Source: TURN Newsroom | By Steve Padilla’s Office

The legislative package is co-sponsored by ratepayer advocacy group TURN and environmental advocacy group Net-Zero California. “California needs to take a leadership role in addressing the threats and opportunities presented by data centers” said Matthew Freedman, Staff Attorney at The Utility Reform Network. “These bills will ensure new electrical demand created by data centers helps to lower rates for all customers, improves grid reliability and accelerates the transition to clean energy resources.”

SACRAMENTO – Yesterday, Senator Steve Padilla (D-San Diego) introduced Senate Bills 886 and 887, two measures designed to protect California ratepayers from the potential increased costs and environmental damage caused by data centers. Data centers are facilities housing the digital infrastructure, crucial to artificial intelligence services. The bills set new standards incentivizing data center development that supports California’s grid and communities in which they are built.  

Source: Politico | By Noah Baustin

The Utility Reform Network is contacting state Assembly and Senate candidates urging them to take strong energy affordability positions, according to Mark Toney, the organization’s executive director. 

Energy rates have quickly emerged as California’s 2026 political punching bag. And signs are everywhere that the Sacramento class intends to keep hammering the issue this election year.  

Source: KQED | By Laura Klivans with Montecillo, Gabriela Glueck, and Jessica Karisa

Mark Toney: Maybe it will take a credible campaign to wake up PG&E to what they need to do.  I don’t want to discourage this campaign, public power campaign, and I’ll tell you why. Because if there is a real threat that they may lose the franchise, maybe that will provide the motivation to do a better job, to bring the rates down, to increase the of their facilities.

San Francisco residents are furious with Pacific Gas & Electric after nearly one third of the city was hit by a series of power outages over the holiday season. This public outrage has also revived calls for the city — or even the state — to take over the investor-owned utility.

Source: The Sacramento Bee | By Stephen Hobbs

The Utility Reform Network, an organization also known as TURN that closely watches and challenges utility filings, said the company knew the program was not cost-effective but kept doing it anyway in 2022.  The suggested decision supports that argument, saying the company acted “unreasonably and imprudently” when it continued the program in 2022 without making changes even as expenses outpaced budgets. “This proposed decision sends a clear message that ratepayers should not have to pay for unnecessary overspending that doesn’t benefit wildfire safety,” Mark Toney, TURN’s executive director. “We are hoping the commissioners will stand strong and adopt the recommendations.”

Pacific Gas and Electric Co. could be allowed to recover more than $1.4 billion from ratepayers for wildfire mitigation, vegetation management, storm response and other expenses the company had in 2022 under a proposed decision set to go in front of state utility regulators.

Source: The Mercury News | By Ethan Baron

But Mark Toney, executive director of watchdog group The Utility Reform Network (TURN), said PG&E’s customers “expect PG&E to walk the talk” on safety, and added, “that’s what we’re paying the bills for.”  Critics say the focus on wildfire prevention may come at a cost elsewhere, with TURN’s Toney worrying that PG&E is “not paying the same level of attention to other safety issues and other maintenance issues.” “Who’s going to pay?” Toney said. “Are ratepayers going to have to pay for it? It doesn’t seem fair.”

Two recent fires at PG&E substations cut power to thousands, drew condemnation from members of Congress, and spotlighted a year full of safety and maintenance violations at the utility giant’s substations throughout the region, from oil leaks to broken cooling fans and birds’ nests in equipment.

Source: KRCR ABC7 | By Hannah Gutierrez

Executive Director of TURN, Mark Toney, claims that although a noticeable drop was observed in 2025, the utility has 10 rate increase proposals before the CPUC. “That is strong evidence that the bills are destined to go back up. If you think your bills are too high, every time you get a bill once a month, call your assembly member, call your senator, call the governor, and say support TURN’s affordability bills" Toney told KRCR. He believes rates will eventually rise again.

PG&E announced electric rates will drop for the fourth time in two years on January 1, 2026, but The Utility Reform Network (TURN) says they don't expect the relief to be for long. PG&E said that, along with earlier reductions, residential electric rates will be 11% lower than in January 2024, resulting in savings of about $20 per month. Additionally, electric prices for CARE customers will decline by 6%. 

Source: Bay Area News Group | By George Avalos

“PG&E’s claim to care about affordability would ring more true if it decided to withdraw its 10 rate increase requests currently pending at the CPUC, rather than trumpet temporary decreases brought about because customers have finally paid for some of PG&E’s overspending on tree trimming projects,” said Mark Toney, executive director of The Utility Reform Network, a consumer group. “Claims of lower bills are little more than smoke and mirrors.”

After years of steep increases, PG&E customers are expected to see modestly lower electric and gas bills starting in January 2026, according to a new regulatory filing by the utility.  The typical residential customer who receives both electric and natural gas service from PG&E would pay an average of $285 a month beginning with the January 2026 billing cycle — about $10 less than the average bill in January 2025, or a 3.4% decrease, the company said.

