{"id":276,"date":"2021-02-01T16:26:10","date_gmt":"2021-02-01T16:26:10","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.commoncause.org\/ohio\/articles\/another-puco-vacancy-recommendations-from-the-public-utilities-nominating-commission-council\/"},"modified":"2021-02-01T16:26:10","modified_gmt":"2021-02-01T16:26:10","slug":"another-puco-vacancy-recommendations-from-the-public-utilities-nominating-commission-council","status":"publish","type":"article","link":"https:\/\/www.commoncause.org\/ohio\/articles\/another-puco-vacancy-recommendations-from-the-public-utilities-nominating-commission-council\/","title":{"rendered":"Another PUCO Vacancy & Recommendations from the Public Utilities Nominating Commission Council"},"template":"","class_list":["post-276","article","type-article","status-publish","hentry","article_type-blog-post"],"acf":{"details":{"summary":"","featured_image":null,"article_type":153,"authors":["{\"site_id\":\"1\",\"post_type\":\"person\",\"post_id\":7876}","{\"site_id\":\"1\",\"post_type\":\"person\",\"post_id\":12163}"],"related_issues":[105,423],"related_work":false,"location":null},"sidebar":{"helper_enable_sidebar":false,"helper_media_contact":{"heading":"Media Contact","manually_enter_person":false,"person":null,"name":"","role":"","phone":"","email":""},"helper_links_downloads":{"heading":"Links & Downloads","links":null}},"page_layout":[{"acf_fc_layout":"layout_wysiwyg","_acfe_flexible_toggle":null,"component_wysiwyg":{"content":"On January 22, the Public Utilities Commission Nominating Council sent Gov. Mike DeWine a list of recommended candidates to serve on the Commission for a five-year term beginning on April 11, 2021. The seat is held by Dennis Deters whose term expires in April. The 12-member Council is responsible for screening candidates and giving the governor a list of finalists. The Public Utilities Commission of Ohio (PUCO) is the sole state agency responsible for regulating utilities.\u00a0<\/span>\r\n\r\nThe governor rejected finalists submitted for a separate vacancy created by the resignation of Sam Randazzo as PUCO chairman, and subsequently received a new list of recommendations. Randazzo\u2019s departure came after the FBI raided his condo and after FirstEnergy disclosed that it paid $4 million to a person meeting Randazzo\u2019s description. Federal officials have an on-going bribery investigation into passage of a nuclear bailout law sought by FirstEnergy and its affiliates. Neither Randazzo nor any utilities have been charged in the case.<\/span>\r\n\r\nDeters is seeking re-appointment. He and three other finalists were recommended to Gov. DeWine. They are:<\/span>\r\n\r\n \r\n

Angela Amos<\/b><\/h3>\r\nAmos is a policy adviser at the Federal Energy Regulatory Commission (FERC), <\/span>the independent government agency regulating the interstate transmission of electricity, natural gas, and oil. She joined FERC as a financial analyst in the Office of Energy Market Regulation and now serves as policy adviser to FERC\u2019s <\/span>West Division, in the <\/span>Office of Energy Market Regulation. Her duties include providing technical and legal<\/span> advice to FERC Staff and Commissioner offices.<\/span>\u00a0<\/span>\r\n\r\nShe is the only Democrat to have made the first list of recommended candidates to fill Randazzo\u2019s vacany. Her background includes 15 years in the finance and energy industries.\u00a0<\/span>\r\n\r\nBefore joining FERC, her jobs included managing a Lehman Brothers energy trading desk and writing research reports on global coal and uranium markets. In her application, she noted past work for international firms where she analyzed how to apply business strategies to different (and sometimes conflicting) energy regulatory frameworks.\u00a0<\/span>\r\n\r\nIn doing her work, Amos says she often refers to the framework of ethics, economics, and the law that she studied in Leadership & Corporate Accountability as a first-year student at the Harvard Business School, \u201cEthically, we have to be mindful when considering the right thing to do. From the legal perspective, FERC has to ensure our regulations will hold up in court\u2014but those regulations also have to protect the markets, which brings in the economic lens. At the end of the day, the businesses that provide energy have to make money to survive. And customers need to pay, but the rate must be just and reasonable\u2014provisions exist so citizens can get the energy they need to live,\u201d she wrote in information provided with her application.<\/span>\r\n\r\nShe has an undergraduate degree in Afro-American Studies and Government at Harvard, and an MBA from Harvard.<\/span>\r\n\r\n \r\n

