Court Opinion

ID: 9754581
Source: CourtListenerOpinion
Date Created: 2023-08-28 20:05:09.461147+00
Date Added: 2024-06-11T07:27:54.842820
License: Public Domain

Webber, J.
(concurring) I concur in the opinion and the result. I would merely emphasize that the statute (35 M.R.S.A., Sec. 2809; R. S. 1954, Ch. 51, Sec. 24) gives only carefully restricted jurisdiction to the Public Utilities Commission with.respect to the furnishing of service by cooperatives. The Commission is without any power to compel the cooperative to improve the quality of its service where some service is in fact being rendered to its members. A public utility is afforded an exclusive and monopolistic franchise in return for its submission to the control of the Commission with respect to rates, quality of service and the like. The position of the appellants here seems to me to be that of one who would have his cake and eat it too. They desire the competitive advantage offered to regulated public utilities without paying the price which such utilities have to pay to the public in order to secure such protection. The legislature has not seen fit to confer upon these cooperatives the preferred position which they now seek. I am in agreement with the concurring, opinion of a member of the Public Utilities Commission in the instant case in which he stated:
*229“Thus in my view, the customer who is located in the franchised territory of a regulated public utility and receiving service from an unregulated cooperative may request service by the public utility; and if it is economically feasible for the utility to render the service so requested, he is entitled as a matter of law to receive such service, whether his reason be a desire for improved service, more equitable rates, or simply a desire to come under the protection of this Commission and the laws administered by it.” (Emphasis mine)