Arise’s Dev Wakeley testified Tuesday before the Senate Fiscal Responsibility and Economic Development Committee in support of the House-passed version of HB 475, and against proposed Senate changes through a substituted bill to weaken HB 475.

As originally passed in the House, HB 475 by Rep. Mack Butler, R-Rainbow City, would have required the Public Service Commission (PSC) to hold a formal rate hearing at least once every three years and would have limited utility companies from including certain lobbying and other costs in their rates. But the Senate committee amended the bill to weaken provisions regarding rate hearings and the PSC’s independence. Here is the full text of Wakeley’s remarks:

I’m Dev Wakeley with Alabama Arise. We are an anti-poverty organization, and accordingly, we supported HB 475 when it was introduced. We thought it was a good bill, and it was a bill that would have fostered accountability for the catastrophically high utility rates that the people in Alabama pay.

Our folks pay 20% more for electricity than people in Louisiana and Kentucky. Our folks pay more for electricity than all of our neighboring states. And that includes states where Southern Company owns the utility provider there. Georgians pay less for power than Alabamians do from the same parent company. It doesn’t make any sense.

Georgia and Alabama are the same climatically. People are dealing with the same amount of heat and the same amount of sunshine. The only thing that’s different is the regulatory structure or lack thereof. And we urged folks to support HB 475, and at the same time to oppose SB 360. Because SB 360 – the provisions of which have just been incorporated into HB 475 – is the exact opposite of an accountability bill.

That is a bill to put the thumb on the scale in favor of corporate interests at the expense of everyday Alabamians’ pocketbooks. And the people of Alabama are fully aware of this. They overwhelmingly turned out in opposition to the attempt to take away their right to vote for PSC commissioners. Now they face a similar effort to subordinate the elected PSC commission to an appointed position.

Please don’t do that. The people of Alabama have already made it perfectly clear they don’t want y’all to do that. They think it’s a way to shirk accountability for corporations.

People are squeezed every which way right now. The way to fix that is to lower electricity rates. This bill now doesn’t do that. It did before. It would have fostered the accountability that would have led to lower rates. And now there’s a thumb on the scale that’s going to prevent that in the long run.

I urge you to vote “no” on this bill as amended. Thank you.