Psc Staff

State regulators took the first step yesterday toward fundamentally restructuring the way Maryland residents and businesses buy electricity, issuing a report that will likely serve as a framework for future competition and deregulation.The recommendations by the staff of the state's Public Service Commission, if adopted, would give most customers the ability to choose electricity suppliers by 2001.An initial two-year prototype program would commence in April 1999."This framework will allow competitive forces to exert downward pressure on costs and spur innovation to meet customers' demands," the PSC staff wrote in a 175-page report.

Turning away from a decades-old system of regulation of Bell Atlantic-Maryland's profits, the state Public Service Commission made a pair of landmark rulings yesterday that overhaul the way the telephone industry is regulated.That sparked howls of protest from the Maryland People's Counsel and MCI Communications Corp.The PSC eliminated rules that regulate profits in favor of a system that limits Bell Atlantic's prices. With maximum prices, .. the company will be able to keep most of the money it saves from building modern networks, instead of being required to pass along the savings to consumers.

Americans generally take high-quality telephone service for granted. Pick up a phone, you get a dial tone, the call goes through. You can't count on that in much of the world.Marylanders are among the most favored of Americans when it comes to phone service. Most are served by Bell Atlantic Corp., a company that is widely regarded as one of the best of the regional Bell companies in terms of service. Unlike some of its peers, the company takes genuine pride in the quality of its network, boasting in ads about its 99.99 percent reliability.

The Baltimore Gas and Electric Co. yesterday was granted an increase that will raise the cost of natural gas to residential customers by 5.4 percent, or $19.45 million annually.In addition, a hearing examiner for the Public Service Commission allowed the utility to raise a mandatory charge to those customers to $10 per month. That will generate $13 million in additional revenue for BGE.The rate increase, while less than the amount BGE had requested, exceeded that recommended by the PSC staff.

The staff of the Public Service Commission yesterday came out against a plan that would split Maryland geographically into four area codes when the supply of 410 and 301 telephone numbers runs out in about two years.Instead, the PSC staff supported a plan proposed by Bell Atlantic Corp. that would require Marylanders' fingers to do a little more walking each time they make a local call. Under the so-called "overlay" plan, seven-digit local dialing would go the way of the 10-cent pay phone call.

The staff of the state's Public Service Commission has appealed a hearing examiner's decision granting Baltimore Gas and Electric Co. a $19.45 million annual increase in its natural gas revenues.The appeal means the Oct. 4 decision granting BGE a 5.4 percent increase in residential gas rates will not take effect early next month. Instead, the PSC will decide by Nov. 20 whether to accept the appeal.The PSC staff objected to the examiner's determination that ratepayers should absorb some costs associated with BGE's appliance sales and repair subsidiary.

A Maryland Public Service Commission hearing examiner yesterday gave the Baltimore Gas and Electric Co. until Dec. 15 to rebut arguments that it should pay from $194 million to $450 million for past shutdowns at its Calvert Cliffs nuclear power plant.The decision extends by four months a 4-year-old legal battle, which will not be completed until 1996 at the earliest. The case will decide whether BGE or its ratepayers will shoulder the half-billion-dollar cost for a series of shutdowns at its Southern Maryland nuclear power plant from May 1989 to May 1991.

Case No. 8587 before the Maryland Public Service Commission ought to be renamed after Adm. James Stockdale, Ross Perot's erstwhile running mate. In it, the PSC basically asks the question: "Why am I here?"It's not your garden variety PSC rate case. No. 8587 is an effort, instigated by state People's Counsel John M. Glynn, to explore fundamental questions about the PSC's proper regulatory role in the rapidly changing telecommunications industry.Frank O. Heintz, the commission chairman, says the case is an opportunity for the commission to "get a grip on the future" and perhaps resolve the basic legal issue of what the PSC's jurisdiction should be at a time when it's hard to tell what is regulated telephone service and what is unregulated cable service.

Some Baltimore residents say that getting a taxi can be a spiritual experience. You call one and pray it shows up."I have only once been able to telephone for a taxi to take me to the airport or the train station and have them come at the time I asked," said Susan Talbott, who moved to Baltimore five years ago from Manhattan. "Even my efforts to get service by calling the night before have been a failure."When The Sun asked for comments on city taxi service through its Sundial telephone voice-mail system, 38 of 59 callers complained that taxis were chronically late or didn't respond at all to phone calls, or were difficult to find on the street.

Arguing that Chesapeake Bay pilots have not reduced their ranks to match declining ship traffic, the staff of the Public Service Commission has recommended that they be granted less than half the 33 percent rate increase they are seeking."

