Fresno Mayor Jerry Dyer says an Assembly bill that would retroactively change the rules for the state’s net metering agreements with solar customers would be a “significant threat” to the city, its residents, and all of California.

Assembly Bill 942, introduced by Southern California Democrat Lisa Calderon, would trim compensation agreements from 20 years to 10 years for customers with NEM 1.0 and 2.0 contracts, and also would eliminate the carryover of such contracts after home sales.

Calderon previously worked for Southern California Edison’s parent company.

On Tuesday, Dyer sent a letter of opposition to Assemblymember Cottie Petrie-Norris, chair of the Assembly Committee on Utilities and Energy. The committee has scheduled a hearing on the bill on April 30.

Dyer said the city is halfway into the deployment of more than 34 megawatts of solar energy, with expected savings of more than $154 million in electricity costs over the next 20 years. AB 942 would jeopardize more than 50% of the city’s utility bill savings, which would result in uncertain costs for city residents and uncertain funding for public safety jobs, he wrote.

“Retroactive policymaking is a detrimental practice that undermines responsible city planning. While the state is entitled to reassess the future of solar policy, altering established regulations regarding long ago procurement decisions is inappropriate. It is alarming to see the Legislature contemplate such actions during this time of uncertainty on the federal level for municipal revenues and clean energy efforts,” Dyer wrote.

Mayor Dyer’s Letter

Outrage Spurs Other Legislation

He joins a growing chorus of opponents that includes the Fresno City Council, which is scheduled Thursday to consider a resolution in opposition of AB 942, school districts, and advocates for the environment and the solar industry.

AB 942 in an outlier in the current legislative session that has a number of bills addressing utility costs on the docket, including one that would limit annual rate increases to the consumer price index.

Related Story: Outrage Grows to Assembly Bill That Would Slash Solar Contract Benefits

That’s the result of growing pressure on legislators by their constituents to rein in skyrocketing utility cost and focus their attention on the regulators in the California Public Utilities Commission.

Former PUC Chair Loretta Lynch, now one of the agency’s biggest critics, said in an opinion piece published Wednesday that the PUC has not rejected any rate increase requests from the investor-owned utilities for the past 10 years, and Californians now pay the nation’s second-highest residential rates and highest business rates for electricity.

Lynch said the PUC is failing in its duty as a watchdog for the state’s residents by ignoring audits about the utilities’ wildfire mitigation spending and also by allowing interim rate increases without requiring the utilities to document how the money would be spent and whether such spending is justified.

“What’s surprising is why, for so long, we have tolerated the commission’s abdication of its central duty: To protect us while making sure that needed and reasonable investments are made to keep the lights on. When will we require our elected officials to stop the gravy train and make the state utilities commission do its job?” Lynch wrote.