Public Utilities Regulatory Authority should be independent

A good idea has broken through the legislature’s self-imposed isolation.

A bipartisan coalition of senators and representatives wants to restore the independence of the Public Utilities Regulatory Authority (PURA).

Connecticut is the only state without a freestanding utility regulator. It is also the state in the continental United States with the highest electricity rates. Draw your own conclusions about that.

What is not in doubt is the failure of the 2011 decision to merge the utility regulator into the new Department of Energy and Environmental Protection (DEEP)

That decade-old mistake put PURA under the control of DEEP’s commissioner and made it more susceptible to political calculations and plans. Gov. Ned Lamont’s administration is learning what an obstacle to economic development the cost of electricity remains. The governor is romancing data center operators to build facilities in the state but is limited for locations to a handful of towns with their own municipal power companies that have lower electricity rates.

The reality Connecticut residents confront every month may at last have made an impression on the hoity-toity running state government. The governor may want to recall the pre-pandemic panic that swept state government last year when consumers were stunned to find hefty new charges on their electricity bills. The legislature — facing November elections — scurried to defuse the public’s anger.

The state needs an independent rate-setting utility regulator. The three PURA commissioners are intended to be free from the political and calculations of actors in the executive branch.

Personal ambition should not be a driving force in setting utility rates. Lamont should be pleased that the head of PURA, Marissa Gillet, distinguished herself by standing up to Eversource, the giant and influential utility, in the aftermath of its inept response to Tropical Storm Isaias last summer. It felt like at last there was someone in state government who did not worship at the alter of the insatiable gas, water and electricity behemoth.

The bill to restore independence in rate setting has evoked fury in the Lamont administration. The executive branch has become accustomed in the past year to having its way while operating under a state of emergency. It has developed a worrying taste for opposing sensible reforms in how state government operates.

The Lamont administration’s opposition to the PURA independence hill provides an unintended glimpse of trouble within the ranks and elsewhere. The limits imposed by the pandemic have diminished opportunities for scrutiny. That is bad for everyone, especially Lamont.

Reversals of fortunes in politics are swift and brutal. They remind political leaders that approval is not a synonym for love. They arrive from unexpected places, and when they start they often continue to an unhappy end for a political leader.

Gov. Lamont cannot continue to be indifferent to how his aides treat people. A governor with a business degree from Yale ought to know that screaming and hurling obscenities is a management practice that has fallen into disrepute in the 21st century.

Legislators, lobbyists, members of the administration and people trying to share information have

been shaken by the arrogance and abuse that meet them from official and political lieutenants to the governor at the first note of dissent. Lamont by now should have established a reputation for encouraging candor. If he has, word has not reached some of his most senior advisors.

He must set some modern standards. His office is not a Wall Street boiler room.

New York Gov. Andrew Cuomo’s first crisis started with a former official alleging sexual harassment. After weeks of revelations, insiders have begun leaking appalling tales of Cuomo’s misuse of government resources to benefit himself and family members. Fear and loathing in Cuomo’s administration figure in each disturbing allegation. The humiliated have found their moment to strike.

Lamont has been ballyhooing his experience in business since his first campaign for statewide office 15 years ago. Fifty million dollars from his fortune later, he became governor. A quiet personal decency underpinned his three campaigns. It was never my impression, and I paid attention to him from the start, that it was the work of image-makers.

The governor needs to act from within. He should speak to members of his administration alone — with no aides present — and ask for the sharp gift of candor.

Ned Lamont needs to know what it’s like to work for and with his administration.