Court Opinion

ID: 9749675
Source: CourtListenerOpinion
Date Created: 2023-08-27 16:57:21.460365+00
Date Added: 2024-06-11T07:25:55.596348
License: Public Domain

*1242PRYOR, Associate Judge,
concurring:
I join in the majority opinion affirming the Commission’s Order.
I note, however, that a divided Commission excluded certain expenses claimed by the Company in the areas of advertising, trade and civic association dues, and for community affairs programs. As I read the Order, it does not reject those items as categorically unrelated to the interests of the ratepayer; rather, the rulings rest on the narrower ground that the Company did not carry its burden of proof by merely asserting the claimed expenses. If it is true, as the dissenting Commissioner indicates, that this greater scrutiny is a departure from past practice, then the Commission should — as it indicates in its Order— take the necessary steps to clarify “... the treatment of advertising expenses in the near future.”
Viewing the case as a whole, it is clear that the majority and dissenting opinions, in discussing the numerous issues at length, disagree, at bottom, on the lawful and appropriate role of the Commission in approving and structuring the rates of a public utility. Putting aside the dissenter’s characterizations of the majority’s views, the fundamental question which we have decided is whether the Commission’s Order, innovative though it may be, is within the authority entrusted to it and is not arbitrary, capricious, or unreasonable. I think the Order passes the statutory test and I therefore vote to affirm.