredible amount of work and the staff are incredibly resilient and hardworking people and they are handling it and will continue to handle it. But it is I mean, since you asked, it is certainly an issue that at the at the agency.

[Speaker 0]: No. I appreciate that. And, you know, obviously, in your your role, the the relationship between PURA and the utilities is is critical. How would you describe your the relationship when you worked as OCC and now as chairman?

[Thomas (Tom) Weil (PURA Commissioner & Chair Nominee)]: Yeah. I I appreciate I appreciate that you asked about the OCC because I I think it was, it was really good to have the experience there in terms of the relationship with the utility because I think we that office in particular is a pretty good model for a way to have a working relationship with the utility companies without being, you know, without necessarily sharing all of the same end goals. I mean, the OCC sort of by design is sort of not not to use an overly controversial commercial word controversial word, but sort of like the statutory adversary to the utility companies. That was sort of the idea when the office was founded in 1975. Right? So you would think that maybe that relationship is volatile or not great, but I didn't feel that way. I feel like we were able to have a lot of open communication with the companies even while we are sort of engaged in litigation against them. We recognized, you know, what their goals were. We generally kind of weren't in the business of sort of blaming a company for being a company and for having the priorities a company has. And I think that's also possible for PURA. There are obvious differences. At OCC, there's no ex parte prohibition between us talking to the companies. That's not the same at PURA. So there's sort of a different boundary set that makes sense if you kind of consider our role as a quasi judicial body. But I also don't I mean, I don't think, the responsibility of the regulator is to be an adversary, even even though I come from a place where that sort of was a responsibility. I think I think the relationship with the utilities, I think we should view it as the same as the relationship with any party that appears before us.

[Speaker 0]: I appreciate that. Thanks for for for that answer. With that, I will turn it over to chairman Duff.

[Sen. Bob Duff (Senate Chair, Executive & Legislative Nominations Committee)]: Thank you, and good afternoon. Good to see you here. At first, I just wanna apologize to, mister Smith, for not being here during your questioning and everything else, so you you missed a few. But we'll we'll catch up later. I just had another meeting. I had her attend, but thank you, mister chairman, for for being here and for your testimony. Wanted to just get a a I'm gonna ask someone similar questions to ask you for, but just get as a chair, I wanna ask some of your your thoughts on really the role of chairperson and how you view this going forward in an agency or regulatory authority that, you know, has had some bumps along the along the way and how to kinda repair that work to establish public confidence, and and also with the utilities, as well. So it's not as adversarial, as it might have been in the past. How do you how do you kind of bring all those things together as a as a new chair?

[Thomas (Tom) Weil (PURA Commissioner & Chair Nominee)]: Sure. And I think with respect to the role of the chairman, I view it as just sort of like a mechanical necessity of like, if you have to have a multi member the idea of PURA is that we've got five people who are in charge of the agencies essentially, but that doesn't work. Like you can't have five bosses who have co equal power you know, who do you ask for vacation time? Like it's so you sort of have to have a mechanical solution to that of establishing, well, there's gotta be one person who's the person who signs off on stuff. That's what I think most simply is the role of chairman. I don't see any substantive difference either in the statute or in my view of the daily operations of PURA between the chairman and any other commissioner with respect to the work the agency does. I mean, I have one vote just like every other commissioner. I have the I have a voice in deliberations that's equal to every other commissioner. I think in that the feedback or the direction even that I give staff with respect to the work we're doing, I view as equal to every other commissioner. Certainly access to staff, I view as co equal. To the other part of your question about sort of improving public confidence and transparency and the relationship with the utilities or anyone else who appears before us. I think one thing that I've been trying to work on is sort of treating the work we do, approaching the work we do from a perspective of there's no reason from my perspective for Kira to not be open about sort of where we are, like the way we're viewing an issue. So I've been literally kind of trying to say out loud during the hearing process or during meetings that we have, like, well, here's here's how I view this. Here's a problem I have. Can someone explain to me, like, why I shouldn't view this as a problem? I think that is a change from, at least from my experience practicing before peer at the OCC for five years. And I hope that that is is improving a little bit of the of the relationship with some of the parties before us because I think it, I think it's important for people to feel like they're heard and understood. And I think it's important to me that we hear and understand exactly where everyone's coming from. But I also think it's helpful for any, for the four people who tune into our YouTube hearings, to get a sense of sort of what's going on. Like, I think it's important to have conversations where, where, you know, you set a baseline and you sort of actually have the conversation as opposed to a sort of hearing where you're just, you know, referring to interrogatories by code and looking at spreadsheets that nobody can see. So I'm hoping that that's, that's a path, towards sort of making improvements to the to the general atmosphere.

[Sen. Bob Duff (Senate Chair, Executive & Legislative Nominations Committee)]: Right. And and and I appreciate that. And it's it's a it's a process. It's time. It's kinda stylistic. It's it's not something you can change overnight, obviously. And and, you know, it's cultural too based on the five folks who were there and and how they interact and how that and it plays out with the staff and and and people who are coming in front of you. But you also have an opportunity as chair to share a vision and kinda direct that vision to a certain extent. And and so a little more direct, I guess, in some of the other questions I've asked of working regionally or working on other issues like cybersecurity or the double poll issues or things like that. How do you view your role as chair in in either pushing not just those issues that are important to me, but issues that you see as things that need to be addressed in a way that are not reactive, but more proactive type things?

[Thomas (Tom) Weil (PURA Commissioner & Chair Nominee)]: Yeah. Thanks for that question. Because I've heard a lot of the discussion in the prior hearings about that, the kind of distinction between proactive and reactive roles of PURA. And I think we can be proactive. I I kinda think of it maybe this is overly simplistic, but we kind of have two different kinds of proceedings at PURA. We have what what I think of as just contested proceedings where the kind of what's happening there is someone is coming before us and asking us for something. They're asking us for more money. They're asking us for some sort of change to a legal situation. They're asking us for a license. Those those are very formal proceedings as required by the United I mean, the Uniform Administrative Procedure Act. We're we're we're acting we're a court there. Like, that's that's our our role in those situations. But then we also have these things that we think of as uncontested dockets, those are sort of, like, investigative proceedings, proceedings where we're sort of designing potential ideas for different programs. And those are our opportunity to be more proactive. And basically what's happening in those proceedings is we're sort of inviting conversations with the public of what can we do about this? And I think this is sort of addressing some of the questions that have come today. I think part of our role is to determine sort of where are the borders of our jurisdiction on something? Where is our purview? Where does it begin and end? And I think we do have a once we've figured that out, which does take figuring out, like, because, you know, you can't you can't really know that before you've invited sort of a creative conversation with people sort of throwing out ideas and vetting it all. I think once we figure that out, I think we can report it to the policymakers at the legislature and let you folks know, sort of, you know, here's our view of what we could potentially do about this or not. I think the same is true at the regional level. As other speakers here, they have, discussed, we do those conversations are happening. We do have relationships with the other, commissions here in New England. And a lot of those discussions are similar to what I just talked about of sort of what can we do about this because, this meaning affordability, which is kind of the central question at every utility commission, I think, in the country at the moment. And, and, yeah, it's not, it's not there isn't a clear answer, obviously. If there were, we would have put it forward. But I think it is important that we're engaging those conversations, and and it is important that we continue that work of having those regional discussions and figuring out what's possible.

[Sen. Bob Duff (Senate Chair, Executive & Legislative Nominations Committee)]: Right. Thank you. And I'm and I apologize this question has been asked before, but we haven't really we haven't really talked a lot about data centers. We don't really have data centers here in Connecticut, but we are on a regional grid. How did how is that is any of those things, data centers, cloud, AI impacting, our rate payers here in the state of Connecticut?

[Thomas (Tom) Weil (PURA Commissioner & Chair Nominee)]: Yeah. Absolutely. I'm glad you asked that. And please stop me if this gets, like, too weedy. But the ultimately, like, the the way rates are set fundamentally is you it's not actually dissimilar from taxes at all, as I think maybe, Commissioner Beecher was mentioning. You start out with, an amount of money. Like, there's a number. This is how much money we need to give to the recipient of the rates. And that's a single number, a $100,000,000 or something to that effect. And then you figure out, like, well, how how do we break that up? Like, how does how do we and the way we break it up is we have various different kinds of charges, but the most simple one to understand, I think, is the volumetric rate itself. And we have different rate classes. So we we don't just take the $100,000,000 and divide it purely by expected sales. This is getting to what something Senator Fafara brought up, which I did agree with. This is why the more sales you have, the less the lower the volumetric rate. Anyway, wait. You the the there's a more complex exercise associated with rate classes so that because it kind of arrives from this idea that not every kind of customer is imposing the same kind of costs onto the system. So it's not fair to charge every kind of customer the same rates. So you engage in this process called rate design, which is you take a lot of things into consideration. But one of the biggest things you take into consideration is cost causation, this principle of what if you're what are you using this energy for? And importantly, get into your finally get into your question, Senator, what is your use? What cost is your use imposing upon the system itself? And the notion of kind of pure cost causation is that you should be designing a rate such that the usage is covering the costs imposed by the usage are being covered by the rate itself. And that is when Commissioner Beecher mentioned rate design as a potential solution to affordability. And I think there was a reference also to it being a potential issue to be considered in the context of data centers. I think that's a question. I can't really speak to how I would view the question because it could appear before me. But there is a question of this sort of newer concept of these incredibly large industrial scale loads, what costs are those imposing not just on the distribution system, but also the transmission system? And how do we answer that question of the fair allocation of those costs as associated with the cost with the with the burden that it may be imposing? And how do you split all that up? And getting to your question about regionality, the transmission costs in particular are a tough nut to crack because you put a large load kind of anywhere on, on a general sort of section of transmission grid, presumably that everyone is is gonna end up paying some portion of that cost. And that's that's an issue that, in my opinion, should be addressed, but that is FERC's purview to address. So anyway Okay.

