October 23, 2014 @ 9:30 a.m.

Minnesota Public Utilities Commission

121 – 7th Place East, 3rd Floor Meeting Room

St. Paul, Minnesota

Thursday, the ITC Midwest, LLC application for its MN/IA Transmission Project is before the Public Utilities Commission.

WATCH Live Webcast

PUC Staff filed Staff Briefing Papers which gives us some idea what PUC staff is thinking about it:

Staff Briefing Papers_201410-103871-01

From these Staff Briefing Papers, it’s clear staff is discounting the importance of the judge’s “Finding of Fact” that ITC Midwest is a public service corporation.  The judge started out his Recommendation with this finding, the erroneous part highlighted:

PUC Staff, however, glossed over this in the narrative, and then used the summary which did not highlight the erroneous part.  So today I filed a letter of clarification:

NoCapX_PUC_Oct 21 2014

This is the most important part, a big deal, yet so simple:

Minn. Stat. Ch. 322B does not equal Minn. Stat. 301B.01 (or Ch. 301B).

301B	PUBLIC SERVICE CORPORATIONS

322B	LIMITED LIABILITY COMPANIES

Will the Public Utilities Commission care?  We shall see.