Source: CalMatters | By Alejandro Lazo

It amounts to a “toothless” measure, directing the utility regulator to study an issue it already has the authority to investigate, said Matthew Freedman, a staff attorney with The Utility Reform Network, a ratepayer advocate.  The report could help shape future debates as lawmakers revisit tougher rules and the CPUC considers new policies on what data centers pay for power – a discussion gaining urgency as scrutiny of their rising electricity costs grows, he said.

Tools that power artificial intelligence devour energy. But attempts to shield regular Californians from footing the bill in 2025 ended with a law requiring regulators to write a report about the issue by 2027.  If that sounds pretty watered down, it is. Efforts to regulate the energy usage of data centers — the beating heart of AI — ran headlong into Big Tech, business groups and the governor. 

Source: Redheaded Blackbelt | By Staff Writers

“Revising the Cost of Capital decision in favor of utility shareholders is more than just buckling under pressure from PG&E and other major utilities. It is part of a disturbing pattern of Commissioners disregarding proposals to address the affordability crisis issued by their own judges and staff, based upon evidence presented by all parties in ratemaking cases. The legislature needs to take more action to address the affordability crisis, because the CPUC has failed to do so,” said Mark Toney, executive director of The Utility Reform Network (TURN).

The California Public Utilities Commission (CPUC) voted (4-1) last week to approve profit margins for the state’s utilities that consumer, environmental, and community intervenors agree are unjustifiably high. The approved profit margins range from 9.78% to 10.03% across PG&E, SoCalGas, SCE, and SDG&E. 

Source: The San Francisco Chronicle | By Julie Johnson

Mark Toney, executive director of utility customer advocate group The Utility Reform Network, or TURN, told the Chronicle on Monday that his organization wanted the commission’s investigation to examine the connection between all three fires.  “The fact that it’s happened before in the same location — absolutely there are questions that ought to be answered,” Toney said. 

Widespread blackouts hit San Francisco at the worst time. Christmas shoppers crowded commercial districts. Restaurants were buzzing and the city’s concert venues were packed for holiday shows.  Suddenly, the lights went dark in about 120,000 businesses and homes. BART trains bypassed Powell and Civic Center stations. Food went bad in warm refrigerators. 

Source: KCBX | By Kendra Hanna

Mark Toney is the executive director of The Utility Reform Network. He said the new rate is only a little higher than what he had hoped, but that rate decrease is negligible next to the amount spent on expensive projects like PG&E burying their power lines. Toney still expects that customers’ monthly bills will continue to go up.

The commission that regulates California’s utilities just approved a lower investor return rate for the next two years. That can affect costs to customers, but it’s not clear if it will reduce their monthly bills. Pacific Gas and Electric, or PG&E, will have to compensate investors for infrastructure projects at this new, lower rate. It’s now set to just under 10% — lower than what PG&E requested, and the lowest rate since 2006.

Source: The Mercury News | By George Avalos

The Utility Reform Network also disagreed with the decision because the PUC didn’t sufficiently reduce PG&E’s rate of return.  “Revising the decision in favor of utility shareholders is more than just buckling under pressure from PG&E and other major utilities,” TURN Executive Director Mark Toney said. “It is part of a disturbing pattern of commissioners disregarding proposals to address the affordability crisis.” Toney urged state politicians to step in and help utility customers.  “This is a clear sign that the Legislature needs to take more action to address the affordability crisis, because the CPUC has failed to do so,” Toney said.

State regulators Thursday reined in the profit returns that shareholders of PG&E and other utility providers can harvest, a decision that failed to quell a debate over whether customers can easily afford to pay their monthly electric and gas bills.  The state Public Utilities Commission voted 4-1 to approve slightly lower rates of return for shareholders starting in 2026 compared to current levels.

Source: The San Diego Union Tribune | By Rob Nikolewski

“Revising the cost of capital decision in favor of utility shareholders is more than just buckling under pressure from PG&E and other major utilities,” TURN executive director Mark Toney said.  “It is part of a disturbing pattern of commissioners disregarding proposals to address the affordability crisis issued by their own judges and staff, based upon evidence presented by all parties in ratemaking cases. This is a clear sign that the Legislature needs to take more action to address the affordability crisis, because the CPUC has failed to do so."

The California Public Utilities Commission on Thursday trimmed the rates of profit that investor-owned utilities such as San Diego Gas & Electric will make on their energy infrastructure projects — although consumer and environmental groups said the CPUC’s reductions should have cut deeper.  

Source: Politico | By Noah Baustin

Mark Toney, executive director of affordability group The Utility Reform Network, said in an interview that the small drop in the return on equity won’t make up for other major CPUC approvals of capital spending to reduce wildfire risk on the grid, which will have the overall effect of increasing ratepayer costs in the long run. “The CPUC giveth with one hand, they taketh away with another hand, and that’s what’s happening right now,” Toney said, expressing frustration with the agency’s utility-friendly decision on a recent major wildfire resilience investment decision.