[Sen. Bob Duff (Senate Chair, Executive & Legislative Nominations Committee)]: I may need to put that through AI to get that translated somehow. But I understand I understand your big points of that, and it it is it is something to look at because it does impact us. And then in a lot of ways, this is all increasing our rates, whether it's in Connecticut or somewhere on the grid or someplace else. And you have now you have other companies that are are having their own generation, but they're generating energy taking natural gas that may have been coming to Connecticut or into New England. So those are all things we have to sort of think about. So that that's why I asked the question about as role as chair of being proactive on things, and it's not to suggest you're not being. But that may not be something that's in front of you. It may be something that you know of based on your work at OCC or just based on what you're hearing from your fellow commissioners around the the country or around the region, that needs to be addressed or needs to be somehow investigated in some ways.

[Thomas (Tom) Weil (PURA Commissioner & Chair Nominee)]: Yes. I agree. I should also just throw out that our colleagues at our sister agency, Deep, are also an important part of this conversation. And I want to emphasize, we really value working with them on these questions as well. And they are also working on these these questions on behalf of the people of Connecticut. But, yeah, very important questions that absolutely deserve discussion.

[Sen. Bob Duff (Senate Chair, Executive & Legislative Nominations Committee)]: You know, also yeah. And so I think I think all that's very important. I mean, even whether we this this body here or in general do some type of expansion on nuclear or whatever we're doing or the wind or whatever we're doing or the wind or or hydro or whatever. All those things kinda come into play and and and trying to meet the energy needs, especially with data centers and and other things that are sucking up a lot of energy right now and raising rates on on on rate payers. So I just I I guess I just wanted to just get if we could just do a quick round, because I know there's others who have questions as well on just where you are on cybersecurity issue, double polling issue, and and I'll pass it off to the next person.

[Thomas (Tom) Weil (PURA Commissioner & Chair Nominee)]: Yeah. I don't I think with respect to cybersecurity, I agree with everything my the folks who spoke before me said. I think it is an important issue. I think there was a docket. There were several kind of reports issued in the docket over the past several years. The reports are a little thin from my perspective. They could we could do I think there was an initial investigation at PURA several years ago that sort of said, Henceforth, every year we're gonna issue a report that looks at this. But the but the initial investigation, it's been a long time since we put in the work to sort of say, what's going on out there and and what are what are the utilities and and anyone else sort of within our our world doing about this and and what can we do to to to make sure that we're all as safe as possible. So I think, we're definitely the commissioners and I have already discussed, we're definitely interested in opening and proceeding on that. Double pulls, certainly an issue. I do wanna say, I think I think, the current kind of system in Connecticut, despite the recognition that we've got a lot too many double pulls, But we've got we've got a pretty good system worked out. I think it's actually a good example of a sort of collaborative partnership, if you will, between the electric utilities at least and sort of the regulatory community because we've we kind of have a pretty solid working group, that's been going on for a while now that has been addressing some of these issues with one touch make ready, of course, with the initiative from the legislator legislature. But I think, Senator Duff, you were asking sort of what else sort of is in with within PURA's area of of influence that could be could be considered. And one issue, just just for your awareness, the the poll attacher is not the electric utilities, but the folks who are the other companies that are attaching themselves to the pole. And I know you understand this issue very well, but, you know, this is what's going on, right? If a pole needs to be replaced, the electric folks can't touch someone else's facilities, so they have to sort of wait until someone else shows up. It causes issues. It causes issues for the linemen who have to who have to perform this work as well. But those folks, those attachers are essentially tenants on the on the poles. They pay rent to the utility companies and that rent functions as revenue, as an offset to electric ratepayers. And, you know, it's PURA who sets that rent, essentially. It's called it's the pole attachment rates that that we we decide sort of how much can be charged of those companies. And that's something that I think can is under our purview. It can be taken into consideration of of what costs similar concept that I just discussed. This is imposing costs. Like this double pull issue is imposing costs, and those costs should be recognized in that when we consider that aspect of rate making. So that's certainly something that is in our, it's another tool in our toolbox that we can consider to address this issue.

[Sen. Bob Duff (Senate Chair, Executive & Legislative Nominations Committee)]: Great. Thank you. And I appreciate your answers on that. Obviously, this is an important hearing. You have an important job, and we want nothing but the best for this authority to succeed, because it helps all of us as elected officials and, in the sense that, your success is the success as a state, and we're all here for the success of the state too and to have balance good balance and and not to have acrimony. And and, again, to have you all on page seven of the the newspaper, not page one of the newspaper. So and I I don't wanna speak for anybody else here, but I'm assuming that may be something that we would all agree to.

[Thomas (Tom) Weil (PURA Commissioner & Chair Nominee)]: Us us too at Pure. I could speak.

[Sen. Bob Duff (Senate Chair, Executive & Legislative Nominations Committee)]: Thank you. It's almost like the opposite of cheers where everybody knows your name. May Yes. May nobody know your name. Yes. You know? Except for except for those who are after, I guess. But okay. Thank you, mister chairman, and thank you again for your testimony.

[Speaker 0]: Thank you. Thank you. Representative Viakarino followed by senator Looney.

[Rep. Dave Yaccarino (House Ranking Member)]: Thank you, mister chairman. Thank you, mister Will, for being here today and your testimony. So many questions were asked of all the of the commissioners. I appreciate all the answers. We had met a look for a few minutes earlier today. Obviously, you'll you'll be the chair of the of of PURA working with your peers. When you worked for OCC, you did work with PURA. Will you take some of your will you I'm sure you're gonna take your experience working with them. But when you were working with them, Pure was a little I hate to use the word, but it was a little toxic. And I don't know. Well, it doesn't matter if it matter if I think it was and whether it's it turned out it wasn't. It's it's no reflection on any of you. But I would hope and I had the feeling just from meeting you and your demeanor and all the folks, it's not going to be toxic. But saying that, what direction are do you wanna take it in? Because it's gotta go in a different direction.

[Thomas (Tom) Weil (PURA Commissioner & Chair Nominee)]: Yeah. Thanks. I I mean, to be perfectly frank and honest, I I wasn't I did I did, you know, interact with folks at Pura.

[Rep. Dave Yaccarino (House Ranking Member)]: And I'll hold it against you, Wendell. I

[Thomas (Tom) Weil (PURA Commissioner & Chair Nominee)]: can't speak to whether the internal environment at Pura was toxic. I just don't know. I I wasn't here. There certainly was there certainly was tension, like in the I was in the building and in the hearing room with with PURA staff and the commissioners, and there's undeniably tension. And I don't, you know, and it is all of our goal to try to find ways to relieve that tension to the extent that it can be relieved with us still sort of fulfilling our mandate. The goal always from from my perspective, and maybe this sounds a little boring, is just to iteratively improve, find ways to improve what are improve the mission. And the mission is somewhat simple, although the the issues are highly complex and the goals are massively important. But the mission essentially is just to be a check, to be as, as I think, Commissioner Beecher said, to be a stand in for a competitive marketplace. And ultimately that just means, you know, what that means in sort of less economics and more nuts and bolts terms is we look at a lot of numbers and we check to make sure they make sense and we ask ourselves questions of whether whether what we're paying for is worth it or not within the within the purview that we're given from the legislature. So the goal is just to make is to try to find ways to do that better. And I don't know whether that's a different goal than than there was before at PURA. I don't, you know, I think I think that's the goal of maybe any regulatory agency. But that's that's the goal from from my perspective.

[Rep. Dave Yaccarino (House Ranking Member)]: That that's actually a very good goal. And just being a calling balls and strikes, being an honest broker and arbiter for the rate payer. And also, I've said it all day, but to have a you know, all the utilities, telecommunications, electric, gas, and a cable and water to you know, the strong infrastructure and and and strong relationship with PURA. Because at the end of the day, we need that for the ratepayer. It it be it through Wall Street for bonding, for them getting a rate increase or not a rate increase, but to have clarity and being deliberate and and following the tenets of where you are you you all stand for as far as our our our repairs and a strong utility. So that's that's just how I feel. I think it's you've said it's it's simplistic. It actually is simplistic, I think. The technology maybe is complicated, but the end result should be simplistic, I believe. And I I think you said it, and I really appreciate that.

[Sen. Henri Martin]: Thank you.

[Rep. Dave Yaccarino (House Ranking Member)]: I don't have a you know, there are so many questions today, and I've asked so many questions. We all want affordability. You know, we all, I want more natural gas. It's not gonna happen right now. I envision in five or six years, safe, nuclear pot reactor, you know, the pot modules, you know, but at the end of the day, we have such a demand for supply. And how do you how do you meet that? We have all the infrastructure in Bridgeport and other parts of the state. I will say I think the Dominion deal turned out to be a good deal in the long run so we know the choice. You know, right now, we're reaping the benefits. There's it's a cycle, and anything with energy, it's always a cycle. And I think their demand's gonna get greater and greater, to be honest with you. It's taking data centers aside, put put them aside, but all the innovation for science, for AI, just our our state is so clustered and dense. It just I know it's a long my you know, I'm not on your side, but I I I really have faith in the the five of you, the four today and, the five.

[Thomas (Tom) Weil (PURA Commissioner & Chair Nominee)]: Thanks, Robert. Thank you. And, yeah, I think I certainly don't have the solution to affordability, as I said before, but I think the solution's gotta involve collaboration across the across the spectrum. I think it's gotta involve partnering with the legislature, the executive branch, the Office of Consumer Council, working with the utilities, working with finding improvements to the way that we're procuring energy, considering policy directions at the highest level for sort of what what we can do in the region. I think all of these are things that need to be on the table.

[Rep. Dave Yaccarino (House Ranking Member)]: And I think renewables are fine, but at this point in time in 2026, they're they're only a very small part of our equation. It's maybe 15% if that. I'd love for them to be greater. We're just not gonna by the time they're greater, there'll be something else, some more innovation. But I'm hoping we all work together. I I'm on the energy committee, and I'll I'll probably see you in front of us. And it's a pleasure meeting you today. Hopefully, we'll speak again and further. Thank you, mister chair. Thank you, mister Will. Thank you.

[Speaker 0]: Thank you. Senator Looney.

