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Mar-11-2006 03:21TweetFollow @OregonNews Op/Ed- PGE:
Op/Ed By: Henry Clay Ruark
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PGE crew works during outage Photo By: Tim King |
(SALEM) - Circuit Judge John Witmayer was the `analytical mind" in play for that decision demanding PGE pay back $10 million to its Multnomah County customers.
Careful analysis by that experienced jurist clearly indicated to him that refunds should be granted for county business income-tax payments sent directly to Enron.
Yet more questions are unavoidable when one learns that the Oregon PUC staff states that between 1997 and 2005, PGE paid Enron `and taxing authorities" $56 million MORE than the $635 million collected by PGE in state and federal income taxes.
The intense need for solid, reassuring and proven-reliable factual statement is still further demonstrated by the reported fact that an OREGONIAN analyst, Scott Learn, argues that PGE actually paid $64 million LESS than the PUC states it did.
Then the same solidly-reliable source states that, in truth, only $692,000 of those `taxes" went to the requisite authorities, with Enron getting all the rest.
Are you confused, yet ? If not, try this one on next:
PGE filed claims of $246 million against Enron in bankruptcy court, then `settled" by making a non-cash distribution to Enron approximating $66.3 million -- AND a cash payment of another $9.3 million.
The `settled" is in-quotes placed by the PUC staff, we are informed.
NOW all should be very clear: PGE was owed $246 million by Enron, The debt was `settled" by Enron collecting still another $75.6 million.
What could be clearer ? What is NOT clear is why-and-how that flow of monies went the way it did, and why-and-how it is presented as if it `settled" the situation for either Enron OR PGE -- and now, for the Oregon PUC, too.
You will recognize these facts and their presentation as coming very directly from a report by Steve Duin, in his column in The OREGONIAN last Thursday.
We owe The Big O and its major columnist a debt of deep gratitude for providing some semblance of common sense, surely missing in the public record reported in Salem so far, from this latest misadventure of the state`s regulatory agency, the Public Utilities Commission.
OR do we ? Either Duin is in deep and desperate degree of disparate reporting, or there is something surely similar going on with what the PUC has placed firmly on the public record. The question thus becomes, immediately and irreversibly, which is to be accorded our confidene and economic trust.
For me, the situation thus demands still further rapid clarification by PUC, perhaps by direct challenge to the Duin report and its eventual settlement via legal action. Either proven-practical and reliable Duin is `damned right" or he is equally in error.
What is NOT in further question for most deeply concerned citizens is that there is something fundamentally wrong with such agency actions resulting in seriously questioned reporting of what should surely be directly and arithmetically documented. Such figures should be firmly on the legally-testable record, and thus present working-dollar totals for what PUC is required to provide:
Protection for the public interest.
How do we know, given this kind of ongoing display? When will we find out? Will the PUC press this matter further?
There are other judges with their own analytical minds, to whom this may well now be moved for profound study and final public report. What does it take to bring about that demanded result?
Multnomah County ratepayers are about to get refunds covering their PGE/received-Enron/relayed `tax payment". Why not the rest of us ???
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