February 21, 2007: PUCO Nominating Council chair comments on selection process Sandy Buchanan is Executive Director of Ohio Citizen Action. Thomas Green is a lobbyist for AT&T and Columbia Gas and the Chairman of the PUCO Nominating Council. Charles Moses is President and chief lobbyist for the Ohio Telecom Association. Ms. Buchanan, I see by your website that you still have Mr. Moses in your gunsight. I wanted you to know that he was the only unanimous choice of the 12 member nominating council. In the discussions we had before voting, the council members were most impressed with Mr. Moses' background as a senior vice president of a major public relations agency in Columbus. Mr. Moses said he believes the PUCO and its functions were not well known to the general public and he thought he could make a major contribution to changing that. He felt the public may never like the PUCO but if the agency reached out to the public, perhaps they would better understand why things happen as they do. We were extremely impressed with that motivation as well as his description of how he would seek public input to the process. Although he is a registered lobbyist, he is not considered to be a "statehouse lobbyist" in the sense that he is there on a daily basis cajoling legislators. All of the telephone companies that belong to the association he manages, have their own lobbyists that do that. People who know Charley Moses find him to be intelligent, articulate and a fine human being. I believe he would make an outstanding public utilities commissioner although he may not be given that opportunity due to continued assaults on him as a "lobbyist." This is just a little background on what occurred at the nominating counsel meeting. Please remember that only four of the council members have any involvement with utilities. The others who voted for Mr. Moses included the vice chair of the Ohio Consumer's Counsel, former Senator Meshel for the Department of Aging, representatives of the accounting and engineering profession and the mayor of St. Clairsville representing Ohio Municipals. Best regards, Tom Green