[Sen. Martin M. Looney]: Thank you. Thank you, mister chairman, and good afternoon, mister chairman. Appreciate the opportunity to, have a discussion with you in in advance of, of this hearing, and congratulations on your your nomination. First of all, I'm, I'm entirely comfortable with the idea of your moving from the advocacy role of the Office of Consumer Council to the, to the regulatory role of, PURA. Have you gotten just let me have you gotten any negative feedback from the, utilities industries about, about your your making that move?

[Thomas (Tom) Weil (PURA Commissioner & Chair Nominee)]: I have not at all. I I'm frankly a little surprised. I have to say, this is a joke, but I've been saying up to my colleagues, I wonder if I wasn't doing a great job at the OTC because I see them because it's because I should I be worried that no one seems mad about this situation? But no. I haven't gotten any negative feedback from the utility.

[Dr. Jan (Janice) Beecher (PURA Commissioner Nominee)]: Well, it's

[Sen. Martin M. Looney]: well it's sort of like the role of somebody either who was a either a prosecutor or a public defender who becomes a judge or somebody whose practice as an attorney was primarily, you know, plaintiff's personal injury work or insurance defense work often wind up as judges. Right? So, it's, it's, it's, I think, similar that you, you assume the, the role of the the obligations of the position you're in. And, you know, I think we're very confident of of of you doing that. Just wanted to ask a little bit, as I asked some of the other nominees, just the your sense of the the, the proper, role of the regulatory body in dealing with, with a business which is more or less than a private business at the same time because it's, it's, investor owned. It it it operates like a business, but at the same time, it operates in a regulated and controlled, market with, in many cases, a guaranteed customer base and guaranteed return. And, so it's it's really a hybrid. So just your your thoughts on that that whole process.

[Thomas (Tom) Weil (PURA Commissioner & Chair Nominee)]: Absolutely. I I I think, it's funny because I think, like, in in a lot of the public discourse about utilities, the word monopoly gets thrown around in sort of lot of comments saying it's a monopoly. And absolutely, it is a monopoly. And that's not a secret. It's actually and I don't think the utilities would disagree, at least with respect to their distribution business, their regulated portion of their business. Absolutely, they're monopolies. And it's it's it is the sort of whole notion of the system. These companies have exclusive franchises, meaning they have legal rights to have no competition in their service areas. And as Commissioner Beecher wisely discussed, the whole kind of model here is that what do you do, you know, an acknowledgment of the of the normal kind of economics issues that you have with the monopoly. You have to design some system to replicate the benefits of a competitive market, and that system is regulation. So absolutely. I mean, our role fundamentally is to be skeptical. I think I think if I had to kind of pick one word to say what it is that we should be doing, we should be expressing skepticism always with respect to anything that anyone, frankly, brings before us. I think we are evaluators of people people come before us and they and they make their best effort to request something and convince us ultimately of an outcome. And then we have other interveners oftentimes who could try to convince us, who attack that, argument and try to convince us of another outcome. And we need to be highly skeptical of everything we hear and scrutinize to the greatest degree we can any any suggestion we get. And I don't mean to sound adversarial or combative. I I honestly think that's what our role is. So that is why, in my opinion, it is important to although it's important to kind of find ways to reduce tension and ensure that we're not unnecessarily sort of creating a negative working environment, it is, you know, boundaries are important. My wife's a therapist. She talks a lot about boundaries. And they're important. But again, as I think I referenced before, not just with the utilities, but with everyone who appears before us. So, but yeah, I think we, all of us take that rule very seriously that we are we are neither there as our our role is neither the consumer advocate nor the advocate for the interest of utilities. Our role is to be skeptical of of what comes before us.

[Sen. Martin M. Looney]: Well, thank you very much, mister Wieland. I think that that really does express a what I think is the best operating attitude to to go into this, to basically be skeptical of ever everything that's presented to you and then the demanding of evidence and proof. So thank you again, and congratulations on your nomination. Thank you.

[Speaker 0]: Thank you, senator. Senator Burfel followed by senator Harding.

[Sen. Eric C. Berthel (Senate Ranking Member)]: Thank you, mister chairman and commissioner, mister chairman. Congratulations on your nomination, and and thank you as well for the private private conversation we had prior to this meeting today. I do have a a question that I I think might have been partially answered already by one of my colleagues. But, you know, since since your appointment to PURA, you have had to abstain from dockets that you did work on as office of consumer council staff. And I'm just wondering, do you know how many of these cases there are that you have already had to abstain from or that might be remaining?

[Thomas (Tom) Weil (PURA Commissioner & Chair Nominee)]: I think thank you for the question. I I compiled a list when I when I got the news that I had received this nomination and when I was transferring agencies. I was able to kind of take, you know, in the couple of days I had while I was still an employee of OCC but knew I was transitioning, I was able to take the kind of active list of dockets that OCC was actively engaged in and bring that list with me to PURA as sort of the baseline list of dockets that I absolutely had to recuse myself from. And I think Commissioner Cheeseman addressed this perfectly in her remarks. It's not an option, particularly for me. There is a rule in the code of judicial conduct that's actually specifically to government lawyers appearing before us. Sure. So, and I think that was sorry, to finally get into your question, I wanna say off the top of my head, there was something like 35 dockets on that original list. I have had to additionally recuse myself from some other dockets, not newer, but older dockets. So when a motion has been filed and a docket that has been more or less dormant for a couple of years, but it's a motion that ruling on it requires sort of an analysis of of what occurred in that docket in the past. If that's a docket that I worked on at OCC, I've also been recusing myself from from those. So at the same time, there has been thankfully, because I I I really don't enjoy recusing myself from these dockets. I I love doing the work and, unfortunately, it's the docket that I care the most about and put so much work in that I that I'm not allowed to even talk about anymore, which is tough. But thankfully the number has been declining over time, sort of every time we issue a final decision in the docket from which I'm recused, it's, you know, one less docket on whatever that total number is. But I can't tell you for sure, I would guess somewhere between thirty five and forty was the total. And again, offset by that, you know, the trickling off as as we kinda get through the dockets. So I don't have clear number for you.

[Sen. Eric C. Berthel (Senate Ranking Member)]: No. Thank you. I I appreciate that, and I appreciate your response as well. You know, part of the part part of what you and I spoke about privately and that I spoke about with the other three nominees was, you know, this, this renewed spirit and energy of this new PURA board coming out of, you know, a, you know, somewhat dark space that we were in not too long ago, and just being, again, more transparent and open. So I I fully respect the fact that you are bound by the law in in in with respect to having to recuse yourself from or abstain from participating in these dockets. I I fully appreciate that, and I and I appreciate, again, your comments just now. I I'm curious. Going forward, are there are there any viewpoints or approaches that you took in your previous work at OCC that you think you'll have to be particularly aware of when acting as an impartial PURA commissioner? Because it's a very different role now, you know, advocating for consumer council issues versus making decisions with your with your other commissioners on the PURA board. It's a it's you're doing similar work, but it's in a different you know, it's aligned differently. I think you understand what I'm getting at. I'm just wondering if you can speak to that, that you have we have to be aware of of different things in this new role.

[Thomas (Tom) Weil (PURA Commissioner & Chair Nominee)]: Absolutely. I I am hyper conscious and, again, perhaps annoyingly hyper conscious of that distinction with my colleagues now. It is absolutely a different role, an entirely different role. And that's why we have two separate state agencies to fulfill those separate roles. So I am always conscious of, the fact that the, you know, the mission at OCC was to advocate for the interests of consumers specifically, consumers and no one else. We it was not our mission to advocate for the interests of utilities, except with respect to, you know, that doesn't mean necessarily that the the job is just to nuke ever utilities and to demand that rates are zero because it is a balance and the and the system does require a recognition that, like, these companies need revenue in order to provide service. Right? But the but the point of view, from my perspective at OCC, always was that the priority at all times is the consumer and the impact on consumers. And frankly, that we should be that to the extent that there's a question of who should own the risk of any decision as between shareholders or consumers. I felt that my job at OCC was to advocate in all circumstances that none of that risk should be born by consumers. I think that's the that was my my view of the sort of requirement for zealous advocacy in that role. That is not the role of PURA. I don't think PURA is an advocate at all. I think we're not we don't take sides. We watch as people take sides before us and we evaluate the, you know, the evidence, the strength of the evidence. We consider the reasonableness of the arguments and we're trying to find the solution that makes the most sense that's before us, which, you know, not saying that they're that the outcomes between the two perspectives are necessarily drastically different or necessarily opposed. And that's also true from the perspective of utility arguments versus, the decision that comes out. But anyway, there's a lengthy way of saying, I hope you understand, how much I do appreciate the distinction between those two roles.

[Sen. Eric C. Berthel (Senate Ranking Member)]: No. Thank you very much. I and I I appreciate you taking a moment to explain that. I think that's perfectly clear and should be to anyone else, who's listening today. And very quickly, because I know I know the the day is getting long. I I'm sure you heard the other questions that I asked. And, unfortunately, I missed my missed my opportunity to speak with my former legislative colleague with, Commissioner Cheeseman. But the the whole notion of expanding public outreach and participation and, you know, understanding beyond the PURA one zero one presentations. As the chair, I know well, you and I spoke about this privately, and I I think as the chair, we'll be incumbent upon you clearly to bring that forth and support what the other three nominees today have said, what I believe they think is also important, you know, hearing from the public, encouraging them to testify, so that, we can reposition PURA as exactly what you just described it as. And that is you're not you're not advocating for the consumer like you were in your OCC role, but you are more of a watchdog over the whole process and how how the the as senator Looney spoke to, it is very much a monopoly with these with these utilities and how they will interact with the public with with you guys in the middle, really trying to make sure that everything is done fairly. So I I hope we can count on on, you, pushing forward this whole concept and an important, really important piece of the work you'll do to get the public as involved as you possibly can and getting them to understand what your role is. Because we as I spoke to earlier, we have quite a bit of angst that comes to all of our offices, people complaining about what PURA has or hasn't done. And a lot of that is rooted in in a misunderstanding of what your role is. So so, commissioner, I don't know if you can you can speak to if you wanna respond to that, I made a lot of comments, but I think it's an important piece of the future role of the new PURA board.