Baltimore Gas & Electric's residential customers will pay an estimated 5.5 percent more for electricity starting in June, largely as a result of federal rules that are driving wholesale energy prices higher, state officials and industry experts said yesterday. The increase will add about $100 to the average customer's annual utility bill, although the amount will vary depending on usage, the state Public Service Commission said. When combined with increases imposed since rate caps expired in 2006, BGE customers will be paying 85 percent more for electricity than they were before the General Assembly approved deregulation in 1999.

Unless General Assembly leaders resolve their differences - and call a special legislative session - the next and last stop for the twinned issues of electricity rate relief and the proposed merger of Constellation Energy Group with Florida's FPL Group is Maryland's Public Service Commission, which must review both plans. Consumer advocates don't expect much from the commission, with four of five members having been appointed by Constellation's best friend in Annapolis, Gov. Robert L. Ehrlich Jr. The panel is so industry-friendly that just the legislative threat to replace PSC members caused Constellation to offer more rate relief than the governor was able to negotiate without that.

The Maryland Public Service Commission kicked off hearings yesterday into electric utilities' response to widespread power outages across the state during Tropical Storm Isabel, amid PSC staff's call for improvements in communications and outage management and for the burying of some power lines underground. In the first day of the two-day hearing in Baltimore, commissioners questioned officials from two of the state's publicly held utilities, Potomac Electric Power Co. and Allegheny Power Inc., about spending on transmission system maintenance, tree trimming and pre-mobilization of repair crews.

An attorney for AT&T Corp. accused rival Verizon of Maryland Inc. yesterday of overstating how much competition from other telephone companies could threaten future business. In the final day of hearings before the Maryland Public Service Commission, AT&T attorney David Levy, through a series of questions, noted that an expert witness for Verizon couldn't say how 133 competing phone companies were faring against Verizon. AT&T Corp. and MCI WorldCom have accused Verizon of preventing rival companies from competing in the local telephone market.

State regulators took the first step yesterday toward fundamentally restructuring the way Maryland residents and businesses buy electricity, issuing a report that will likely serve as a framework for future competition and deregulation.The recommendations by the staff of the state's Public Service Commission, if adopted, would give most customers the ability to choose electricity suppliers by 2001.An initial two-year prototype program would commence in April 1999."This framework will allow competitive forces to exert downward pressure on costs and spur innovation to meet customers' demands," the PSC staff wrote in a 175-page report.

Turning away from a decades-old system of regulation of Bell Atlantic-Maryland's profits, the state Public Service Commission made a pair of landmark rulings yesterday that overhaul the way the telephone industry is regulated.That sparked howls of protest from the Maryland People's Counsel and MCI Communications Corp.The PSC eliminated rules that regulate profits in favor of a system that limits Bell Atlantic's prices. With maximum prices, .. the company will be able to keep most of the money it saves from building modern networks, instead of being required to pass along the savings to consumers.

Americans generally take high-quality telephone service for granted. Pick up a phone, you get a dial tone, the call goes through. You can't count on that in much of the world.Marylanders are among the most favored of Americans when it comes to phone service. Most are served by Bell Atlantic Corp., a company that is widely regarded as one of the best of the regional Bell companies in terms of service. Unlike some of its peers, the company takes genuine pride in the quality of its network, boasting in ads about its 99.99 percent reliability.

The staff of the state's Public Service Commission has appealed a hearing examiner's decision granting Baltimore Gas and Electric Co. a $19.45 million annual increase in its natural gas revenues.The appeal means the Oct. 4 decision granting BGE a 5.4 percent increase in residential gas rates will not take effect early next month. Instead, the PSC will decide by Nov. 20 whether to accept the appeal.The PSC staff objected to the examiner's determination that ratepayers should absorb some costs associated with BGE's appliance sales and repair subsidiary.

The Baltimore Gas and Electric Co. yesterday was granted an increase that will raise the cost of natural gas to residential customers by 5.4 percent, or $19.45 million annually.In addition, a hearing examiner for the Public Service Commission allowed the utility to raise a mandatory charge to those customers to $10 per month. That will generate $13 million in additional revenue for BGE.The rate increase, while less than the amount BGE had requested, exceeded that recommended by the PSC staff.

The staff of the Public Service Commission yesterday came out against a plan that would split Maryland geographically into four area codes when the supply of 410 and 301 telephone numbers runs out in about two years.Instead, the PSC staff supported a plan proposed by Bell Atlantic Corp. that would require Marylanders' fingers to do a little more walking each time they make a local call. Under the so-called "overlay" plan, seven-digit local dialing would go the way of the 10-cent pay phone call.