On January 3rd of this year I was chosen by my fellow Commissioners to become the next Chairman of the Arizona Corporation Commission. Today I gavelled to close our final Open Meeting of the year, and I wish to take a moment to reflect on the work our Commission completed this year.
I first want to recognize the tremendous work done by our Staff here at the Commission, the Commissioners and their respective staff, the applicants, intervenors, and the members of the public that I believe helped us arrive at decisions that were informed, reasoned, and inclusive of perspectives, even when we didn’t always agree.
At the close of today’s meeting, by my estimates we have heard some 302 total cases, with 272 of those being unanimous decisions, which represents 90%. That, to me, demonstrates that no matter whether we are Red Team or Blue Team, we get down to the business of the people of Arizona, and work towards consensus to achieve what is in their best interests.
I highlight the following accomplishments from this year:
- We launched the modernization of our Commission to move us into first tier among our peer states, beginning with bringing in our new Executive Director Mr. Doug Clark. We established Robert's Rules of Order for our Open Meetings. We moved forward rulemakings to improve Rail Safety and registering Corporations; we reaffirmed our Rate Case Settlement Policy; clarified our Line Siting Policy and refreshed the membership after decades of service by our former committee members.
- We issued rate decisions for almost every Class A utility in the state of Arizona–no small undertaking by our Administrative Law Judges and Utilities Staff!
- We approved to add, or cause to be added through our decisions, approximately:
- 1,610 MWs of solar energy
- 323 MWs of wind energy
- 1,655 MWs of batter storage
- 845 MWs of gas-fired energy
- Over 60 miles of interconnections to our transmission grids, all of which were the result of hearings held by our Line Siting Committee under the leadership of Chairman Adam Stafford
- Transferred ownership or consolidated more of our smaller water companies to Class A utilities who can invest in the infrastructure needed to better serve our communities
- Ordered some $40 Million in restitution from those individuals who sought to defraud our citizens, and ordered them to pay fines of approximately $1.1 Million.
- We held five major workshops ranging from Cybersecurity to Winter Preparedness
- We settled several major pieces of litigation that had been pending, thanks to the Herculean efforts by our Legal team
- And just last week we helped get reliable water service initiated to the Rio Verde Foothills community.
I am honored and blessed to work with outstanding public servants, and commend them all on these momentous decisions. I wish you all a healthy, wonderful Holiday Season. God Bless, and see you in the New Year!
Chairman Jim O’Connor