[Thomas (Tom) Weil (PURA Commissioner & Chair Nominee)]: Sure. I mean, I'll start by saying I do fully agree with everything that my colleagues have said today, and I absolutely support, them and and the initiatives that they've discussed. And I do agree we we can always improve, the work that we're doing to to meet that that goal. I think education in this field is really tough. I've tried it myself. I think we at OCC put a lot of work into trying to explain exactly how the RAM works, in July 2024 when rates skyrocketed and there was a lot of, we got a lot of questions asking to explain how, like, the non bypassable federally mandated congestion charge and the reconciliation of that work on an annual basis. And I, you know, I made lots of slide decks and we tried color coded pie charts and some of those resources are available at OCC's website. But I recognize having made a lot of it myself, like this is not understandable, you know. Part of the problem we face is that the system is so complex. It's just difficult to understand. But I think that doesn't mean we don't keep trying. So, yeah, it's of utmost importance, I think, to all of us to continue to try to find better ways to increase public engagement and understanding of these important issues.

[Sen. Eric C. Berthel (Senate Ranking Member)]: Yeah. That that's great. Perhaps the perhaps the solution to this, and thank you for the for your answer, was to to get a group of sixth, seventh, and eighth graders together and explain to them what PURA is and have them build it for you. And you're marketing the the piece, and and you might have a really incredible work product that that now would be would be understandable to, I'm sure, vastly to the public at large. So mister chairman, thank you again for stepping up, and I look forward to seeing the work that you and the board do. And mister chairman, representative Concepcion, I'm I'm through with my questioning. Thank you so much.

[Speaker 0]: Thank you, senator. Senator Harding followed by representative Gresco.

[Sen. Stephen Harding]: Thank you, mister chair, and I'll be brief. Because I know the day is getting, long quick. So, chairman, congratulations. Thank you for coming and testifying and, for stepping up into this role. My question is is more, you know, 35,000 foot, focused, and it's probably something that I, I believe you've been already kind of been asked in different ways. And I know that all the other commissioners today have been asked, but I think it's imperative that, you know, I speak with you, because you're gonna become the new leader of this organization, presumably, And, you know, people look to PURA, as, an organization, that is, you know, setting rates and and obviously, you know, rates in this state have become unaffordable, the third highest in the in the country. I believe everyone here, I hope, I know believes that's unacceptable. And so, look, I know that you are a regulator. You're not policy based. We are policy based. We can create we as a legislative body can create policies that hopefully could make, electric rates in the state more affordable. But obviously, PURA has some role to play, in that. So could you speak to that, from a very basic general perspective, how, you know, you, as the leader of PURA, you know, could help, to garner more affordability surrounding the rates, that that that our consumers face here in the state?

[Thomas (Tom) Weil (PURA Commissioner & Chair Nominee)]: Sure. Absolutely. I I think to reiterate what commissioner Cheeseman spoke about, the the most kinda obvious area of under our purview is what's sort of labeled on the bill as local delivery. That's where the kind of evaluation of the business expenses of the distribution businesses of the utilities themselves live. That's our bread and butter, right? Like, so our our job always is to make those costs as affordable as possible within the statutory framework. But there are there are things we can do that at least impact the costs of the other parts of the bill as well. There are there are costs in the public benefits charge that ultimately like, that include prices that were ultimately determined by PURA or tariff designs that that PURA took the initiative on and and and designed and put into place. Ultimately, PURA is responsible. You know, we're the ones who decide what the price is and put the put the price tag on the product. Like, we're, so even if we can't control the drivers of the cost themselves, we we do have the information, and we are kind of the close where the where where where where the rubber meets the road with respect to the prices themselves. So, I think one of the things that comes to mind as a result of this conversation is I think the focus I think if we wanna figure out how to get bills lower, we should be focused on cost drivers. Just sort of as a state, I think all of us, the conversation should be about what's driving these costs and then ultimately policy decisions of whether we wanna pay the costs or not and whether the, you know, whether basically just a cost benefit analysis or a cost effective analysis, depending on what you're looking at. And we although we don't control really any cost driver, small ones, we do we do impose an actual cost for the running of the agency, for example. But we understand the cost drivers. We can identify them. And I think if we were you know, I'm happy to be proactively engaged in the conversation of, you know, if a legislator or anyone else sort of asked what could we do to accomplish this goal? I think I think we could certainly give direction on that, and we and we can also sort of proactively keep policymakers informed of sort of what's going on on the ground level.

[Sen. Stephen Harding]: And thank you, Mr. Chair, and and and, I appreciate your answer. And and I certainly welcome your engagement in that. I think, we should be working collaboratively together, both PURA and legislators, all those involved to to address this issue and tackle it because, you know, I I find it to be unacceptable. I I can't tell you how many phone calls, that are heartbreaking that I get from constituents, particularly those on fixed incomes, talking about their electric bills and how unaffordable it's become in our state. So I think it's incumbent upon all of us, you know, serving in our roles here in the state of Connecticut to work collaboratively to to try to find ways to address this issue and tackle it, once and for all. So I appreciate that answer. You did mention, Mr. Chair, and thank you, Mr. Chair, through you, you did mention chairman the public benefit charge. And obviously that's something that that I have found to be increasingly, frustrating. My constituents understandably so have found it to be increasingly frustrating, seeing that public benefit, charging a skyrocket, particularly over the past few years, and a significant driver to the cost of their electric bills. Understood that understanding that, obviously, PURA doesn't have an ability to remove a public benefit charge that would be incumbent upon a legislature, and I think we should, or work towards towards that goal and moving on to the state budget at some point. But with that said, chairman, do you in your new role in leading this, body, are there certain ways that that you can relieve that public benefit charge or maybe at least not add additional costs to that public benefit charge? What are your thoughts on that?

[Thomas (Tom) Weil (PURA Commissioner & Chair Nominee)]: Yes. I I think so. And I was kind of alluding to this before. I think, although the cost drivers for, primarily of the public benefits charge aren't aren't decisions that PURA have made, PURA does make decisions between those decisions and what ultimately impacts on the bill. And we, so for instance, it's kind of what I was discussing before with respect to scrutiny. For instance, an applicant of, that isn't a utility, for instance, might come before us to ask for, for some some sort of, funding through the public benefits charge through a particular program. I'm not trying to be obtuse. There's just, as I think most people know, there are so many programs in the public benefits charge. I'm not sure what to use as an example. But we there are opportunities where we evaluate there are issues before us where we evaluate whether to allow for ultimate rate recovery of particular costs. And some of those decisions are driven by statute, but not all of them are. And there are the legislature has kind of put issues before us in some circumstances where we do get to decide whether, whether to authorize certain costs or not. And I can say that the current panel of commissioners has been engaged in those discussions already. There are I can't speak to them specifically, obviously, but we have certainly been looking at particular issues that do drive costs and having robust conversations about our responsibility to the custom to those citizens of Connecticut to ensure that no one is paying for something that is unfair or doesn't, doesn't benefit them ultimately, again, within the within the scope of review that the legislature has afforded us in any particular program.

[Dean (Committee Clerk)]: So, well,

[Sen. Stephen Harding]: the chairman, thank you for that answer, and I I do hope and appreciate and, that that we can work, collaboratively and and also to to see, your body, you know, work to, in some cases, maybe reject some of these increased disposable benefit charges if if possible because it's unacceptable. It keeps on growing. It's unacceptable. It's there in many regards, but the fact that it continues to to grow is even more alarming. And we, I appreciate that answer. Mr. Chair, through you one last question, and I appreciate your indulgence already. I supported and appreciated the purest decision re related to the, the RWA, query and merger, and I I understand that you're limited in in speaking to any specifics on that, because of, I think, potential, requests moving forward. And I understood, you know, the litigation that that that occurred subsequent to that, after it came out of, PURA, after your decision. You know, with that said, just, can you speak in general, to how you as as the chair, and your body, look to review, some of these, mergers, and and particularly how how you review, the consumer aspects to that and what that could do to their rates, whether it be in in any utility that PURA regulates. Doesn't have to be electric or water or any utility. Could you speak to that? Just how you, review these mergers particularly, How do you foresee or forecast some of the rate increases that would be involved with it?

[Thomas (Tom) Weil (PURA Commissioner & Chair Nominee)]: Sure. So I I I cannot speak to the to to that particular case. And that is just for the record before us that that case was remanded to the superior court by the superior court back to PURA, and it's still pending proceeding. I'm also recused from it, so I kind of double can't speak to it. But I can speak to the the scope of review that's available to us now for mergers or what we think of as change of control applications, there is a there are kinda clear, well, there there are two kinda primary statutory guidelines in those circumstances. One, there is a statute that's kind of directly on point, that that tells us what we look for in a in a merger application, and that tells us that we need to evaluate whether the entity that will ultimately control the public service company has sufficient managerial, technical, and financial expertise. So the question essentially is, is this company one that can operate a utility? Notably, that statute does not include an evaluation of the potential rate impact associated with either the transaction or the the sort of planned rates in the future that the that the entity, expects to impose on customers. Again, even even the financial question according to the statute is the question is whether the company possesses financial expertise, which at least in my mind as an attorney is a distinct question. There is also General Statute sixteen twenty two, which is the general kind of burden statute that applies to PURA in particular, which I'm not looking at it off the top of my head, but it essentially says that in the context of either a change of control application or a rate case, a rate application, the applicant has the burden to demonstrate that the, that what they're asking for is ultimately in the public interest. So that, we do have, we've got those kind of two avenues. We have to answer the question that the legislature has tasked us with about financial, technical, and managerial expertise. And then ultimately, the question of whether the, not the question of whether the applicant has met its burden to demonstrate that the transaction is in the public interest. Whether and the degree to which, like, future potential rates to be charged by an applicant are are within those, particular sort of relatively narrow fields of vision, I think depends a lot on the specifics of the application. So I'm just just to answer your question as clearly as possible, I'm not I don't believe we do have statutory authority specifically. We don't there isn't a statute in place that says, hey. You should be evaluating the, the rate making proposal in the context of a merger.

