Utility regulation is supposed to be boring. Rate cases, dockets, proposed final decisions — the stuff that makes reporters’ eyes glaze over and editors reach for coffee. For a few years in Connecticut, somehow, it wasn’t.
It was front-page drama: a disingenuous chief regulator at war with the utilities she oversaw, credit downgrades, lawsuits, bills spiking and a dramatic, Nixonesque exit for Public Utilities Regulatory Authority Chair Marissa Gillett after she was allegedly caught perjuring herself in front of the legislature.
But regulatory drama usually comes with a cost and in Connecticut’s case, the actions under the previous PURA leadership proved incredibly costly.
Now, though, we have evidence the drama may finally be over, in the form of PURA’s March 6 proposed decision approving the $2.4 billion sale of Aquarion Water Company to the quasi-public Aquarion Water Authority. The decision follows the law, hews to facts and puts in place real consumer protections — a rate stabilization fund, ongoing bill credits. That is what regulation is supposed to look like.
Getting back to normalcy involved an 18-month case of politically-motivated whiplash. The legislature endorsed the sale in a 2024 special session, without a public hearing. PURA, with fingerprints from the previous leadership all over it, blocked the sale the following November. A Superior Court reversed PURA and sent it back with instructions that effectively required approval. Now PURA has done exactly what the law said it should.
The chaos didn’t happen in a vacuum. Under Gillett, PURA became a place where process ran subordinate to a single personality. A Connecticut court found the majority of her significant decisions legally invalid. Credit rating agencies downgraded Connecticut’s utilities on her watch, raising borrowing costs that flow directly to ratepayers.
After Gillett resigned under impeachment threat, Gov. Ned Lamont exhibited the kind of leadership which has become his trademark: balanced, reasoned, and not politically reactive. He appointed a fresh slate of PURA commissioners, filling all five seats, and brought in Thomas Wiehl as chair to restore normal, professional regulation.
My sources tell me Wiehl is following through in word and deed. Relations between PURA and the utilities it oversees are thawing — not a rollover, but a return to the fact-based dynamic where regulators enforce the law and customers aren’t used as pawns. The Aquarion decision reflects that reset.
One legitimate criticism stands: the consumer advocacy office serving Aquarion customers needs to be a dedicated, robust resource — not a shared part of the larger authority. That is fixable, and it should be fixed before the final decision lands March 25.
Yet, we still have noxious political emissions emanating around PURA. Attorney General William Tong, apparently convinced that an election year demands a villain and that PURA and utilities will do nicely, keeps making predictable, repetitive comments.
Exhibit A is His “again, what the hell” comment and a press release and letter demanding PURA reverse itself. Exhibit B is Tong’s appearance at oral arguments on Monday where, The Courant reported, Tong drew a rebuke from Commissioner Holly Cheeseman for alleging PURA – part of the same executive branch as the attorney general – considered matters under utility pressure rather than its authority. Smells like performance politics to me.
Top Connecticut leaders including Gov. Lamont, House Speaker Matt Ritter, Senate Majority Leader Bob Duff, and Republican Vincent Candelora have all called for a lower temperature in Connecticut’s energy debates, and to get PURA off the front page of the newspaper.
They understand that a functioning, good-faith regulator is worth more to customers than 1,000 indignant press releases. Outrage politics are failing the American people in Washington, and they have failed here in the Land of Steady Habits.
The Aquarion decision isn’t perfect. No transaction this complex ever is. But it is lawful, grounded in fact, and oriented toward the actual interests of the 236,000 customers it affects.
That is boring old utility regulation. Connecticut’s ratepayers should be happy it’s back, because we’ve already paid the cost for the bad kind.