AUGUSTA - Rep. Seth Berry, D-Bowdoinham, and Rep. Nicole Grohoski, D-Ellsworth, issued the following statements in response to an announcement from the Maine Public Utilities Commission (PUC) on Thursday. The PUC shared that it is initiating an investigation into Central Maine Power's (CMP) parent company, Avangrid Networks, about how a desire to increase earnings may have affected its operations and investment in Maine. The PUC also announced a decision to remove an ongoing financial penalty imposed on CMP two years ago.
"It does not take a regulator or a rocket scientist to see that the monopoly management of CMP is fundamentally flawed," said Berry, House chair of the Energy, Utilities and Technology Committee. "CMP is not controlled by its own board. It is not even controlled by Avangrid, which is a mere holding company. As Avangrid's filings with the Securities and Exchange Commission make clear, the controlling interest in all decisions is Iberdrola, which itself is owned by shareholders that include the governments of Norway and Qatar. Our public utilities' management should have a fiduciary obligation to Maine customers. Instead, CMP's are beholden solely to foreign even foreign government shareholders."
In Avangrid's most recent 10-K filed with the SEC (pp. 34-35), as well as previous filings, independent investors are warned that Iberdrola maintains a controlling interest in the Avangrid board, and that Avangrid is a "controlled company" under New York Stock Exchange definitions.
"Maine people are struggling to pay their electricity bills, with recent massive rate hikes both to supply and delivery charges," said Grohoski, a member of the Energy, Utilities and Technologies Committee. "It is a travesty that the PUC would increase CMP's guaranteed profits from 8.25% to 9.25% at this time, adding millions to their corporate coffers, particularly based on largely self-reported performance data. As of January 2022, CMP and Versant's delivery charges already averaged 49% more than Maine's consumer-owned utilities, per kWh delivered."
Berry represents House District 55, which includes Bowdoin, Bowdoinham, Swan Island and most of Richmond. He previously served from 2006-2014, the final two years as House majority leader, and returned to the House in 2016.
Grohoski, who is serving her second term in the Maine House, represents the communities of Ellsworth and Trenton.
Contact:
Jackie Merrill [Berry, Grohoski], c. 812-1111