[Sen. Stephen Harding]: Understood. And and, you know, I I I don't know if there's ways we can revisit that as a legislature, but but particularly with what is pending before us, it might be, prudent to do that. But, chairman, thank you, for your testimony today, and mister chair, thank you for the opportunity to, ask some questions.

[Speaker 0]: Thank you, senator. Representative Gresco followed by senator Martin. Do you want us to move on, representative? Got it. Senator Martin.

[Sen. Henri Martin]: Thank you, mister chair. Congratulations on your nomination. So I earlier today, I spoke with commissioner, Cheeseman, and I asked her about affordability. And I think that's under everybody's top of mind, not on top of everyone's mind. Here in this here here today, and I know those in my in my district, it is the top discussion starter, so to speak, about the utility bills. Sorry for my voice here. Long term, it seems like we're shackled or for us to increase supply in order to drive down costs for elect for electricity, it's gonna take us a long time, ten plus years. And then if you add on top of that, the renewable mandates that we have on our utility that we need to purchase 48% from class one, class two, class three. And and that will increase the cost of electricity to consumers. I understand and, commissioner Cheeseman clarified that, you know, you guys are only responsible for a part of the utility, the utility, rates or and bills, and and understanding that some of the components of all that, you know, have to do the fed with the feds. Also, with us, legislatively, we've enacted some of this. And you guys really we've placed these fees onto you, and you really have no no, I guess, you know, you're you're doing what we ask you to do. So the benefit portion of the invoice, the the public benefit is a 20% to on average for most of the households in the in the state. 47 different programs. I don't know how many that you were the pure of responsible for directly. But it seems to me that we are not going to be able to lower electrical rates. If you look at the demands that are in front of us, you can you can see that we really need to find a supply because of the we're not gonna be able to keep up with demand. And that that's not only here in Connecticut, but throughout the country. So if we want to help the consumer, the the the customers of of the of Eversource, United, Luminate, It seems to me that the only thing that we actually can do anything immediately are the public fees and moving them over. And if they are that important for them to be placed into the general fund and compete against all the other demanding services that we have in front of us that we we collectively have to decide, you know, who are we going to allot of funding for. Could you speak to that a little bit? You know, I wanna go back to my my district and say yes or no. Right now I'm leaning and I've last week, I was as candid as I could be with my constituent constituents. Do not expect us to do any meaningful impact on utility cost. It's literally impossible unless and I can then I turn to the public benefit charge. Can you speak to that?

[Thomas (Tom) Weil (PURA Commissioner & Chair Nominee)]: Sure. I think I think it's possible to I mean, it's it's certainly possible to take those costs, remove them from the electric bills, and and create some other mechanism, like like funding through the general fund. I I I threw out there, I think, maybe sounds strange, but you could do that with, I think, any cost on the electric bill. You could do that with distribution or transmission as well. I think like an electric bill is just sort of the mechanism that we've all sort of collectively decided, I guess, as a nation, that this is like sort of where we pay these costs. But, you know, ultimately, like, the framework here is with respect to, say, distribution, which is, like, the an electric that ever sources actual business cost to which they have a statutory right, a statutory and constitutional right to recovery. I think if, the method for recovery, exactly how they get that revenue isn't set in stone. So just throwing out there, I think conceptually, you could maybe, I think the legislature could choose to move any costs, off of electric bills and through some other funding mechanism. I would just highlight not to be, too too weedy about it. The public benefits charge, as you've noted, is has so many different cost drivers in it. In my opinion, is, conceptually, I agree it's it's possible, and it certainly would probably be the fastest way to immediately lower rate pressures. There are because of the kind of complexity and variety of things that are in there, the ease with which it one could find other funding mechanisms is kind of variable. So one thing that jumps out at me is a is a substantial driver of the public benefits charge is what we think of as hardship on collectible debt. So and that's, I think everybody, there's a lot of discussion about that in 2024. But, it's the notion of when some, when someone doesn't pay their utility bill, that doesn't reduce the utility company's ultimate authorized revenue requirement, they still need to get their money to which they're legally entitled anyway. So we have to sort of redistribute that cost among the people who who are going to pay it. That I mean, I'll start out by saying, like, that's not a new cost or a new concept. I think that that concept has been around for maybe a century because it's basically just this economics problem of, again, using a hypothetical $100,000,000 revenue requirement. The utility has gotta get their $100,000,000. And if and if it'll and if only $50,000,000 of it is paid and the other half is unpaid, will they still need the other $50,000,000 So that that has to come from somewhere. So I'm just pointing out, I think there might be you might there might be problems, legal problems with shifting, for instance, that portion into the general fund and and entering a system where perhaps, like, the legislature decides there just isn't budget for this right now. It would be equivalent to PURA just saying, yeah, you have legal entitlements to this, but rates are too high, so we're denying it. It. I think I think you'd run into the same sort of legal issue. And I think there are sort of different shades of that potentially as to different costs within the public benefits charge. So again, I don't I'm just sort of adding that just sort of cautioning that this is complex stuff, but I agree kind of conceptually that would be a fast way to to separate this stuff out. And and and there certainly are elements in there that that could be that are ultimately up to the the legislature could decide to just end some of these programs and potentially eliminate all going forward costs associated with those programs as well.

[Sen. Henri Martin]: All right. Thank thank you for the answer. And to to all the commissioners, I just wanna encourage you all all each each of you that when you're making these decisions, just keep in mind, you know, the, obviously the ones that we've been talking about here today are the primary residential users, but there's also the business component of all this. And we, as a body again have been working since I've been here and this is my twelfth year now. And it is, the economic growth in the state has has been stalled. It's been stalled for a long time. Many reasons why, one of which is the energy factor. So

[Thomas (Tom) Weil (PURA Commissioner & Chair Nominee)]: I do understand that. I actually worked at a company prior to going to OCC where we built and operated convenience stores. And those people don't think about this often, but think about the number of refrigerators in a convenience store. Those are running twenty four hours a day. Like that's our electric bills made my eyes pop, when I first saw them when I started working at that place, and that was, you know, now ten ten years ago.

[Sen. Henri Martin]: Maybe they should consider solar panels on top of there. Yes. Alright. Thank you, mister chair. Thank you.

[Speaker 0]: Thank you, representative Cresco.

[Rep. Joe Gresko]: Thank you, mister chair. Glitch alleviated. Mister Weil, congratulations, on being, nominated as a as a chairman. And, coming from OCC, look. I don't wanna get in trouble with the boss, but, one of the things that makes Connecticut unique is having PURA under the jurisdiction of the Department of Energy and Environmental Protection. There have been efforts in the past through legislation to separate the two. How do you navigate that going forward?

[Thomas (Tom) Weil (PURA Commissioner & Chair Nominee)]: Well, there was a bill passed last session that effective October 2025. We are no longer a PURA is no longer a a portion of the Department of Energy and Environmental Protection Bureau.

[Rep. Joe Gresko]: You passed the test.

[Thomas (Tom) Weil (PURA Commissioner & Chair Nominee)]: So we are we are a a portion we have a relationship with Deep that's APO'd as we call it for administrative purposes only. So Deep has no input whatsoever into the substantive work of of PURA. And I will add, although I wasn't at PURA prior to this, it was my understanding that that was also true prior to the passage of this bill, that DEEP was not interfering with the with the decisions the PURA was issuing or the issues before it. Because DEEP actually is also a party. The the Bureau of Energy and Technology policy within DEEP is commonly a party at PURA proceedings. So there was a you know, and I know how seriously DEEP takes ex parte communication considerations. But anyway, regardless, we are now, part of DEEP for administrative purposes only. I'm sure the legislature understands having created the the standard, but all that essentially means is we don't have our own business office, IT, HR, payroll. We we utilize Deep's offices to for those services and be for lack of having our own services in place. And, actually, the OCC is also an agency that's under Deep for administrative purposes only.

[Rep. Joe Gresko]: Right. Thank you for delineating that. That's all I had, mister chair. Thank

[Speaker 0]: you. Thank you. Senator Humphreyra.

[Sen. John W. Fonfara]: Thank you, mister chairman. Chairman Weil, congratulations. Wish you all the best. I have to say it's refreshing to hear you say that you consider yourself one of five and really refreshing. You said earlier that in terms of evaluating the work and what could going forward at PURA saying, what what can we do? I hope you extend that one step further in asking or saying to us what we can do in your role, which I think is critically important. I think, frankly, there is no other agency in Connecticut. It isn't deep. It is not OCC. There is no other agency that has a charge, the potential, the capacity, to be able to address the issues you've heard heard here today. I have great respect for my colleague, senator Martin, but I disagree with him wholeheartedly about what we can do to lower electricity rates in Connecticut. I actually believe we could be as competitive with the country, which is half the rates that we charge. We're about 32¢ a kilowatt hours. The average across the country is 16. And I think we could get close to that. It'll take a lot of work. But you said something about the decisions that we could make to move things off the bill. Here's the reality about electric rates. They are the most regressive tax on the public, on the payer that you could find. And we spent a lot of time debating regressive taxes in a committee that I chair, but in the legislature in general. And when we add something to the electric bill, we're saying to those least able to pay the bill, you're gonna pay more of your income than anyone else. And that's wrong. It doesn't mean we shouldn't have low rates strive for low rates for everyone, but we ought to recognize when we add something to the electric bill. And and I'll say, when I chaired the committee, mister chairman, what we had was a scenario where the where the usage was rising, and you could absorb these extra costs. And it was a millicent, if you will, in terms of the impact. That's not the case anymore. The usage is dropping. Costs continue to rise in a heavily intensive industry like utilities. And so we're moving in the wrong direction. And, so I I really appreciate the comments that you've made here today. If I could ask you to focus on anything and that may be unfair, but I have a shot here today. I'm gonna I I know we can speak otherwise, but, it's difficult. That building is a fortress. It really is. And I I beg you to fix your website. The document system is the worst in the world.

