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Video: HB6 Referendum Fight Goes To Court

"This week brought a close to one chapter for Ohio's nuclear power plant bailout law, House Bill 6. But another could be starting.

The law would create 150 million dollars in annual subsides for nuclear plants starting in 2021 and running for 10 years. It would generate hundreds of millions of dollars for two coal plants – one in Indiana. And it would roll back renewable energy requirements on utilities and eliminated the mandate for power companies to reduce its energy use.

The group fighting against the bailout and these other measures mounted a last minute push for signatures and as Statehouse correspondent Andy Chow reports, their fight ultimately landed in federal court."

- Andy Chow, Statehouse News Bureau 

Nuclear bailout law to go into effect after referendum group misses deadline

Rachael Belz and Melissa English, Ohio Citizen Action, collect signatures for the HB6 Referendum at Land Grant Brewery. 

COLUMBUS -- "Ohioans Against Corporate Bailouts is still hoping a federal court will rule in favor of their request to extend the deadline in order for them to collect more signatures.

Ohioans Against Corporate Bailouts says they did not have enough signatures to qualify for a referendum. The anti-nuclear bailout group did not turn in their collected signatures to the Ohio Secretary of State's office by the deadline set in order to make next year's ballot.

Gene Pierce, Ohioans Against Corporate Bailouts spokesperson, says their referendum drive has been met with heavy opposition. He says this includes ads, mailers, and canvassers who allegedly blocked and harassed signature collectors.

'The bottom line is that the smear campaign and the lies and deceit of the House Bill 6 supporters were successful in confusing Ohioans and discouraging them from signing our petition,' says Pierce."

-- Andy Chow, Statehouse News Bureau

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IEEFA update: FirstEnergy stops at nothing in its quest for an Ohio ratepayer-financed bailout

"FirstEnergy has made one costly error in judgment after another over the past couple of decades. It covered up a near nuclear disaster at the Davis-Besse plant in 2002, for instance, ultimately costing hundreds of millions in repairs and replacement power. It made an ill-timed purchase of the coal-heavy Allegheny Energy in 2011. It sold natural gas and hydropower plants at a time when they were economically competitive. And it has failed to invest in wind and solar while leading the charge to weaken Ohio’s already-anemic renewable energy portfolio.

As a result, both the company and its subsidiary FirstEnergy Solutions—which owns the nuclear plants in question—sank into deep financial trouble, and FirstEnergy Solutions declared bankruptcy in April 2018. The company said it would close its two nuclear plants, Perry and Davis-Besse, and its remaining coal plant, W.H. Sammis, if it didn’t get a bailout from ratepayers or taxpayers.

Over the course of several years, FirstEnergy proposed at least four legislative and regulatory bailout schemes in Ohio (and IEEFA issued several analyses showing why these proposals were such a bad deal for Ohioans). Most of these schemes were rejected in full or in part for being unfair to ratepayers and antithetical to Ohio’s deregulated electricity marketplace. It also must be said that Ohio’s elected leaders have shown little interest in supporting workers and communities harmed when uncompetitive electricity generation plants close. This political inertia has enabled a climate ripe for fear-mongering by coal and nuclear proponents.

The 2018 elections gave the bailout proposal new life, when FirstEnergy saw its chance to hit the jackpot by placing its bets in the form of  close to $1 million in strategically-placed campaign contributions on a new governor, Mike DeWine, and new leadership of the Ohio General Assembly."

-- Sandy Buchanan, Institute for Energy Economics and Financial Analysis (IEEFA)

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Dark money is pouring in to protect the “worst energy policy in the country”

Mother Jones illustration; Getty

"It all started back in July, when the Ohio state legislature passed a law—called HB6—that, starting next year, will charge consumers new fees to rescue four struggling power plants. Those charges will eventually add up to a $1 billion bailout for the utility FirstEnergy Solutions’ two nuclear plants, while handing a lifeline to two 1950s-era coal plants owned by another utility, the Ohio Valley Electric Corporation.

Because of the law, Ohio is the first state to reverse its renewable energy standards and efficiency targets, all while funneling more money to coal—a move that has clean energy advocates fuming. Leah Stokes, an environmental political science professor at the University of California at Santa Barbara, called it the 'worst energy policy in the country.'

But this it isn’t your typical environmentalists-vs.-fossil-fuel-industry fight. The side opposing the bailout has clean-energy advocates working alongside the natural gas industry. And though the supporters of the bailout include some of the usual suspects—FirstEnergy, coal-reliant American Electric Power and Duke Energy, and the coal baron and Trump donor Robert Murray—they have also marshaled a mysterious string of deep-pocketed advocacy groups."

-- Rebecca Leber, Mother Jones

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Editorial: When thugs disrupt electoral process, courts should intervene

"Under state law, the referendum group has until Oct. 21 — 90 days after Gov. Mike DeWine signed HB 6 — to gather 265,774 valid signatures. The federal lawsuit asks a judge to reset the clock for another 90 days to compensate for what the group claims are unconstitutional burdens imposed by state referendum law.

Those include the requirement for the attorney general to approve proposed ballot language — Yost’s approval didn’t come until 40 of the 90 days had elapsed — and a requirement that signature gatherers submit their personal information in a public record.

Organizers of the referendum effort say Generation Now agents are using that information to contact signature gatherers and buy them off.

However the court rules regarding state referendum law, if Yost’s investigation finds criminal conduct by blockers, we hope it will lead to convictions, serious penalties and another chance for the referendum effort if it fails to meet the signature deadline."

