Court Opinion

ID: 9583536
Source: CourtListenerOpinion
Date Created: 2023-08-21 22:39:36.213714+00
Date Added: 2024-06-11T13:39:03.728982
License: Public Domain

Gregory, Justice
(dissenting):
I would hold that the Public Service Commission did have jurisdiction to inquire into and about the Greenwood facility to determine the fairness of the differing rates.
The Commission has broad powers to regulate public utilities in South Carolina. S. C. Code Ann. § 58-27-140 (1976). These powers encompass the power to “... [ascertain and fix just and reasonable standards, classifications, regulations, practices or service to be furnished, imposed, observed and followed by any and all electrical utilities.” Section 58-27-140(1).
The Commission’s power to investigate and change rates is set forth in S. C. Code Ann. § 58-27-850 (1976):
Whenever the Commission after a hearing, upon its own motion or upon complaint, finds that the existing rates ... for any service ... are unjust, unreasonable, insufficient, unreasonably discriminatory ... the Commission shall determine the just, reasonable, and sufficient rates to be thereafter observed and in force and shall fix the same by its order, (emphasis added.)
The Commission declined to act in this matter because Act 1293 of 1966. In my view, the Commission had authority to inquire into the sufficiency and fairness of the rate.
Although it is doubtful the scheme set forth in the 1966 Act could be anything but unfair, I do not decide this issue and, indeed, it is impossible to make such an inquiry because the Commission never reached the merits of the application. Instead, the Commission ruled it lacked jurisdiction because of the Act.
*103Therefore, I would remand for full consideration by the Public Service Commission. Any other holding seriously dilutes the powers granted to the Commission by the legislature, allowing those powers to be contracted out of regulatory control.
Reversed and remanded.