[Rep. Dave Yaccarino (House Ranking Member)]: I can

[Thomas (Tom) Weil (PURA Commissioner & Chair Nominee)]: I I'm sorry to address, but we everyone sitting here today who works at PRF wholeheartedly agrees that is a a a a dire need, that we discuss frequently? I will say I don't wanna have too much hubris. It's my understanding that this has been tried and attempted by, I think I think, the last four chairs before me to to update this docket system. So confidence. Thank you.

[Sen. John W. Fonfara]: With respect to ex parte rules, you mentioned that earlier. Can you relax those and still protect the process that you are involved in judicially?

[Thomas (Tom) Weil (PURA Commissioner & Chair Nominee)]: It depends on the yes. I think we I mean, it is not an option for contested cases. The UAPA makes quite clear. So but, yes. And we have and and this was happening before I joined PURA. There were certain dockets where that concept was being explored, and I think it's worked out well. We sort of an example is sort of dockets where the purpose is sort of a working group or a working group that ultimately especially culminates in, like, a report to the legislature. In my view, there's no reason to have ex parte communication restrictions there. And it really just gets in the way and is inefficient. And we've the commissioners have been discussing I think we're a little reticent to sort of decide that any uncontested docket, for instance, we're just lifting ex parte prohibitions because it kinda depends. Like, there's a lot of things. There there are some dockets where it might make sense that we don't we don't wanna kind of open ourselves up. But yes, I agree. Like I and I find it frustrating sitting having gone from coming from the OCC where certainly we had ex parte prohibitions with PURA staff. Like, we couldn't talk to PURA or commissioners, but I used to talk to utility companies, various kinds of advocates, legislators all the time. And it was helpful. And it's frustrating to not have that

[Dr. Jan (Janice) Beecher (PURA Commissioner Nominee)]: available in a lot in

[Thomas (Tom) Weil (PURA Commissioner & Chair Nominee)]: a lot of circumstances now. So it's certainly something worth considering.

[Sen. John W. Fonfara]: I think that's great. I hope you can. With respect to if I can read my own handwriting here. Oh, you mentioned earlier about uncontested dockets, and I found that encouraging that you would use that as a way to pursue on on your own initiative ways in which to lower electricity rates and any other area that comes under your purview. And I I hope all commissioners pursue that. Lastly, Commissioner, solar and storage are critical. This state has embraced the environmental agenda very strongly. This building has. The governor has. But solar, as I mentioned a few hours ago, is eating into kilowatt hours dramatically. We had a couple of businesses, solar companies in, that came before the finance committee last year. We had a bill on on these issues last session, and one had 300 employees, the other had 200 employees. And I said, that's a lot of solar. And I think that's great for Connecticut, but it has to and people need to understand that the way rates are designed, it's cost divided by revenue. And when revenue is falling and costs are either stagnant or or rising, that means every kilowatt hour costs more. And there at minimum, we need to and California is investing heavily in storage and they're seeing the duck curve flattening. How much? I don't know exactly, but it's having an effect. And so that it's a broader point I'd like to make for you your consideration that the balance between the environmental commitments and and and energy cost has to be hopefully on your agenda. And it I believe we can do both. And I hope that the commission feels that way as well, that that we can maintain our commitment. Actually, we've fallen behind what Deep has set out for 2030 in terms of carbon reduction. I believe we could achieve that and lower cost if we use these investments more wisely. You can comment if you care to, but Sure.

[Thomas (Tom) Weil (PURA Commissioner & Chair Nominee)]: I mean, I think I'll start with an earlier comment. I I think you're completely correct. I think that, you know, rate making is kind of like a delicate ecosystem or at least like what leads to rate making in that, like, there you've mentioned the concepts that I refer to as revenue dilution, which is the idea of the increased sales, all else equal results in lower volumetric rates. That's correct. One one thing to take into consideration though, is that if if increased sales impose increased costs, that has an offsetting effect to the revenue dilution. So that's something that Piro needs to consider as well. With respect to solar and and environmental goals generally, yeah, I think it's crucial that our agency consider as carefully as possible that the balance that you're discussing. And I think that that has that always is, I think, the the general sort of policy notion. There are, there are ideas with which I don't agree. I mean, sorry, which with which I don't disagree, that there are benefits. There are actual tangible economic benefits associated with clean energy investments, and and and and some of those benefits are sort of external to the to even energy costs. And I think those can and should be recognized. And and ultimately, we should we should do the very hard thing that I don't know that any state has been able to do yet, but our goal should be to kinda do the math. Right? Like if we're like if we're if we're recognizing that this that this sort of program is ultimately gonna derive benefits, even sort of broad social benefits, environmental benefits, if we can find a way to figure out how much we wanna pay for those benefits, I think that is sort of in our lap to try to to work on that problem. So I don't wanna make a promise that we can figure out what I don't know that anyone else has yet, which is sort of how you ultimately convert everything to dollars and cents in in in recognizing those benefits. But that problem is is is our job. Our that prop working on that problem is certainly in our lap. So I I absolutely recognize that, and I think our my fellow commissioners do as well.

[Sen. John W. Fonfara]: Thank you. And I'm wishing you and the rest of your fellow commissioners all the best as you go forward. We're we're counting on you. Thank you, mister chairman.

[Speaker 0]: Thank you, senator. Any other questions or comments from committee members? Just wanna check online really quickly. Seeing none, mister chairman, we do have one question that we ask of every nominee. Is there anything in your past that you believe might be embarrassing to this committee, to the governor, to the state of Connecticut? No. Well, thank you so much for spending all day with us. Thank you. Alright. We do have a few members of the of the the public that would like to testify. We'll start with Anthony Welilo.

[Anthony Vallillo (UI retiree; former President/COO)]: Greetings, senator Duff, representative Concepcion, and members of the committee. My name is Anthony Bello. I reside in Woodbridge, Connecticut. I am a retiree of United Illuminating Company of New Haven, having retired after forty five years in 2012 as president and chief operating officer of UI. I'm here representing approximately 500 nonunion retirees of the UI company and their eligible dependents. As you know, UI was acquired by Iberdrola, a Spanish company, in 2015 and placed in a subsidiary called Evangrid. We, nonunion retirees, and our eligible dependents were granted postretirement pension and medical benefits earned during our years as employees. These included full or partial reimbursement of annual medical part b premiums and an annual funding of $1,800 for the retiree and $1,800 for the retirees eligible dependent funded in an HRA. On 06/30/2025, the nonunion retirees were notified by letter that Avangrid, effective 01/01/2026, was to terminate medical Medicare Part b reimbursement and reduce HRA funding. Ibadrola's acquisition of UIL required approval by UIL short shareholders and by PURA. Shareholders were provided a proxy statement dated 11/12/2015, which specifically states on page 42 that, quote, Iberdrola USA will cause the survive surviving corporation of Iberdrola to honor all employee benefit obligations to current and former employees under the UIL employee benefit plans. Shareholders voted in favor of the merger, which contained the above statement. In July 2015, PERA opened Ibadrola UIL Holdings merger docket fifteen o seven thirty eight. Ibadrola stated in its in its answers to both interrogatories f one thirty four and f one thirty five, quote, there will be no transfer of PBOP expenses and employee benefits will not be adversely affected as a result of the proposed transaction. Quoting from page 19 of PERS final decision approving the merger, the authority received this is a quote. The court the authority received correspondence concerning changes in retiree benefits as a result of the merger. On post retirement benefits, the applicants, Iberdrola, stated that there would be no transfer of PBOP assets and employee benefits would not be adversely affected as a result of the proposed transaction. Therefore, based on the evidence presented, the authority expects no changes in the BPOP and pension benefits. Couldn't be more clearly stated. On 08/09/2025, in conjunction with PERA docket twenty four ten o four application of UI to amend its rates, I sent a letter to PERA requesting PERA promptly order Avangrid to abide by the commitments made by Ibadrola to not change retiree benefits. PERA did not act on on my request. In summary, we nonunion retirees request this committee to strongly urge the new PERA commissioners to promptly order Avangrid to abide by the commitments made by its parent, Ibadrola, and its proxy statement to your shareholders and in the merger docket approved by PERA to not change new union nonunion retiree benefits. Thank you for this opportunity, and I would gladly answer any questions.

[Speaker 0]: Thank you very much, mister Villalue. Any questions from committee? Sure. Senator Looney.

[Sen. Martin M. Looney]: Yes. Thanks. Thank you for coming, mister Belolo. Just, one thing. I know that, Avangrid or UI has circulated a a letter indicating that the agreement back in 2015 was only for one year. I don't know if you had a response to, to that.

[Anthony Vallillo (UI retiree; former President/COO)]: Yeah. That was a misrepresentation. The one year applied to only, quote, continuing employees. It did not apply to retirees. And that's and I had sent that letter back to their general counsel when I saw his response, and I and I said that his his stating that was disingenuous and a misrepresentation of the facts. So it does not apply to to to retirees.

[Sen. Martin M. Looney]: Thank you.

[Speaker 0]: Thank you. Alright. Thank you very much. Appreciate it. Next one up is James Crow.

