SB235 Veto Message Full Text

As any casual reader knows, my typing sucks. I had to type in this document so any errors you may find are mine. If there is anything substantive please let me know.

July 31, 2001

TO THE MEMBERS OF THE SENATE OF THE 141st GENERAL ASSEMBLY

Pursuant to article III, Section 18 of the Delaware Constitution, I am vetoing Senate Bill 235 by returning it to the Senate without my signature for reconsideration. I take this action because of serious operational and structural problems presented by the bill, particularly those caused by an amendment to the bill which was introduced on June 28 2001, passed by the house of representatives late in the evening on June 30, 2001 and passed by the senate shortly after midnight on July,1, 2001.

Senate Bill 235 places the sole authority for ‘development, promulgation and maintenance’ of state facilities energy management plan in the hands of the State Energy Office. This task has previously been the express responsibility of the division of Facilities management. I do not believe that it is wise to div3est the Division of Facilities Management, which bears responsibility for containing the cost of maintaining state facilities, from any role in developing and maintaining energy management plans. For those facilities. Considerations of long and short-term costs and return on investment are vital to all decisions regarding energy management plans, and although the Energy Office has a valuable role to play in developing and maintaining such plans, such plans should not exclude the entity responsible for overall maintenance of state facilities. S.B. 235 also strips the division of Facilities management of its responsibility for conducting energy audits of state facilities and provision of technical assistance to such facilities, and purports to transfer that responsibity to the Energy Office. The performance of such energy audits is a labor-intensive task that the Energy Office is not currently equipped to perform because of limited staff.

Senate Bill 235 expands the allowed use of ‘environmental incentive fund’ monies in a manner that is contrary to the purpose for which those monies were originally collected from electricity customers. As originally created by the legislature during the electric deregulation process, the environmental incentive fund was to be used for “environmental incentive programs for conservation and efficiency.” In other word, the fund was to be used to provide incentives to persons within the DP&L/Conectiv service area to take steps promoting conservation and energy efficiency. S.B. 235 dramatically expands the allowed use of these funds to include grants of up to $1 million to persons presenting ‘a feasible business plan…for the development of a product directly related to renewable energy property…” Thus, under S.B. 235, grants of up to $1million could be to persons or companies to develop renewable energy equipment, which companies could then sell without any requirement of reimbursement to the State of Delaware. Drawing huge sums of money out of the fund for private projects that may be of little or no benefit to energy conservation in Delaware is inconsistent with the purpose of the environmental incentive fund.

Senate Bill 235 also contains language which would eliminate an important condition that the legislature put on the expenditure of environmental incentive find money when the fund was created: that the money be spent within the service are covering those customers who created the fund through their payment of the DP&L and Conectiv bills. The legislature placed this condition of the environmental incentive fund monies to ensure that those funds were not spent out of state or even in those portions of the state that had not contributed to the fund. However, House amendment No. 1 to Sb.B 235 eliminated this requirement altogether.

Senate Bill 235 also removed from the President Pro Tem of the Senate and the Speaker or the House the authority to appoint representatives to the body that would distribute environmental incentive fund money and instead afforded those appointments to the chairs of the Senate Energy and transit Committee and the House Telecommunications Committee. This is a substantial departure from the manner in which legislative appointments are normally made.

Senate Bill 235 also gives the board of the “Delaware Center for Green Energy” permission to use environmental incentive find money to pay for its members to take trips, pay for meals, and retain consultants – all without any limitation or approval of any state agency. The original version of S.b. 235 prior to its amendment (not to mention the existing statute governing the environmental incentive fund) required that the fund be used only for grants to third parities relating to energy conservation.

Finally, the Delaware Department of Justice has expressed serious concerns regarding the practical problems presented by Senate Bill 235’s unorthodox attempt to legislatively direct the creation of a private non-profit corporation without any direction as to the corporation’s charter, terms of its directors, the procedures for the conduct of the business, or it susceptibility to certain state laws that affect government entitles (such as freedom of Information Act).

The topic of energy conservation is an important one that should be addressed in a thoughtful, comprehensive manner when the legislature returns, and I also believe that Delaware’s State Energy Office should be administratively located within the Department of Natural Resources and Environmental control. However, I do not believe that Senate Bill 235 would result in sound energy conservation policy for Delaware. For this reason and those stated above, I have vetoed Senate Bill 235. Base upon the legislature’s directive in Section 79 of Senate Bill 350, I have directed the Budget Office to defer any transfer of Energy Office funds or duties to DNREC until S.B.235 or an equivalent bill is enacted.

Sincerely,

Ruth Ann Miner
Governor

Cc: Director John Wik
Secretary Nicholas A. DiPasquale
Director Peter M. Ross
Secretary Gloria Wernicki Homer