CALIFORNIA FOCUS
FOR RELEASE: FRIDAY, MAY 12, 2017, OR THEREAFTER
FOR RELEASE: FRIDAY, MAY 12, 2017, OR THEREAFTER
BY THOMAS D. ELIAS
“WILL COURT RULING ON OFFICIALS’ E-MAIL MOVE BROWN?”
More than one month after the state
Supreme Court ruled unanimously that text messages and emails sent by public
officials on their personal devices are matters of public record if they deal
with public business, Gov. Jerry Brown has still not moved on his own email
issues.
During that time, in fact, Brown
flouted his own boasts of transparency by using a federal anti-terror rule to
deny public access for records on various aspects of the Oroville Dam crisis.
Brown’s email issues stem from his communications with the state
Public Utilities Commission at the time of the infamous PUC decision on
financing the closure of the crippled San Onofre Nuclear Generating Station.
The settlement forced customers of Southern California Edison Co. and the San
Diego Gas & Electric Co. to foot more than 70 percent of the $4.7 billion
cost for the shutdown, largely caused by an Edison blunder.
The question: Was that so-called
settlement mostly decided in a well-documented secret meeting between
then-commission President Michael Peevey and Edison executives in a luxury
hotel in Warsaw, Poland? Or did Brown have a major hand in it?
Either way, the division of costs was
so unfair that the PUC was forced last fall to reopen its decision-making
process, a process that is not yet finished.
For sure, more than 60 possibly
relevant emails exist between Brown and the PUC. San Diego consumer lawyers
Michael Aguirre and Mia Severson have pushed almost two years for their
release, but Brown steadfastly refuses, calling them confidential. No one knows
if any or all involved Brown’s personal email, which would make these
communications subject to the recent state Supreme Court ruling.
It would not be a good idea to bet on
these emails being released anytime soon. When current U.S. Sen. Kamala Harris
was state attorney general and conducting a loudly announced investigation
(still incomplete well over two years after Peevey’s homes were raided by
investigators), she delayed indefinitely a ruling on whether Brown must divulge
the emails. Meanwhile, Brown was heartily endorsing her Senate candidacy.
Now, with the impending retirement of
Pete Wilson-appointed state high court Justice Kathryn Werdegar, Brown will
soon have appointed the majority of members of that court.
Given that Brown appears to expect
even supposedly independent appointees to toe his political line – his PUC
commissioners are good examples – there’s no reason to expect the state’s high
court ever to go against him.
For sure, there are indications from
material already been made public that Brown at the very least knew and
approved what would happen between Edison and the PUC at the time San Onofre
was playing out. A June 6, 2013 note sent by Edison CEO Ted Craver to company
board members starts with Craver saying he “wanted to give you a quick report
on my phone calls with Gov. Brown.”
At the time, Brown was meeting in
Rancho Mirage with then-President Obama and Chinese President Xi Jinping.
Reported Craver, “He said what we were doing seemed right under the
circumstances.” Craver also said Brown “indicated a willingness to” say
publicly that Edison was acting responsibly. No one knows what, if anything,
else might have been covered in that call.
No one also knows what Brown said in
all his subsequent emails to PUC members. But the eventual PUC decision
blatantly favored Edison. There is no record of Brown talking to consumer
advocates around that same time.
Maybe Brown was directly involved in
the entire decision-making process. Without the 60-plus emails – and maybe even
with them – it’s impossible to know. He
and his press secretary have consistently refused any comment.
Now comes the state Supreme Court’s
ruling on private emails dealing with public policy decisions. If any of the
Brown messages were on a private email account, they should be subject to this
ruling.
No one yet knows how new Attorney General Xavier Becerra,
appointed by Brown, will deal with the issue. So far, he’s said nothing about
the entire investigation into the PUC.
All of which means the taint of possible Brown complicity in what
may have been corruption remains, and could become a significant part of his
eventual legacy unless he relents and lets the public in on public business he
so far has kept very private.
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Email Thomas Elias at tdelias@aol.com. His
book, "The Burzynski Breakthrough, The Most Promising Cancer Treatment and
the Government’s Campaign to Squelch It," is now available in a soft cover
fourth edition. For more Elias columns, visit www.californiafocus.net
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