[James Crowe (UI retiree)]: Co chairs Duff and Concepcion, thank you for letting us appear here today, and congratulations to the PURA nominees. My name is James Crowe and I am a resident of Wallingford, Connecticut and a retiree of UI for over twenty six years. I will not repeat what Mr. Verillo has presented, but I would like to make a few additional points. When we decided to speak here today, our first instinct was to request this committee to direct the prospective pure commissioners to order Avan grid to restore our medical benefits. But I realize that this is not an appropriate role for this body. I understand that your job is to assure that the legislature to assure the legislature that the nominated candidates are qualified, able to serve in a fair and unbiased manner, and are willing and able to do the work at PURA. It's on this last point that we are requesting help. As mister Velillo stated, we had previously filed a petition with PURA for relief from Avangrid's actions. For whatever reason, PURA did not act on our petition. After a new panel, PURA panel is confirmed, we plan to refile our petition with some additional information. I believe we have provided this commission with enough information for you to realize we have a legitimate issue that deserves the attention of pure in the supplemental information that we provided. You will see the references that Mr. Pure that Mr. Filillo. Talked about and the language of those commitments is clear and they're not, they are not at all qualified by one year limitations. I believe, we are simply asking this committee to get a firm commitment from the nominees that they will receive our position, our petition, review the record, ask for additional information if necessary, and respond to our refiled petition. I believe this is part of the job they are taking on and we are just asking them to do it. I want to speak about an important policy associated with Avangrid's actions. Avangrid callously disregarded the commitments made to shareholders, to PURA and interrogatory responses, which I recall carry the weight of testimony sworn under oath and to a statement made by the previous PURA commission in their approval of the merger, which is one of the conditions placed on Iberdola as part of the approval of the approval of the merger. For PURA to have a smooth and effective regulatory oversight, I believe it is important to have respect and trust among the various parties involved in the process. I do not see how one can have trust in AvanGrid if they regularly abandon their commitments and ignore direction from the authority. When I was working at UI, I made dozens of trips to New Britain to testify regarding many issues. UI respected PURA's predecessor, the DPUC. And when they told us to do something or to stop doing something, we complied with the letter and spirit of their direction, even at times when we disagreed with them. I do not know if Iberdola gets away with a blatant disregard for authority in the other jurisdictions or overseas where they operate. But it is important for PURA to send a strong message to AvanGrid by ordering their regulated companies to abide by their commitments, restore our medical benefits, and consider finding them a sum large enough for them to pay attention. PURE should let know that it is not how it works in Connecticut. And I would tell them that they have a long way to go to regain purest trust. Thank you. Could I have just one more minute? I heard a lot of this discussion is very interesting. It brought me back many years. And this business about, what can we do to make electric rates more affordable? I think there's two parts to that. Number one are the prices that electric rates, that we charge. But the other part of it is the public's ability to pay those prices. With regard to the first part, when I was working, I spent many hours up here in in, Hartford, in this building, trying to work a cooperatively with the State Economic Development Commission. I worked with Senator, then senator Tony Avellone to establish the Connecticut Manufacturing Association. And the whole mission of that was to retain manufacturing and create good paying jobs in Connecticut. And I think in addition to focusing on the rates, we have to also provide an economic climate where people can afford to pay those rates. Because realistically, as it was said earlier today, you know, inflation is affecting all of our companies, whether it's the electric companies or when we go to the grocery store or Home Depot, where a quart of polyurethane was $8 a few years ago, and now it's 25. I think we've got to communicate effectively with the public, and we can't mislead them into thinking when we control inflation, prices are going to go down. When we control inflation, it just means they're not going to go up as fast. So we got to be careful about how we communicate with the public. And one other thing I did note is, when listening to the news in Albany a couple of weeks ago, the New York legislature is considering suspending some of the state taxes on utility bills. They're facing the same problems as we are here in Connecticut. If you look at the components to go into the electric rates, Senator Martin earlier, well, was talking about the system benefits charge. Well, I think the taxes that are in electric bills, the taxes on fuels, when they come into the state, the grocery seats tax, the local property tax layered on top of that are the sales taxes. So you have taxes layered on top of taxes layer on top of taxes are a very significant component of our electric bill. Sometimes doing the hard thing is the right thing. I know it takes a lot of courage to tackle some of those problems, but you might wanna put that on your on your list of things to look at. New York is looking at it. I don't know whether who proposed it is still alive or not, but, that's something that they're talking about over in New York.

[Speaker 0]: Well, I appreciate that very much. Thank you so much for your testimony.

[James Crowe (UI retiree)]: One last thing, senator Looney. I met with you on many issues years ago, thirty years ago, and frankly don't remember what the issues were. But what I do remember is your willingness to listen, your thoughtfulness, and your fair mindedness. And I wanna thank you for helping us get to our be an appear make an appearance here today. Thank you very much.

[Speaker 0]: Thank you, mister Croft. And last member of the public on the agenda, joining us online is Theresa Kovaleski.

[Teresa (Teresa) Kovaleski (UI retiree)]: Good afternoon, ex executives and legislative nominations committee members, and congratulations to the newly appointed PRO commissioners. My name is Teresa Kovaleski, a retiree of United Illuminating who served the company for over thirty five years with thirty three in human resources. At a high level, I was responsible but not limited to the administration of UI's health and welfare plans, specifically pensions, four zero one k, FSAs, HRAs, employee and retirement reimbursements, budgeting, forecasting, and ensuring the benefits promised to employees and retirees were properly funded and administered. In addition, I collaborated with executives and counsel to design health and welfare, pension and savings programs, and communications, which I later presented to all levels of employees and retirees. During the thirty three plus years when counseling employees and retirees preparing for retirement, I provided documents that were approved by company executives and counsel that presented their benefits upon retirement which varied based upon their year of retirement and age and service. Retirees were granted post retirement pensions, medical, and prescription coverage, some on a subsidized basis, life insurance and dental. When either an employee or their eligible dependents attained Medicare eligibility, they were provided reimbursement ranging from 20 to a 100% of their Medicare part b premium. It should be noted that the Medicare part b reimbursement is not available for those employees who were hired after May 1992. Thus, the reimbursement is limited to a group of retirees that are aging and the benefit is payable to a spouse until the retiree expires. Then it ceases. Thus, this is not a forever benefit or an expense to UI as it is a life expectancy benefit that is limited. In June 2025, nonunion retirees of United Illuminating and several gas companies were notified by Avon Grid that effective 01/01/2026, their Medicare Part b reimbursement would cease and significant changes would be made to the HRA funding structure. Retirees have been severely harmed by these changes. Benefits that were promised to them upon retirement that were budgeted to meet their expenses are no longer available effective January 2026. Retirees have contacted me and sent me copies of various communications that they have received upon their retirement and later years stating that they were eligible for Medicare part b reimbursement. And although extremely unhappy with the former HRA structure of $1,800 for an individual annual funding, which provided reimbursement far less than their incurred annual expenses for medical, prescription, dental, vision premiums, and co pays, they have now been transitioned into a different HRA structure in 2026, which is devastating to most. For example, retirees have stated that they have seen their monthly pensions reduced by $405.80 per month. That's for a Medicare part b reimbursement for a retiree and his or her spouse at a 100%. Realized increases in their medical and prescription benefits, loss of HRA funding of $800 if you multiply that by two that's $1,600 annually. Understanding a variable subsidy was added. However, it should be noted that the twenty twenty six variable HRA expense are different than the fund former HRA which may cause a loss of funds. In addition, retirees must not submit their variable HRA expenses until year end for consideration of payment in April of the following year. Many retirees are concerned that they will not live to receive these benefits. In addition, retirees who were shareholders have lost lost their dividend payments and have stated that the proxy and documents they received stated that the benefits would not be adversely affected. What a shock when the benefits were changed and the monetary losses to these retirees were realized. Retirees have not received a pension cola for almost thirty years which does not assist in offsetting their ever growing expenses and reductions in reimbursements. I received calls, correspondence, and visits from retirees who are devastated by these reductions and increases in premiums. Thus they requestify, I testify on their behalf. I shall share two quick examples that present how the impact of these changes have harmed UI employees. A few weeks ago I was exiting my car at my home and an older car pulled up with a couple in the car looking at a paper map and they rolled down the window and asked if they, have reached such an address. I stated yes, and I identified myself as the resident of the home. The couple asked me for a few minutes of their time and provided me with bank statements and showed that their pension was reduced by almost $400 a month. I explained to them that since the gentleman was a UI nonunion retiree, they would no longer receive this Medicare Part b reimbursement of $202.90 each. They did not recall receiving the notification in June 2025, advising them of the Medicare reimbursement ceasing. In addition, they showed me their medical and prescription insurance that had increased, which would further affect their monthly budget, and they could not make ends meet. I asked them if they had anyone to assist them in reviewing their budget and cost for 2027 as it is too late for 2026 changes, and they laughed stating, quote, who knows if we'll live that long? We were born in 1928 and 1932, age 98 and 94 respectively. They explained their son served our country, however, did not survive, so they cannot seek his advice as they visit him at the cemetery. Their sisters and brothers are only with them in spirit, and the only surviving niece is living in a group home as once her parents departed, there was no family to take care of her. They advised me that they do not have a machine in their car to provide directions, I e the navigation system that we are used to. They don't have a cell phone nor a computer. Thus, the option of transmitting and reviewing the online communications is not a possibility. Please note, their annual income, the loss is approximately $7,000 annually. I provided them social secure social service worker contacts, a list of food banks, and gave them $400 and a bag of groceries which I had planted to donate to the church bank. They were very grateful, but they said that will not solve our problem. In addition, a social worker from the Department of Social Services contacted me while working with a retired UI couple, reviewing their income to determine what benefits they may be eligible for in 2026 as it seemed that they were short about $415 a month due to a pension reduction, I e Medicare reimbursement. I advised her that the changes Avangrid made and her calculation was accurate. The social worker was shocked and speechless. Take a moment to think whether your family, parents, grandparents would be able to absorb a $405.80 monthly income loss or possibly a $1,600 annual HRA loss. Thank you for your time and considerations regarding these changes and hopefully assist the UI and gas company retirees to be made whole. Respectfully submitted. Thank you.

[Speaker 0]: Thank you so much for your your testimony. Alright. Seeing no other items on the public hearings agenda, I will adjourn the public hearings portion of the executive legislative nominations committee. We will adjourn, and we will immediately go into so I will call the executive and legislative nominations committee meeting for Thursday, 03/05/2026 to order. We have four items. Good? Alright. Well, first item is a house joint resolution. It's the nomination of Holly Cheeseman of Niantic to be utility commissioner of the public utilities regular authority. Is there a motion?

[Anthony Vallillo (UI retiree; former President/COO)]: Yeah. Yeah.

[Speaker 0]: Motion made by, representative Godfrey. Is there a second? Second by Martin Yaccarino. Any discussion? Seeing none, mister Clerk, please call the roll.

[Dean (Committee Clerk)]: Duff. Yes. Concepcion. Yes. Looney.

[Sen. Stephen Harding]: Yes. Godfrey. Yes. Purcell.

