Sam Randazzo is the chairman of the Public Utilities Commission of Ohio (PUCO). He was appointed to the PUCO and designated chairman by Governor Mike DeWine in 2019.

Chairman Randazzo, an attorney, began his career as a member of the PUCO’s technical staff. After leaving the PUCO, he was appointed to act as an assistant attorney general for the State of Ohio and assigned to the PUCO section. He then entered private practice where he focused on energy, communications and utility law.

At the end of 2018, Chairman Randazzo retired from the law firm of McNees Wallace & Nurick LLC where he provided guidance to a broad range of clients including residential, commercial and industrial customers, cooperatives, municipally-owned and investor-owned utilities. His experience includes developing Ohio’s innovative self-help natural gas program in 1973; implementation of the Telecommunications Act of 1996 in Ohio; proactive leadership on Ohio utility legislation providing customers with supply side and demand side choices; and general counsel to the Industrial Energy Users-Ohio (IEU-Ohio). Throughout his professional career, Sam has strongly supported and been an active participant in utility consumer education activities.

Chairman Randazzo is a graduate of Cuyahoga Falls High School, the University of Akron and Capital University Law School.

Dennis P. Deters was appointed to the PUCO by Governor Mike DeWine in March.

Prior to joining the PUCO, Commissioner Deters has served in local government for the last decade, most recently as a judge on Ohio’s First District Court of Appeals. Prior to that, Deters served as a Colerain Township Trustee, a Hamilton County Commissioner, and a private attorney representing local government interests.

In these positions, Deters has overseen local regulation of basic public service, has been tasked with adopting and enforcing administrative regulation of local services, worked to solve public service disputes, and represented individuals and businesses navigating government regulation.

PUCO initiates investigation of two retail energy providers

The PUCO has initiated an investigation into two retail energy providers’ marketing and sales practices, PALMco (d/b/a Indra Energy) and Verde Energy.

On April 16, 2019, the PUCO staff filed notices to the Commission alleging potential misleading and deceptive practices by PALMco Energy OH and PALMco Power OH, which together do business as Indra Energy, and Verde Energy’s marketing and sales practices, and recommended the Commission conduct thorough investigations.

The PUCO is charged with adopting and enforcing regulations to protect consumers from any misleading or deceptive acts or practices by competitive retail electric and natural gas providers.

Read more about the investigation here.

New interactive Ohio consumer choice page

Over the past several months, staff has been working to combine the electric and gas customer choice pages and remove the burdensome amount of PDFs and non-interactive documents. The new Ohio customer choice activity page provides easy-to-use dashboards with the ability to filter data for various criteria such as time period, customer sector and company.

This is the PUCO’s first use of Microsoft’s Power BI dashboards that are fully interactive for public use. Additionally, electric choice data is also available in spreadsheets that users can download for their own analysis.

AT&T discontinues Lifeline program

The PUCO has approved an application by AT&T Ohio to end its participation in the federal Lifeline program. AT&T Ohio will stop providing Lifeline discounts to the majority of its landline customers on June 11, 2019. Lifeline is a federally funded program that provides monthly discounts to eligible consumers of landline, wireless or broadband services.

The Commission ordered AT&T Ohio to notify affected customers by letter and bill inserts.

Find out if you are affected and what you can do here.

PUCO fines Columbia Gas of Ohio following Avon Lake home fire

Columbia Gas of Ohio has been ordered by the PUCO to pay a fine of $400,000 to the State of Ohio. The penalty is based upon the PUCO’s investigation of an August 2017 home fire in Avon, Ohio that caused an estimated $83,000 property damage.

A PUCO staff investigation determined that an excavator struck an unidentified 2-inch natural gas service line while installing a new water service line to the home. Columbia records failed to identify the presence of one of two natural gas service lines supplying the property. When Columbia responded to the scene, they were unable to identify the natural gas service line that was feeding the fire.

PUCO staff concluded that Columbia Gas did not follow its operating procedures when abandoning the service line in 2012, and failed to disconnect it properly from the main line. On multiple occasions, Columbia did not investigate contradicting records regarding the existence of two service lines at the property. Columbia also failed to respond and shut off the flow of natural gas in a timely manner.

In its order, the Commission noted that Columbia has complied with PUCO staff’s directives to update company procedures regarding underground locating, service disconnections and emergency response.

NARUC-NASEO Comprehensive Electricity Planning Task Force Announces 16 State Members

The Task Force for Comprehensive Electricity Planning has announced 16 states to represent the National Association of Regulatory Utility Commissioners and the National Association of State Energy Officials on the joint task force.

The two-year collaborative initiative of NARUC and NASEO, announced last November, is a forum for participating states to develop new approaches to better align distribution system and resource planning processes. The selected states will pioneer new tools and roadmaps for aligning planning to meet states’ needs while applying insights from the task force to initiate action in their own states. At the conclusion of the task force, NARUC and NASEO will publish templates that all members can adapt and use for their states.  

Chris Douglass published in CVSA magazine

The Guardian features an article on glider trucks by safety inspector Chris Douglass.

"Whether you are a roadside inspector, a safety investigator or a motor carrier operator, it is essential that you stay up to speed on the evolution of glider trucks. " 

Read the full article here.

Request a PUCO speaker at your next event

PUCO representatives are available to speak to your organization on a variety of topics including energy conservation, understanding your utility bill and comparing energy suppliers. Requesting a speaker is easy: contact us at (614) 466-7750 or fill out an online request here.