Not even the governor should tell utility regulators whether to give the thumbs up to a proposed $1.3 billion Florida Power & Light Co. rate hike, Public Service Commission Chairman Matthew Carter said today.

“I don’t think anybody should tell us how to vote on a rate case. We have to make our decision based on the facts presented. Each case has to stand on its own merit. To do otherwise would be violating the statute,” said Carter, appointed by Gov. Jeb Bush in 2006 and up for reappointment by Gov. Charlie Crist next month. “I’m not going to do that for anyone.”

Earlier today, Crist said that the commissioners’ vote would impact whether he picks them for the panel. Two commissioners – Carter and Katrina McMurrian – are among the six finalists given to Crist by a nominating council.

“Let’s see what the commissioners want to do. Then I can have a better handle on who I want to appoint or reappoint,” Crist said.

The FPL rate hearing is scheduled to resume on Wednesday.

On Friday, Sen. Mike Fasano asked that it be indefinitely delayed until investigations into possibly too-cozy relationships between the regulators and the utilities they oversee are complete.

Carter hasn’t made up his mind yet on whether to halt the hearing and said Crist’s comments won’t sway him.

“I make my own independent decision. And I’m not intimidated nor am I persuaded by anyone else. I have to stay focused on the law,” he said. “I’m not going to g o into a war of words with the governor.”

An opponent of Florida Power & Light Co.’s proposed $1.3 billion rate hike wants a utility regulator who attended a conference in New York and had a steak dinner with an FPL executive disqualified from the case.

Public Service Commissioner Katrina McMurrian should recuse herself because, at a minimum, the events leave the impression that she won’t be impartial, according to a motion filed this morning by Stephen Stewart for Sarasota citizen Richard Unger, an intervenor in FPL’s rate case.

McMurrian, appointed by Gov. Jeb Bush to the panel in 2006, was a panelist at a Standard & Poors conference in New York in March that dealt with credit issues and their effect on the power industry. The night before the conference, McMurrian had dinner with, among others, FPL Treasurer Paul Cutler.

That leaves the impression that McMurrian won’t be impartial, Stewart said in the motion.

The hearing is scheduled to resume on Wednesday.

State law requires that commissioners “must avoid impropriety in all of his or her activities and must act at all times in a manner that promotes public confidence in the integrity and impartiality of the commission.”

McMurrian, whose term ends in January, is up for reappointment by Gov. Charlie Crist.

Crist earlier this morning threatened not to reappoint commissioners who vote for the rate hike. PSC Chairman Matthew Carter is also up for reappointment.

The future of two utility regulators depends upon their vote in a proposed $1.3 billion Florida Power & Light Co. rate hike, Gov. Charlie Crist said this morning.

Crist has until Oct. 1 to reappoint two commissioners – Chairman Matthew Carter and Katrina McMurrian – whose terms expire Jan. 1.

Crist said he wants them to just say no to the Juno Beach-based utility.

“Let’s see what the commissioners want to do. Then I can have a better handle on who to appoint or reappoint,” Crist told reporters this morning.

A reporter asked Crist if he heard the governor correctly – that the commissioners’ vote would affect their appointments.

“You did,” Crist answered. “I think it would be nice to reject the increase. I’m trying to appoint members that would be sympathetic to the people and the economic challenge that they’re facing. So that’s a factor.”

Sen. Mike Fasano on Friday asked Carter, appointed to the panel by Gov. Jeb Bush, to indefinitely delay the FPL hearing and a $500 million Progress Energy Florida rate case until a storm of controversies surrounding the regulatory panel clears.

Crist disagreed.

“I don’t know why we should postpone it,” he said.

Carter said this morning that he hadn’t seen Fasano’s letter because he was on bed rest Friday recuperating from two back surgeries earlier this year.

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Public Service Commission spokeswoman Cynthia Muir gave this response to Sen. Mike Fasano’s request today that Chairman Matthew Carter indefinitely delay rate hearings now underway for FPL and Progress Energy Florida.

“The Chairman is on bed rest today due to his recent back surgery and the strain caused from the long hours of sitting during the hearings. I can tell you that there are statutory time lines that must be followed for each rate case filing. If a Commission decision is not made within the required time frame, the rates requested by the company in its filing can be implemented, at the discretion of the company.