Dennis Deters<\/b><\/h3>\r\nDennis Deters is the only finalist who currently sits on the PUCO and who is closely tied to one of the people indicted by federal officials in the on-going racketeering case involving FirstEnergy, an Akron-based utility regulated by the Commission. He is a Republican.<\/span>\r\n\r\nPublic records show Deters with no investments in public utilities but his ethics statement for calendar year 2016 shows gifts from FirstEnergy lobbyist Leah Pappas and from the law firm Calfee, Halter & Griswold that employs her.<\/span>\r\n\r\nDeters was appointed to the five-member PUCO by Gov. DeWine in 2019 to fill a vacancy for a term that expires April 10. He served on Ohio\u2019s First District Court of Appeals from 2017-2019 when he was <\/span>appointed by then-Gov.\u00a0<\/span>John Kasich<\/span><\/a>\u00a0to succeed\u00a0<\/span>Pat DeWine<\/span><\/a>, who was elected to the\u00a0<\/span>Ohio Supreme Court<\/span><\/a>\u00a0in 2016.\u00a0Deters lost his bid for re-election to the Appeals Court on November 6, 2018, and left office on February 8, 2019.<\/span>\r\n\r\nDeters is connected to Matt Borges, the former chair of the Ohio Republican Party (ORP) who was indicted last July for his role in the bribery investigation that centers on a nuclear bailout bill that benefits FirstEnergy and American Electric Power.\u00a0<\/span>\r\n\r\nIn 2016, when Borges chaired the Ohio Republican Party, Deters tried and failed to unseat <\/span>Denise Driehaus on the Hamilton County Commission. Borges sent state GOP resources to help Deters\u2019 campaign. <\/span>\"<\/span>This is the largest urban county where the Republicans still control the commission,\"<\/span><\/a> Borges, told the Cincinnati Enquirer at the time. \"We lost it once a few years ago and won it back.\"\u00a0<\/span>\r\n\r\nThe state party\u2019s involvement allowed Deters to tap into a donor network across Ohio. Borges even took the unusual step of sending the Ohio GOP\u2019s finance director to help coordinate fundraising efforts, and campaign finance reports show that the ORP gave $10,000 to Deters\u2019 race.<\/span>\r\n\r\nBorges has a history with the Deters family: Nearly two decades ago he was chief of staff for Deters\u2019 brother, then-state treasurer Joe Deters, when he landed at the center of a pay-to-play scandal in the treasurer\u2019s office. An investigation by <\/span>The Plain Deale<\/span><\/i>r of Cleveland showed that Treasurer Deters\u2019 office steered lucrative state investment contracts to donors \u2013 including some who lacked the qualifications to do the taxpayer-funded work. The contract steering caused Ohio\u2019s investment portfolio to underperform other public investment accounts governed by similar restrictions.<\/span>\r\n\r\nAfter an investigation by the Cuyahoga County prosecutor, Borges pleaded guilty to a misdemeanor charge for improper use of public office. He later got his record expunged and had no more encounters with the criminal justice system until last July when federal officials accused him of bribing a person for information about the campaign to try and repeal the bail law. He has pleaded not guilty.<\/span>\r\n\r\nCommissioner Deters has a Bachelor of Arts in English and government from the University of Notre Dame and a law degree from the University of Cincinnati.\u00a0<\/span>\r\n\r\n \r\n

Ronald Russo<\/b><\/h3>\r\nRusso spent 20 years leading Russo Site Consultants, which contracted primarily with utility companies such as AT&T.<\/span>\r\n\r\nOver the past few years, he\u2019s worked for various other companies on a number of wind and solar farm projects in Michigan and Wisconsin, leading site investigation, landowner relations, environmental research, and other aspects.<\/span>\r\n\r\n\u201cI have been developing new utility scale solar farms and was instrumental in building some of the largest wind farms East of the Mississippi river,\u201d his cover letter states.<\/span>\r\n\r\nHe has applied to be on the PUCO several times and he told the<\/span> Ohio Capital Journa<\/span><\/i>l why he is applying again: He believes PUCO\u2019s interests are \u201cpurely corporate\u201d and he would provide a much-needed consumer voice. \u201cI\u2019m a populist type of guy, helping citizens more than corporate. I\u2019m not sure if the governor\u2019s going to like that.