-- Editorial Board, The Columbus Dispatch

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Actual CO2 emissions from EPA show “Ohio Clean Air Program” in HB 6 legislation lies to Ohio voters

Ohioans Against Corporate Bailouts' promotional material

COLUMBUS - Ohioans Against Corporate Bailouts today released data from the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency showing that carbon dioxide emissions from the three coal plants that benefit from HB 6 exceed by more than two times the carbon offset from the two nuclear plants that ratepayers are being forced to subsidize under the law.

'This information from the EPA shows once again how HB 6 supporters lied to Ohioans by claiming the bill was about clean air when it’s really just a bailout for a bankrupt company that doesn’t reduce carbon emissions,' said Gene Pierce, spokesman for the coalition.

From the moment that HB 6 was filed last spring, supporters of the ratepayer bailout for the Perry and Davis-Besse nuclear plants owned by FirstEnergy Solutions stated the plants must be subsidized and saved because they don’t emit carbon dioxide, a greenhouse gas that contributes to climate change.

However, under HB 6, two money losing coal plants owned by Ohio Valley Electric Corp, Clifty Creek in Indiana and Kyger Creek in Ohio, were added to also receive direct subsidies. A third coal plant set for retirement, the W.H. Sammis plant in Ohio, indirectly got a boost from HB 6 when owner FirstEnergy Solutions announced that with the subsides approved for its nuclear plants, it would keep Sammis open, too."

-- Ohioans Against Corporate Bailouts

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In Ohio, shady front groups fight dirty to attack grassroots campaign against $1 billion nuke/coal bailout

"An ugly political war is raging in Ohio, pitting consumer and environmental advocates against big utilities and dark-money front groups that want to make electricity customers pay more than $1 billion to bail out failing nuclear and coal-fired power plants. The bad guys are fighting dirty, using deceitful scare tactics and alleged cash payoffs that are now under investigation by the state attorney general, to derail the anti-bailout campaign.

It’s a fight for the future of energy that could erupt in other states as utilities seek public subsidies to prop up their outdated, inefficient, dirty and dangerous power plants against competition from cheaper and cleaner solar and wind power. Figures compiled by EWG show that in the past three years, five states have handed utilities more than $15 billion in taxpayer-funded bailouts of failing nuclear plants.

This summer, Ohio utility interests spent almost $10 million to push through legislation to slap a surcharge on ratepayers’ monthly electricity bills in a move to subsidize two nuclear plants owned by FirstEnergy Solutions and two coal plants owned by Ohio Valley Electric Corp. Not only are the plants not needed to provide a secure supply of electricity but the bill would also effectively stop state renewable energy and efficiency mandates for utilities.

Republican Gov. Mike DeWine signed the bill. But a grassroots group, Ohioans Against Corporate Bailouts, wants to let voters decide whether to overturn the law."

-- Grant Smith and Bill Walker, Environmental Working Group (EWG)

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Editorial: Campaign built on deceit undermines democracy in Ohio

COLUMBUS -- "Each time we think we have stated strongly enough our thorough disgust with backers of a nuclear-plant bailout (House Bill 6) and their lying, dangerous campaign to prevent voters from having a chance to overturn it, a new outrage prompts us to say it again: Voters, do not be fooled. If you oppose making electricity customers pay an extra $150 million per year to subsidize two failed power plants — or even if you just think voters should have the last word — sign the petition.

A dark-money group calling itself Ohioans for Energy Security — likely funded by the nuclear plants who want the bailout — has embarked on a scorched-truth campaign to stop an effort by another dark-money group, funded by natural gas interests, to put a referendum — which could cancel HB 6 — on the November 2020 ballot.

The latest ugly distortion is in a 30-second TV ad by Ohioans for Energy Security that began airing last Friday. It warns viewers about people gathering petition signatures for the referendum, describing them as 'outsiders brought into our state to roam our neighborhoods.'

We call this ugly because it casts the gathering of ballot petition signatures as something sinister. A mailer sent out by the group earlier instructed, 'If you see a circulator, report them to our hotline.' For what? Committing democracy?"

-- Editorial Board, The Columbus Dispatch

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Ohio AG investigates new allegations in fight over energy bill referendum

COLUMBUS — "Ohio Attorney General Dave Yost is investigating new allegations that people circulating petitions for a statewide referendum on a controversial energy bill are being offered cash to quit the campaign and to sell signed petitions to the opposing side.

It’s the latest chapter in a costly, contentious fight over House Bill 6, which was signed into law in July. It mandates Ohio’s 4.8 million utility customers pay monthly fees to bailout aging nuclear power plants owned by Akron-based FirstEnergy Solutions and two coal-fired plants owned by the Ohio Valley Electricity Corp. The bailouts add up to more than $1 billion.

Ohioans Against Corporate Bailouts, which faces an Oct. 21 deadline to collect 265,744 valid voter signatures, alleges that opponents of their campaign have offered their circulators as much as $10,000 to quit and one of their petition circulating vendors was offered $100,000 to pull out."

— Laura A. Bischoff, Dayton Daily News

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Nuclear bailout group encouraging people to remove signature from referendum

"'When HB6's supporters' false and misleading propaganda failed to slow down our petition drive, they resorted to physical intimidation tactics. When intimidation tactics didn't work, supporters switched to trying to confuse the situation even more with a withdrawal campaign. Voters are not confused. They know HB6 is a bailout and they know this petition will put the billion dollar bailout up for a vote,' Pierce says in a written statement.

Catherine Turcer with the voter rights group Common Cause Ohio, says the effort to remove names from the petition is just the latest strategy from groups trying to interfere with a citizen's right to referendum.

'Making it just even harder for voters to have the opportunity to vote on this energy bill,' says Turcer. 'There are so many hoops to do a referendum, it's just creating yet another hoop.'"

-- Andy Chow, Statehouse News Bureau

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