Newly revealed texts suggest regulator knew rate hike was improper
More evidence emerged Friday that Ohioans for years have faced questionable utility increases that were granted out of possibly dubious motives.
On June 19, 2019, FirstEnergy’s leaders were furiously pushing what would later be called one of the biggest bribery and money laundering schemes in Ohio history. The same day, the Ohio Supreme Court struck down a big rate increase the Public Utility Commission of Ohio had granted to FirstEnergy three years earlier, saying it was illegal.
In reference to the ruling, then-FirstEnergy Vice President Michael Dowling exchanged texts with Asim Haque, who until several months earlier had been chairman of the PUCO, the entity that regulates monopoly utilities such as FirstEnergy.
One of Haque’s messages suggests that he knew a rate increase he voted to allow FirstEnergy to implement was illegal, but that the Akron-based utility would be allowed to keep the $460 million it had already collected.
Read more: https://ohiocapitaljournal.com/2022/05/20/newly-revealed-texts-suggest-regulator-knew-rate-hike-was-improper/