\u201d<\/span>\r\n\r\nRusso called himself an \u2018\u2019underdog\u201d and suggested that powerful utilities have too much influence over the PUCO.<\/span>\r\n\r\n\u201cI\u2019m kind of tired of what\u2019s going on and what I\u2019m seeing,\u201d he said. He argued that utility companies always get their way in asking for \u201cbailouts, riders, anything extra,\u201d pointing to the nuclear bailout as evidence.<\/span>\r\n\r\nHe lives in Willoughby and has a law degree from the Marshall College of Law with a concentration in real estate and government law.\u00a0<\/span>\r\n\r\n \r\n

Stephen Serraino<\/b><\/h3>\r\nA political independent, Serraino is Counsel, Corporate Secretary, and Chief Compliance & Ethics Officer with a Michigan investor-owned public utility that is not subject to PUCO regulation. In his application for the PUCO, he said that his current job provides him with \u201cextensive energy and utility industry expertise to draw upon, expertise that can only prove valuable to a Commissioner\u2019s decision-making process. \u2018\u2019 He described himself as a \u201cconservative Independent\u2019\u2019 with extensive public utility experience delivering sound and effective regulatory and compliance legal advice.<\/span>\r\n\r\nHe also called himself a \u201crelationship builder\u201d with a knack for translating complex issues into successful solutions. He noted that he holds no stocks or bonds in any regulated utility that would be overseen by the PUCO.<\/span>\r\n\r\nOther previous workplaces include the Lucas County Auditor\u2019s Office in Toledo, where he also served as general counsel, and the Dean and Fulkerson law firm in Michigan, where he \u201canalyzed and mitigated marketing and antitrust challenges for top-tier auto parts manufacturers and other high-profile clients.\u201d<\/span>\r\n\r\nWhile a partner at Anspach, Serraino, Meeks & Nunn from 1987 to 2004, he represented CSX Transportation, Whirlpool and other business clients. The PUCO and Ohio Rail Development Commission regulate and inspect rail grade crossings.<\/span>\r\n\r\nHe spent five years as an Ohio Supreme Court-appointed member of the Lawyers\u2019 Fund for Client Protection and was once an assistant professor of social medicine for Ohio University\u2019s College of Osteopathic Medicine.\u00a0<\/span>"}}]},"yoast_head":"\nAnother PUCO Vacancy & Recommendations from the Public Utilities Nominating Commission Council - Common Cause Ohio<\/title>\n<meta name=\"robots\" content=\"index, follow, max-snippet:-1, max-image-preview:large, max-video-preview:-1\" \/>\n<link rel=\"canonical\" href=\"https:\/\/www.commoncause.org\/ohio\/articles\/another-puco-vacancy-recommendations-from-the-public-utilities-nominating-commission-council\/\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:locale\" content=\"en_US\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:type\" content=\"article\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:title\" content=\"Another PUCO Vacancy & Recommendations from the Public Utilities Nominating Commission Council\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:url\" content=\"https:\/\/www.commoncause.org\/ohio\/articles\/another-puco-vacancy-recommendations-from-the-public-utilities-nominating-commission-council\/\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:site_name\" content=\"Common Cause Ohio\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:image\" content=\"https:\/\/www.commoncause.org\/ohio\/wp-content\/uploads\/2024\/08\/OH.png\" \/>\n\t<meta property=\"og:image:width\" content=\"1200\" \/>\n\t<meta property=\"og:image:height\" content=\"675\" \/>\n\t<meta property=\"og:image:type\" content=\"image\/png\" \/>\n<meta name=\"twitter:card\" content=\"summary_large_image\" \/>\n<script type=\"application\/ld+json\" class=\"yoast-schema-graph\">{\"@context\":\"https:\/\/schema.org\",\"@graph\":[{\"@type\":\"WebPage\",\"@id\":\"https:\/\/www.commoncause.org\/ohio\/articles\/another-puco-vacancy-recommendations-from-the-public-utilities-nominating-commission-council\/\",\"url\":\"https:\/\/www.commoncause.org\/ohio\/articles\/another-puco-vacancy-recommendations-from-the-public-utilities-nominating-commission-council\/\",\"name\":\"Another PUCO Vacancy & Recommendations from the Public Utilities Nominating Commission Council - 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