Florida Statue 366.06 provides detail on this.

Thanks,
Cindy”

Progress is requesting a $500 million rate hike. That hearing is scheduled to resume Sept. 21, and the FPL – which is seeking a $1.3 billion rate increase – case is slated to resume on Wednesday.

When asked specifically whether Chairman Carter would postpone the hearings and what the pertinent dates were in both cases, Muir gave the following reply:

“Florida Statute 366.06 spells out the time frame. The Chairman has not responded to the Senator’s letter yet, so there’s no way of knowing what he intends,” she wrote.

Under Florida law, the PSC must give a final order in the FPL case by Nov. 20 or the new rates can go into effect Jan. 1. The utility would have to pay customers back if the panel then rejected the rate hike.

Sen. Mike Fasano wants a halt to all utility rate hearings – including a proposed $1.3 billion Florida Power & Light Co. hike – until investigations into alleged coziness between the Public Service Commission and the utilities they regulate.

“The integrity of the Commission has been brought into question due to the recent resignation of the PSC’s lobbyist, the firing of a commission aide and the placement of two others on leave due to the question of ex parte communications, as well as sharing of Blackberry PINs, with utility executives of the two companies seeking the rate increases. With the possibility of the Florida Senate Ethics & Elections Committee holding a hearing to look into the serious allegations regarding the operation of the PSC, any decision made while under the cloud of controversy would forever plague all parties in the case,” Fasano, R-New Port Richey, wrote in a letter to PSC Chairman Matthew Carter today.

Fasano is asking for the Senate investigation and the Florida Department of Law Enforcement is also looking into possible wrongdoing at the commission.

Read Fasano’s letter after the jump.
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A rate hearing to consider Florida Power and Light’s proposed $1.5 billion-a-year rate hike will continue, the panel overseeing the state’s utilities ruled.

The Public Service Commission hearing came to an abrupt halt earlier this morning when Commissioner Nathan Skop revealed that commission staffer Ryder Rudd had attended a Kentucky Derby party at the home of an FPL executive in Palm Beach County.

Skop asked that Rudd, who earns $92,000 a year, be removed from the case and other pending FPL dockets, including a $1.6 billion proposed natural gas pipeline.

Rudd had oversight of more than $4 billion in FPL cases pending before the panel, Skop objected. Skop also asked for Rudd’s resignation and questioned whether the current rate hike case should be dismissed.

PSC Chairman Matthew Carter ordered a recess and asked general counsel Patrick Imhof for advice on how to proceed.

Imhof told the panel that this morning’s rate hearing should continue but Rudd, who was never identified by name, should be taken off the case.

“Our recommendation is to remove the person in question from all FPL dockets pending review by the inspector general and review with the office of the general counsel,” Imhof said. But, he added: “There is no impediment to the rate case moving forward at this time.”

Carter ordered a lunch break so the commission, staff and lawyers representing the utility and consumers could have a “fresh start.”

The hearing is scheduled to begin again at 1 p.m.

Palm Beachers love parties and a horse race is as good an excuse as any to host one for the county’s elite.

But the Kentucky Derby party at FPL vice president Ed Tancer’s Palm Beach Gardens home in the gated San Michele community has a Public Service Comission staffer in hot water.

PSC governmental affairs director Ryder Rudd and his wife attended the fete at Tancer’s home although Rudd is involved in hearings about FPL’s proposed natural gas pipeline.

PSC Commissioner Nathan Skop interrupted an FPL rate hearing this morning asking that Rudd be removed from the case and also asking for the employee to resign.

Rudd told Skop and PSC Commissioner Nancy Argenziano about the party over the weekend and tried to reach Commissioner Katrina McMurrian, the commissioners said.

McMurrian said she did not listen to his voice message left on her cell phone.

PSC Chairman Matthew Carter said Rudd did not contact him and was taken aback by Skop’s revelations.

Tancer, 46, is a vice-president and general counsel for the utility.

FPL is asking for a $1.3 billion-a-year rate hike for its 4.5 million Florida customers. The rate hearing is scheduled to last two weeks, but Skop suggested that he may ask that the case be dismissed because of Rudd’s possible misconduct.

The rate hearing is now in recess until the commissioners figure out what to do. They may hold an emergency hearing to decide on Rudd’s fate.