Reviving images of the summer of 2000 in San Diego, Southwest Gas Corp. customers in the surrounding mountain communities east of Los Angeles turned out in relatively large numbers for a California Public Utilities Commission public hearing last Tuesday night in Big Bear Lake, CA, objecting to the Las Vegas-based utility’s rates last year.

CPUC Commissioner Carl Wood attended the session in a packed meeting room that the administrative law judge estimated exceeded 300 angry consumers and some local elected officials. A similar hearing was held Wednesday in the high desert region about 100 miles northeast of Los Angeles.

In the midst of the 2000 and early 2001 natural gas prices spikes in the Southwest, Southwest Gas hedged against further spikes that subsequently have not materialized. As a result, its customers in the California mountain and high desert communities are paying $1.10/therm, compared with the $1.57/therm last winter, but still far higher than the 60-70 cents/therm paid by Southern California Gas Co. customers.

“The hearing reminded me very much of what happened in San Diego in August and September 2000,” Wood reported at the CPUC’s business meeting Wednesday. “The situation was a lot more tense, perhaps related to the fact that if people get their gas shut off in Big Bear, they die. There is a real threat to people’s well being and that was very much on people’s minds.”

The consumers in this relatively remote part of Southern California, were “pretty worked up” about the gas utility rate situation, and Wood said that while he couldn’t “promise them anything,” he told them the CPUC’s eventual action would be based on the results of the ongoing investigation of Southwest Gas’s rates.

©Copyright 2002 Intelligence Press Inc. Allrights reserved. The preceding news report may not be republishedor redistributed, in whole or in part, in any form, without priorwritten consent of Intelligence Press, Inc.