THREADING THE NEEDLE: California energy regulators tried hard to capture the in-vogue affordability rhetoric as they marginally cut the profit rate that investor-owned utilities will be allowed to pass onto their shareholders in 2026. But they’re playing to a tough crowd: Everyone from investment bankers to affordability hawks ended up bashing their final decision.  

Source: The Orange County Register | By Teri Sforza

“What the CPUC giveth with one hand, they taketh away with the other,” said Mark Toney, executive director of the consumer advocacy group TURN, The Utility Reform Network.  People pay a lot of attention to the ROE percentages the utilities can collect — ooo! they’re going down! — but that misses the forest for the trees, TURN’s Toney suggested. “When you’re financing a home, you want to know, ‘What’s my monthly payment?’ ” he said. “The two things that impact that are — yes, the interest rate on your mortgage — but, much more importantly, the price of your house.”  In this analogy, the amount of money utilities borrow for capital projects equates to the price of the house. “It’s the same thing with people’s monthly bills. They’re more impacted by how much is being financed,” Toney said. “I get frustrated because there’s so much media on the percentage, while utilities are allowed to bloat their capital costs. So the reduction in the percentage — don’t get me wrong, that’s a good thing — is going to be more than offset by how much is being financed.”

As our electric bills continue their skyward ascent, a question crackles like lightning over regulators’ heads: how much profit should the big utilities be allowed to make? The California Public Utilities Commission wrestled with that lightning on Thursday. In the end, commissioners gave the utilities less than they asked for, and less than they got the year before, but way more than what consumer advocates believe they should get.

Source: Politico | By Noah Austin

That frustrated affordability advocates at The Utility Reform Network. “This is the CPUC caving to the utilities,” said TURN Executive Director Mark Toney in an interview.

California utilities scored a major victory Wednesday to the dismay of affordability advocates, with regulators stripping a key element energy companies disliked from a proposed power line undergrounding program.  

Source: NRDC | By Jordan Brinn

NRDC and The Utility Reform Network submitted an electric rate design proposal to the California Public Utilities Commission to promote equity and encourage beneficial electrification. This is the first stage in a regulatory process to implement income-based fixed charges.  This proposal helped California regulators figure out how to confidently plan and pay for grid upgrades when the future is inherently uncertain, providing other states with a road map. Although the California Public Utilities Commission (CPUC) gets some things right with this decision, the ways in which it deviates from the NRDC proposal increases the risk of imprudent utility spending.

Planning the electric grid used to be much easier because utilities had a reasonable idea of where electricity demand would grow, when it would grow, and by how much. Electrification, a key strategy to decarbonizing California’s economy, has made distribution grid planning much more complicated because it is now harder to accurately predict how electricity demand will grow and what investments are necessary to support a reliable grid. 

Source: KQED | By Laura Klivans

There are real barriers to seeking help for high utility bills, said Constance Slider Pierre, who oversees The Utility Reform Network’s consumer hotline. Barriers include speaking limited English, confusion over how to read bills, and difficulty reaching customer service representatives, Slider Pierre said.  

For three days last December, when Kenya Brown’s youngest four kids weren’t in school, they spent their time at her oldest son’s apartment. They did their homework, charged their phones, showered and had dinner.  The children returned to the family home only to sleep;the house was dark and cold. Their utilities had been shut off — no heat, no lights, no hot water, no gas for cooking; Brown hadn’t paid the bill in months.  Brown’s bills are like many others in California: high, especially in recent years. 

Source: CalMatters Live | By Alejandro Lazo

Mark: “TURN is a consumer advocacy organization that fights for the customers of the investor-owned utilities.  We believe in the cleanest, safest energy at the most affordable price so we say we want the most green for the least green.  One of our major concerns is the affordability crisis and PG&E’s residential bills have doubled in five years.  We want to make sure that with this affordability crisis that the growth of data centers doesn’t end up with even more skyrocketing bills.  There certainly needs to be more transparency when it comes to data center energy usage.

As California races to break its dependence on fossil fuels and expand clean energy, a new power player is emerging: data centers. Driven by the explosive growth of artificial intelligence, these energy-hungry facilities are reshaping the state’s electricity landscape. 

Source: Communications Daily | By Matt Daneman

The FCC order will increase phone service costs for hundreds of thousands of low-income Californians, the Utility Reform Network (TURN) emailed us. It noted that since the 1980s, the state has operated its own Lifeline program, which is exclusively funded by California customers and provides discounts on the monthly phone bills of low-income households. AB-1303 gives the CPUC "the flexibility to ensure that all eligible households can apply for California Lifeline," TURN said. It also gives consumers "more control over who their data is shared with.”

A state law barring the California Public Utility Commission (CPUC) from sharing information about Lifeline program subscribers with other government agencies, including immigration authorities, means the state can no longer do its own Lifeline subscriber verifications, according to the FCC. The Wireline Bureau ordered Thursday that the state could no longer opt out of using the National Lifeline Accountability Database (NLAD) federal verification system. "Going forward, federal processes will be used to conduct eligibility verifications and perform duplicate checks for federal Lifeline program applicants in California.”