Consumers’ counsel takes on big job under trying conditions

Over a period of seven years, the Office of Consumers’ Counsel under Janine Migden-Ostrander spent about $50 million, much of it in opposing rate increases that were sought by utilities doing business in the state. And by an account put together by Migden-Ostrander’s office shortly before she left last fall, Ohio’s 4.5 million residential customers saved $8.2 billion — yes, with a ‘B’ — because of her office’s effort.

But when Republicans in the General Assembly and Gov. John Kasich arbitrarily cut her office’s budget by 50 percent — when other state offices were being cut by 5 percent — she took her talents elsewhere. The use of the word arbitrarily sounds harsh, but cutting the consumers’ counsel’s budget had nothing to do with balancing the state’s budget because the office is funded by a tiny assessment against the utility companies, not through the state’s general fund.

The consumers’ counsel has served as an advocate for residential utility customers since its founding in 1976. The utility companies pay their staffs and contract lobbyists to look out for their interests and argue their cases before the Public Utilities Commission of Ohio. Big industrial users of energy have their own staffs and lobbyists. Average folks — the ones politicians like to say they’re watching out for — had the consumers’ counsel.

Well, thankfully, those average folks still have their counsel, even if he is operating with a budget that was cut from $8.5 million in fiscal 2010 to $5.6 million for this fiscal year and will be cut again to $4.1 million for the fiscal year beginning in July.

New man at the helm

The new consumers’ counsel is Bruce J. Weston, who began his legal career with the OCC, left to go into private practice and then returned as Migden-Ostrander’s deputy and legal director in 2004. He has been serving as interim director since last fall and was chosen from among six finalists for the job by the office’s governing board.

He received a bachelor’s degree in business administration (accounting) from the University of Cincinnati his law degree from The Ohio State University College of Law. He is chairman of the Public Utilities Law Committee for the Ohio State Bar Association.

He knows utility law, he knows Ohio and he knows the office of consumers’ counsel inside and out. He also is apparently confident that he can continue to serve the interests of Ohio utility consumers even in an office that has been under fiscal attack from the General Assembly and the administration.

Anyone who pays for electricity, natural gas, telecommunications or water provided by a private company rather than a municipal system has to hope that Weston’s office is able to continue advocating on their behalf.

Weston is only the fourth person to hold the office in its 35-year history, but none of his predecessors came in facing the level of hostility he must operate under.

He now has a staff of 42, about 30 fewer than a year ago, which means his office is being asked to do more with less at a level unseen anywhere else at the Statehouse. He said he’ll work for “utility services that are affordable and reliable for Ohioans” and is looking forward “to working with all involved on these issues.”

We’d be more optimistic if there was evidence of more elected office holders in Columbus who showed as much commitment to customers as they do to companies.