Bill Text: CA AB3256 | 2023-2024 | Regular Session | Amended
Bill Title: Memorandum and balancing accounts: audits: reports to the Legislature.
Spectrum: Partisan Bill (Democrat 1-0)
Status: (Engrossed) 2024-06-05 - Referred to Com. on E., U. & C. [AB3256 Detail]
Download: California-2023-AB3256-Amended.html
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Amended
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Assembly
April 29, 2024 |
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Amended
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March 21, 2024 |
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Amended
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March 18, 2024 |
CALIFORNIA LEGISLATURE—
2023–2024 REGULAR SESSION
Assembly Bill
No. 3256
| Introduced by Assembly Member Irwin |
February 16, 2024 |
An act to amend Sections 792.5 and 910.7 of, and to add Section 739.17 to, the Public Utilities Code, relating to public utilities.
LEGISLATIVE COUNSEL'S DIGEST
AB 3256, as amended, Irwin.
Memorandum and balancing accounts: audits: reports to the Legislature.
Existing law vests the Public Utilities Commission with regulatory authority over public utilities, including electrical corporations, gas corporations, heat corporations, telegraph corporations, telephone corporations, and water corporations. Existing law directs the commission to require a public utility to establish and maintain a balancing account whenever the commission authorizes a change in rates reflecting and passing through to customers specific changes in costs to reflect the balance between the related costs and revenues. Existing law requires the commission to develop a risk-based approach for reviewing those balancing accounts periodically to ensure that the transactions recorded in the balancing accounts are for allowable purposes and are supported by appropriate documentation. Existing law requires the commission to maintain an inventory of the balancing accounts and
requires public utilities to record all related costs and revenues in their balancing accounts. Existing law requires the commission to adopt balancing account review procedures that are consistent with a risk-based approach.
Existing law requires the commission to annually provide the Legislature with an update on the status of its review of balancing accounts as part of an annual report or by posting it on its internet website, as provided.
Existing law provides requires that all charges demanded or received by any public utility, or by any 2 or more public utilities, for any product or commodity furnished or to be furnished or any service rendered or to be rendered shall
be just and reasonable and provides that every unjust or unreasonable charge demanded or received for such product or commodity or service is unlawful.
This bill would require the commission to include, as part of its annual update to the Legislature on the status of its review of balancing accounts, the amount of funds in, and the expenditures from, the memorandum accounts and balancing accounts of each public utility. The bill would require the commission to annually determine if conduct a comprehensive audit, with specified criteria, of each wildfire- or emergency-related
memorandum account and each or balancing account has achieved its intended purpose in the previous year.
of each electrical corporation on or before July 1, 2025, or, on or before January 1, 2027, if the commission is unable to review all those accounts by July 1, 2025, as provided. The bill would require the commission, if it determines that the intended purpose has not been achieved and those any actual costs should not be subject to recovery in the next general rate case, recorded in those electrical corporation accounts have already been authorized and collected from customers, to deny the public utility
electrical corporation a 2nd recovery of those costs and other expenses and to reduce the authority of the public utility to use, or close, the memorandum account or balancing to close the account in order to limit future rate increases. after granting the electric corporation recovery of any just and reasonable costs that have not been collected from customers. The bill would require the commission to make those determinations and take those actions in a manner that ensures that the rates are sufficient to enable the public utility to recover a just and reasonable rate of return.
Under existing law, a violation of any order, decision, rule, direction, demand, or requirement of the commission is a crime.
Because a violation of a commission action implementing this bill’s requirements would be a crime, the bill would impose a state-mandated local program.
The California Constitution requires the state to reimburse local agencies and school districts for certain costs mandated by the state. Statutory provisions establish procedures for making that reimbursement.
This bill would provide that no reimbursement is required by this act for a specified reason.
Digest Key
Vote: MAJORITY Appropriation: NO Fiscal Committee: YES Local Program: YESBill Text
The people of the State of California do enact as follows:
SECTION 1.
Section 739.17 is added to the Public Utilities Code, to read:739.17.
In making the determinations and taking the actions described in subdivision (g) of Section 792.5, the commission shall ensure that the rates are sufficient to enable the public utility to recover a just and reasonable rate of return.SEC. 2.
Section 792.5 of the Public Utilities Code is amended to read:792.5.
(a) Whenever the commission authorizes any change in rates reflecting and passing through to customers specific changes in costs, except rates set for common carriers, the commission shall require as a condition of the order that the public utility establish and maintain a balancing account reflecting the balance, whether positive or negative, between the related costs and revenues, and the commission shall take into account by appropriate adjustment or other action any positive or negative balance remaining in the balancing account at the time of any subsequent rate adjustment.(b) The commission shall develop a risk-based approach for reviewing or auditing balancing accounts
periodically to ensure that the transactions recorded in the balancing accounts are for allowable purposes and are supported by appropriate documentation.
(c) The commission shall maintain an inventory of the balancing accounts established pursuant to this section.
(d) The commission shall require the public utility to record all related costs and revenues in the balancing account, unless those costs or revenues are specifically exempted by the commission.
(e) The commission shall adopt balancing account review or audit procedures that are consistent with a risk-based approach.
(f) The commission may forgo the review or audit of a balancing account pursuant
to this section if an independent auditor has reviewed or audited the balancing account in the preceding five years.
(g)The commission shall annually determine if each memorandum account and each balancing account of a public utility has achieved its intended purpose in the previous year. If the commission determines that the intended purpose of a memorandum account or balancing account has not been achieved and those costs should not be subject to
recovery in the next general rate case, the commission shall deny the public utility recovery of those costs and other expenses and shall reduce the authority of the public utility to use, or close, the memorandum account or balancing account in order to limit future rate increases, consistent with Section 739.14.
(g) (1) (A) Except as specified in paragraph (2), on or before July 1, 2025, the commission shall conduct a comprehensive audit of each wildfire- or emergency-related memorandum or balancing account of each electrical corporation. The commission shall examine whether the actual costs recorded in the accounts were expenses authorized in the electrical corporations’s general rate case, whether the electrical corporation complied with the
terms that the commission identified when authorizing the costs to be tracked in the account, and the rate impact to customers if all those recorded costs were approved.
(B) If the commission determines that any actual costs recorded in an account have already been authorized and collected from customers, the commission shall do both of the following, consistent with Section 739.17:
(i) Deny the electrical corporation a second recovery of the actual costs that have already been authorized and collected from customers.
(ii) Close the account after granting the electrical corporation recovery of any just and reasonable costs recorded in the account that has not been collected from customers.
(2) If the commission is unable to review all the wildfire- or
emergency-related memorandum or balancing accounts of each electrical corporation on or before July 1, 2025, the commission shall specify criteria to be used to select accounts that will most impact rates and establish a review schedule prioritizing those high-impact accounts. The review schedule shall be paced in a manner that enables all electrical corporation wildfire- and emergency-related memorandum and balancing accounts to be reviewed, consistent with the criteria in paragraph (1), on or before January 1, 2027. The commission may contract with the California State Auditor’s Office, the Department of Finance, or another qualified audit or consulting firm for any necessary auditing or review services if the commission’s own auditing services are not available.
