By: King of Parker, Hernandez H.B. No. 3615
A BILL TO BE ENTITLED
AN ACT
relating to certain rates charged by and programs offered by
municipally owned utilities.
BE IT ENACTED BY THE LEGISLATURE OF THE STATE OF TEXAS:
SECTION 1. Section 552.133, Government Code, is amended by
amending Subsection (a-1) and adding Subsection (b-1) to read as
follows:
(a-1) For purposes of this section, "competitive matter"
means a utility-related matter that is related to the public power
utility's competitive activity, including commercial information,
and would, if disclosed, give advantage to competitors or
prospective competitors. The term:
(1) means a matter that is reasonably related to the
following categories of information:
(A) generation unit specific and portfolio fixed
and variable costs, including forecasts of those costs, capital
improvement plans for generation units, and generation unit
operating characteristics and outage scheduling;
(B) bidding and pricing information for
purchased power, generation and fuel, and Electric Reliability
Council of Texas bids, prices, offers, and related services and
strategies;
(C) effective fuel and purchased power
agreements and fuel transportation arrangements and contracts;
(D) risk management information, contracts, and
strategies, including fuel hedging and storage;
(E) plans, studies, proposals, and analyses for
system improvements, additions, or sales, other than transmission
and distribution system improvements inside the service area for
which the public power utility is the sole certificated retail
provider; and
(F) customer billing, contract, and usage
information, electric power pricing information, system load
characteristics, and electric power marketing analyses and
strategies; and
(2) does not include the following categories of
information:
(A) information relating to the provision of
distribution access service, including the terms and conditions of
the service and the rates charged for the service but not including
information concerning utility-related services or products that
are competitive;
(B) information relating to the provision of
transmission service that is required to be filed with the Public
Utility Commission of Texas, subject to any confidentiality
provided for under the rules of the commission;
(C) information for the distribution system
pertaining to reliability and continuity of service, to the extent
not security-sensitive, that relates to emergency management,
identification of critical loads such as hospitals and police,
records of interruption, and distribution feeder standards;
(D) any substantive rule or tariff of general
applicability regarding rates, service offerings, service
regulation, customer protections, or customer service adopted by
the public power utility as authorized by law;
(E) aggregate information reflecting receipts or
expenditures of funds of the public power utility, of the type that
would be included in audited financial statements;
(F) information relating to equal employment
opportunities for minority groups, as filed with local, state, or
federal agencies;
(G) information relating to the public power
utility's performance in contracting with minority business
entities;
(H) information relating to nuclear
decommissioning trust agreements, of the type required to be
included in audited financial statements;
(I) information relating to the amount and timing
of any transfer to an owning city's general fund;
(J) information relating to environmental
compliance as required to be filed with any local, state, or
national environmental authority, subject to any confidentiality
provided under the rules of those authorities;
(K) names of public officers of the public power
utility and the voting records of those officers for all matters
other than those within the scope of a competitive resolution
provided for by this section;
(L) a description of the public power utility's
central and field organization, including the established places at
which the public may obtain information, submit information and
requests, or obtain decisions and the identification of employees
from whom the public may obtain information, submit information or
requests, or obtain decisions;
(M) information identifying the general course
and method by which the public power utility's functions are
channeled and determined, including the nature and requirements of
all formal and informal policies and procedures;
(N) salaries and total compensation of all
employees of a public power utility; [or]
(O) information publicly released by the
Electric Reliability Council of Texas in accordance with a law,
rule, or protocol generally applicable to similarly situated market
participants; or
(P) information related to a chilled water
program, as defined by Section 11.003, Utilities Code.
(b-1) Notwithstanding any contrary provision of Subsection
(b), information or records of a municipally owned utility or
municipality that operates a chilled water program are subject to
disclosure under this chapter if the information or records are
reasonably related to:
(1) a municipally owned utility's rate review process;
(2) the method a municipality or municipally owned
utility uses to set rates for retail electric service; or
(3) the method a municipality or municipally owned
utility uses to set rates for a chilled water program described by
Subsection (a-1)(2)(P).
SECTION 2. Section 11.003, Utilities Code, is amended by
adding Subdivision (3-a) and amending Subdivision (11) to read as
follows:
(3-a) "Chilled water program" means:
(A) a program to produce chilled water at a
central plant and pipe that water to buildings for air
conditioning, including a district cooling system or chilled water
service; or
(B) any other program designed to used chilled
water to provide air conditioning, reduce peak electric demand, or
shift electric load.
(11) "Municipally owned utility" means a utility
owned, operated, and controlled by a municipality or by a nonprofit
corporation the directors of which are appointed by one or more
municipalities and includes any chilled water program operated by
the utility.
SECTION 3. Section 552.133, Government Code, as amended by
this Act, applies only to a request for public information made on
or after the effective date of this Act. A request for public
information made before the effective date of this Act is governed
by the law in effect on the date of the request, and the former law
is continued in effect for that purpose.
SECTION 4. This Act takes effect September 1, 2021.