SAN FRANCISCO--(BUSINESS WIRE)--
Pacific Gas and Electric Company (PG&E) today affirmed its commitment to
transparency and accountability and encouraged the California Public
Utilities Commission (CPUC) to adopt new protocols for open access to
communications between the Commission and all parties who are
interacting with the CPUC.
PG&E is taking concrete actions to demonstrate its commitment that
communications with the government regulator should be public:
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PG&E will provide the CPUC with copies of approximately 65,000 emails
that were exchanged between company and agency representatives in
order to ensure the CPUC, as the responsible state regulatory agency,
is able to provide and manage a process for open public access to
those emails. The emails, which date back to 2010, were the subject of
a voluntary review PG&E undertook. PG&E has self-reported the
violations it found. PG&E expects to be able to provide the emails to
the CPUC by mid-February after reviewing them for appropriate and
usual confidentiality exclusions such as specific customer
information, competitive contract data and information about sensitive
infrastructure.
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More broadly, PG&E is urging the CPUC to adopt new standards and
processes that will allow the public to have easy, open access –
preferably electronically – to communications the Commission has with
all parties interacting with it.
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Finally, PG&E submitted to the CPUC 12 email chains that the company
believes could reflect past violations of CPUC rules governing ex
parte communications. Ex parte communications are those that take
place with decision-makers and are either banned or are made without
giving the required notice to all parties to a proceeding. These email
chains can be read here.
PG&E’s Commitment
PG&E Chairman & CEO Tony Earley said:
“We believe we can all agree that the business of the Commission is the
business of the public. We support open access to communications taking
place between the Commission and all parties.
“Some of the emails that we are reporting today suggest clear violations
of ex parte rules along with behavior that clearly failed to meet our
expectations. We sincerely regret that and have taken action to prevent
it in the future. Other emails represent judgment calls that we are
submitting out of an abundance of caution.
“We’re committed to doing the right thing and to interacting with our
state regulator in a transparent and ethical manner that upholds both
the letter and spirit of the law and the company’s own Code of Conduct
at all times. Our customers expect no less.
“From the beginning, we took immediate and definitive action. When we
first discovered violations of the CPUC ex parte rules, we self-reported
them, we held senior-level officers accountable, and we are making
significant changes designed to prevent this from happening again. We’re
also fully cooperating with law enforcement investigations.
“We want to be clear -- we have learned from this experience. Our goal
is to have a world-class regulatory compliance model at PG&E that
reflects the highest ethical standards. It also has become apparent that
the CPUC rules and practices are overly complex and ambiguous. We
respectfully urge the CPUC to put in place a clear regulatory model for
open public access to communications with all parties.”
Concrete Actions Taken
PG&E has already taken numerous actions as part of its effort to achieve
the highest level of ethics and compliance possible:
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Three officers are no longer employed by the company;
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A new senior vice president of regulatory relations was named with the
charge to overhaul PG&E’s regulatory affairs department;
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The company created a new position of Chief Ethics and Compliance
Officer, whose mandate is to help oversee compliance with all
requirements governing PG&E's interactions with the CPUC. The position
reports to the CEO and to the Audit Committee of the PG&E Board of
Directors. A search is currently underway to find the best person for
the job;
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PG&E engaged former Secretary of the U.S. Department of Interior Ken
Salazar, a partner in the WilmerHale law firm, as special counsel on
regulatory compliance matters to assist in developing a best-in-class
regulatory compliance model. Salazar has served as Colorado Attorney
General, United States Senator, and Secretary of Interior. Salazar and
his team have helped PG&E:
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Define the position of a company-wide Chief Ethics and Compliance
Officer, with direct reporting authority to the CEO and to the
Audit Committee of the PG&E Board of Directors.
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Helped overhaul the rules of engagement with Commissioners and
Staff at the CPUC, and for reporting and monitoring ex parte
communications. These new rules of engagement have been
communicated to employees within the Lines of Business that have
any reason to interact with the Commission, on even an occasional
basis.
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Helped develop new training, including web-based and
instructor-led courses, on interacting with the CPUC. The
training, which is underway, highlights compliance with ex parte
rules and requirements.
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Engaged in bench-marking exercises to identify best practices for
ethics and compliance.
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Participated in the Chairman’s Ethics Council meeting to which all
PG&E employees were invited to encourage employees to raise ethics
and compliance issues directly to senior management.
About PG&E
Pacific Gas and Electric Company, a subsidiary of PG&E
Corporation (NYSE:PCG), is one of the largest combined natural gas
and electric utilities in the United States. Based in San Francisco,
with more than 20,000 employees, the company delivers some of the
nation’s cleanest energy to nearly 16 million people in Northern and
Central California. For more information, visit www.pge.com/
and www.pge.com/en/about/newsroom/index.page.
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Source: Pacific Gas and Electric Company