Oklahoma Supreme Court justices are being told they got it wrong in ruling against Rep. Tom Gann in his legal challenge of the Oklahoma Corporation Commission’s approval of the Winter Storm 2021 rate hike given Public Service Company of Oklahoma.
He contends the court failed to look at the calendar in its decision against him in his fight against the Corporation Commission. The legislator also suggested he would have needed a crystal ball in order to meet what the Supreme Court said he failed to do.
Gann argued the issues the Supreme Court said he failed to do, he couldn’t have done at the time because they weren’t known to the public prior to the Corporation Commission decision.
A day after the justices, in a unanimous ruling, said that Gann had failed to raise his challenges during Corporation Commission meetings and hearings, Gann filed a motion to reconsider. He aptly pointed out to the justices, they had apparently “overlooked important facts, and based thereon, reached erroneous conclusions precipitating a Decision that radically departs from past jurisprudence without addressing its rationale for doing so.
Gann’s filing on Wednesday stated, “Very succinctly, this Court may be unaware of the OCC’s 90-day intervention deadline in general rate cases.”
“However, clairvoyance would have been required for Appellant to have anticipated the OCC’s errors of law in time to meet the OCC’s 90-day intervention deadline in the appealed case.”
Gann went on to explain that PSO filed its formal application to modify its rates on January 31, 2024 and under OCC rules, those who were interested had to request permission to intervene no later than 90 days following the date of the application. But the Republican legislator from Inola pointed out that 2024 was a leap year and 90 days from January 31 of that year was May 1.
“But the public (including Appellant) did not learn about Commissioner Todd Hiett’s alleged criminal conduct involving employees of regulated companies until July 16 and 29, 2024 articles in The Oklahoman,” he added.
Gann challenged Commissioner Hiett’s votes on the matters, claiming he should not have taken part in the approval. He stated in his latest filing that Supreme Court was correct in stating he did not file an entry of appearance or attempt to intervene at the Corporation Commission, but “Appellant did not have reason to believe intervention to request Hiett’s recusal would be necessary by May 1, 2024.”
Gann’s filing also said he did not have any reason to “believe that the Attorney General would fail in his statutory duty to represent and protect the collective interests of all utility consumers and fail to request Hiett’s recusal on their behalf.”
As far as Gann’s challenge of the one-page audit used in approval by the commission of billions of dollars in winter storm securitization and use of bonds, he said he did not know the “OCC would put forward false, inadmissible testimony about the jurisdictionally-prerequisite 9078 Audit” on or before May 1 of 2024.
The legislator continued noting that PSO was required in May of 2024 to notify the public through publication of its rate hike intent, but he did not get a notice about the case until after the May 1, 2024 deadline to “request permission to intervene.”
“To summarize, the timing of the facts in this case are clear: Appellant could not have known that the OCC would commit the errors of law he has raised in his appeal on or before the May 1, 2024—Those errors of law either had not yet been committed or were not yet publicly known,” he wrote.
He continued that the Supreme Court ‘s decision against him earlier this week “appears to be influenced by unawareness of the 90-day intervention deadline that prevented Appellant Gann from doing anything other than filing public comment and appealing the OCC’s final order in this case, both of which he did.”
Rep. Gann also raised the question of the justices, “Is the Court really telling millions of Oklahoma utility customers to hire an attorney and intervene in every rate case in case the OCC commits fundamental and/or jurisdictional errors of law to which the Attorney General refuses to object on their behalf?”