[Sen. Eric C. Berthel (Senate Ranking Member)]: Yes.

[Dean (Committee Clerk)]: Gacarino? Yes. Pizzino?

[Rep. Dave Yaccarino (House Ranking Member)]: Representative Pizzino votes yes.

[Sen. Stephen Harding]: Bonfero? Yes. Gresco?

[Rep. Joe Gresko]: Yes.

[Rep. Bob Godfrey (Vice Chair)]: Haines?

[Sen. Stephen Harding]: Harding. Yes.

[Speaker 0]: Hartley.

[Committee Staff (Assistant Clerk)]: Kushner.

[Sen. Julie Kushner]: Yes.

[Dean (Committee Clerk)]: Abraham. Martin? Neutrino? Quinn? Yes. Partigliano?

[Thomas (Tom) Weil (PURA Commissioner & Chair Nominee)]: Yes.

[Dean (Committee Clerk)]: Sanchez? Representative Sanchez votes yes. Scott. Whitfield.

[Everett Smith III (PURA Commissioner Nominee)]: Senator Whitfield. Any affirmative?

[Speaker 0]: Thank you, mister Clerk. We will leave votes open till 04:30 today. Second item on the agenda is a house joint resolution. It's the nomination of Janice Beecher of New Bern to be utility commissioner of the utilities regulatory authority. Is there a motion?

[Dean (Committee Clerk)]: Move to chair.

[Speaker 0]: Motion made by representative Godfrey. Is there a second? Seconded by, representative Haines. Any discussion? Seeing none, mister Clerk. Please call the roll.

[Dean (Committee Clerk)]: Duff. Concepcion. Yes. Looney. Yeah.

[Sen. Stephen Harding]: Godfrey. Yeah. Berthel?

[Sen. Eric C. Berthel (Senate Ranking Member)]: Berthel is a yes.

[Dean (Committee Clerk)]: Yacarino? Yes.

[Everett Smith III (PURA Commissioner Nominee)]: Pizzino?

[Dean (Committee Clerk)]: Yes.

[Committee Staff (Assistant Clerk)]: Bonfero?

[Thomas (Tom) Weil (PURA Commissioner & Chair Nominee)]: Yes.

[Sen. Stephen Harding]: Resco?

[Dr. Jan (Janice) Beecher (PURA Commissioner Nominee)]: Yes.

[Dean (Committee Clerk)]: Haines?

[Sen. Stephen Harding]: Harding?

[Thomas (Tom) Weil (PURA Commissioner & Chair Nominee)]: Yes.

[Sen. Stephen Harding]: You? Hartley?

[James Crowe (UI retiree)]: Kushner?

[Rep. Tammy Nuccio]: Yes.

[Rep. Bob Godfrey (Vice Chair)]: Minnehan?

[Sen. Stephen Harding]: Martin?

[Dean (Committee Clerk)]: Nuccio?

[Sen. Martin M. Looney]: Quinn?

[Thomas (Tom) Weil (PURA Commissioner & Chair Nominee)]: Yes.

[Dean (Committee Clerk)]: Vertigliano? Yes.

[Committee Staff (Assistant Clerk)]: Sanchez?

[Dean (Committee Clerk)]: Representative Sanchez votes, yes. Scott? Winfield?

[Everett Smith III (PURA Commissioner Nominee)]: Any affirmative.

[Speaker 0]: Thank you. Thank you, mister Clerk. Next item on the agenda, we have senate joint resolutions, the nomination of Everett Smith the third of the Greenwich to be utility commissioner of the public utility's regular authority. Is there a motion? No. Motion made by senator Duff, seconded by representative Godfrey. Any discussion? Seeing none, mister Clerk, please call the roll.

[Dean (Committee Clerk)]: Duff?

[Dr. Jan (Janice) Beecher (PURA Commissioner Nominee)]: Yeah.

[Dean (Committee Clerk)]: Concepcion? Yes. Looney?

[Thomas (Tom) Weil (PURA Commissioner & Chair Nominee)]: Yes.

[Sen. Stephen Harding]: Godfrey? Yes. Brithell?

[Sen. Eric C. Berthel (Senate Ranking Member)]: Yes.

[Sen. Stephen Harding]: Yacarino? Yes. Pizzino?

[Rep. Dave Yaccarino (House Ranking Member)]: Representative Pizzino votes yes.

[Sen. Stephen Harding]: Monferro. Yes. Gresco. Yes.

[Committee Staff (Assistant Clerk)]: Haines.

[Sen. Stephen Harding]: Harding. Yes.

[Committee Staff (Assistant Clerk)]: Hartley.

[Dean (Committee Clerk)]: Kushner.

[Dr. Jan (Janice) Beecher (PURA Commissioner Nominee)]: Yes. Thank you.

[Sen. Stephen Harding]: I have to Cunningham. Martin.

[Dean (Committee Clerk)]: Nuccio.

[Sen. Stephen Harding]: Wynn.

[Rep. Irene Haines]: Yes.

[Dean (Committee Clerk)]: Partigliano. Yes.

[Committee Staff (Assistant Clerk)]: Sanchez.

[Dean (Committee Clerk)]: Representative Sanchez, yes.

[Sen. Stephen Harding]: Scott. Whitfield.

[Everett Smith III (PURA Commissioner Nominee)]: Whitfield. Anything affirmative.

[Speaker 0]: Thank you, mister Clerk. Last item on the agenda is another senate joint resolution. This is the nomination of Thomas Wheel of Madison to be utility commissioner and chairperson of the public utilities regulatory authority. Is there a motion? Motion made by representative Jacarino, seconded by representative Godfrey. Is there discussion? Seeing none, mister Clerk. Please call the roll.

[Dean (Committee Clerk)]: Duff. Yes. Concepcion. Yes.

[Sen. Stephen Harding]: Looney. Yes. Godfrey. Yeah. Purcell?

[Sen. Eric C. Berthel (Senate Ranking Member)]: Purcell is a yes.

[Dean (Committee Clerk)]: Yaccarino? Yeah. Fizino?

[Rep. Dave Yaccarino (House Ranking Member)]: Representative Fizino votes yes.

[Sen. Stephen Harding]: Monfero? Yes. Gresco?

[Rep. Joe Gresko]: Yes.

[Anthony Vallillo (UI retiree; former President/COO)]: Haines?

[Sen. Stephen Harding]: Yes. Harding's a yes. Thank you. Hartley? Kushner.

[Holly Cheeseman (PURA Commissioner Nominee; former State Representative)]: Yes.

[Sen. Stephen Harding]: Linehan. Martin. Neutrino.

[Dean (Committee Clerk)]: Quinn.

[Sen. John W. Fonfara]: Yes.

[Committee Staff (Assistant Clerk)]: Partigliano?

[Thomas (Tom) Weil (PURA Commissioner & Chair Nominee)]: Yes.

[Sen. Eric C. Berthel (Senate Ranking Member)]: Sanchez?

[Dean (Committee Clerk)]: Representative Sanchez votes yes.

[Sen. Stephen Harding]: Scott and Winfield.

[Everett Smith III (PURA Commissioner Nominee)]: Winfield, any affirmative?

[Speaker 0]: Thank you, mister Clerk. Our next meeting is scheduled for Tuesday, March 11, at 11:00. With that, we stand in recess till 04:30 today.

[Committee Staff (Assistant Clerk)]: Hey, Robson.

[Dr. Jan (Janice) Beecher (PURA Commissioner Nominee)]: Hey, there. How are you?

[Committee Staff (Assistant Clerk)]: Hi. There you are.

[Rep. Tammy Nuccio]: I'm calling in to vote.

[Sen. Stephen Harding]: Yes.

[Rep. Tammy Nuccio]: I am a no one everyone.

[Dean (Committee Clerk)]: No one everyone. Okay.

[Rep. Tammy Nuccio]: Thank you.

[Dean (Committee Clerk)]: Thank you. Have a good night.

[Rep. Tammy Nuccio]: You too. Bye bye.

[Dean (Committee Clerk)]: Bye.

[Rep. Tammy Nuccio]: Hello?

[Dean (Committee Clerk)]: Hey, representative. How are you?

[Rep. Liz Linehan]: Hi, Dean. How are you? Great. Thanks. Okay. What do I owe you?

[Committee Staff (Assistant Clerk)]: Four. The first is a human the

[Dr. Jan (Janice) Beecher (PURA Commissioner Nominee)]: next thing.

[Committee Staff (Assistant Clerk)]: Regulatory authority.

[Rep. Liz Linehan]: You know what? I'm so sorry to do this to you, but I can't hear. So I'm trying I'm gonna go home. I don't wanna well, so I'm just gonna walk over here. Give me one second. I'm sorry.

[Dean (Committee Clerk)]: Take the notes.

[Rep. Liz Linehan]: Okay. Try me again.

[Committee Staff (Assistant Clerk)]: Okay. So for resolutions, all are for PURA commissioners.

[Rep. Liz Linehan]: Okay.

[Committee Staff (Assistant Clerk)]: But with the exception of the last one who's also the chairman, but we'll get to that. The first is Holly Cheeseman to be a commissioner of the public utilities regulatory authority.

[Rep. Liz Linehan]: Linehan votes yes.

[Committee Staff (Assistant Clerk)]: Mhmm. The second one is Janice Beecher, the commissioner of PURA.

[Rep. Liz Linehan]: Linehan votes yes.

[Dr. Jan (Janice) Beecher (PURA Commissioner Nominee)]: Thank

[Committee Staff (Assistant Clerk)]: you. Third item is Everett Smith the third to be commissioner of PURA.

[Rep. Liz Linehan]: Linehan votes yes.

[Committee Staff (Assistant Clerk)]: Thank you. And the last one is Thomas Weil who is not the commissioner, but also chairman of PURA.

[Rep. Liz Linehan]: Linehan votes. Yes.

[Committee Staff (Assistant Clerk)]: Great. Thank you very much.

[Rep. Liz Linehan]: Thank you. See you later.

[Committee Staff (Assistant Clerk)]: Welcome. See you.