On November 18, 2015, the House engrossed its bill to update the Massachusetts Public Records law, H.3858. The bill was not as far-reaching as the original House bill, of which I was co-sponsor, but that bill encountered serious pushback. As a member of the Committee on State Administration and Regulatory Oversight (SARO), I was asked soon after the bill's public hearing by my Committee Chair, Rep. Peter Kocot, to try to find common ground between supporters of the bill (media companies; ACLU, Common Cause, etc.) and its critics (Massachusetts Municipal Association; Massachusetts Municipal Lawyers Association, etc.)

 

H.3858 - which passed overwhelmingly, and without much debate - was tremendously contentious in its negotiation phase. Part of the difficulty that the municipalities had was the bill's uniform application to all cities and towns, which can range from large, well-staffed, professionally-run cities, to remote small towns which rely mainly on volunteer staffing and have no internet service. Much of the bill's inherent tension arises from the competing values of transparency and confidentiality - the press and public often wish to know every unfiltered detail in a record - versus the legal duty of municipalities to keep certain information private. There was concern over health, family, school and personnel information about individuals; ongoingpolicydiscussions, andunsolvedcriminal investigations, and other such issues.

 

There was also disagreement over how long a municipality should take to produce requested records; what penalties should attach to failures to produce such records, and who should be penalized for failure - the individual employee, or the taxpayers?

 

Public records requests can run from the simple (What are police officers paid? What is the tax valuation for properties on my street?) to the monumental (requests to Boston for every communication  concerning the proposed 2024 Olympics; to small towns in western MA to turn over every communication about controversial proposed natural gas pipelines, or to another town for copies of every email and text message that its elected officials have sent or received over the last 5 years.) In the end, the reforms envisioned by the House are fairly modest, but will be an improvement, and should be a good starting point for further reforms.

 

The Senate has yet to take up public records reform, so this debate will continue.

 In 2008, our legislature adopted laws committing MA to lower its carbon emissions (the "Global Warming Solutions Act"), through actions that would increase our use of renewable energy (the "Green Communities Act"). To optimize the production of electric power through solar photovoltaic (PV) panels, our legislation required electricity distribution companies to purchasesurplus solar energy from producers at the retail rate (what consumers pay for electricity.) The ability ofsolar producers - including homeowners with rooftop solar - to pay a "net" electric bill (the cost of the power you purchased, minus cost of power you sold back to the grid) is how "net metering" works.

 

Since 2008, solar energy has taken off in Massachusetts. For a while, we were the number three solar producer in the nation -+ though we've slipped to fourth place. While our net metering law unleashed demand for solar PV installations, it also set caps on the amount of solar energy that electricity distribution companies would have to buy back from solar energy generators in their geographic areas.

 

When caps are reached, it can become impossible for solar generators to sell electricity back to the grid, squandering the many benefits of distributed solar power generation. Besides being free from carbon emissions, solar power allows us to diversify our energy supply, making us less dependent on expensive spot market energy when demand spikes. As storage battery technology continues to improve, the benefits of solar  will only multiply.

 

Where we are now - and how we got here:

In July of 2014, the legislature raised the net metering cap by a small amount, to avoid reaching caps and allow the continued expansion of solar. On March 31, 2015, the cap was reached for commercial-scale solar projects in National Grid's territory of 171 cities and towns. I spoke personally to Gov. Baker on that day about the need to raise the cap; he was noncommittal then, but subsequently took a public position opposing the raising of net metering caps. In July, 2015, the Senate engrossed a Climate Change Adaptation bill  with an amendment eliminating net metering caps. The House but took up the Senate net metering amendment (disposing of Climate Change Adaptation in the process), and released its own net metering bill on November 17, 2015.

 

House members (myself included) filed 27 amendments to the net metering bill; adopting even a few would have improved the House bill in important ways - but no such amendments were adopted, and I voted against the bill. The House bill proposed a tiny increase (2%) to the cap, which would have likely been used up in just a few months. Worse, the bill would have changed the payment for solar power from the retail rate to the wholesale rate - a difference of approximately 13 cents per kilowatt hour - undermining the economics of solar generation. Although the Senate, in conference committee, quickly agreed to lower the cap increase to 2%, no agreement could be reached between the branches, and the net metering cap remains in place.

 

As State House News Service has reported, "[c]ome January the pressure will ratchet back up on conferees to strike a deal. The disagreement over solar is serving as a prelude to a broader debate next year over energy policies. Offshore wind and Canadian hydroelectricity interests are angling for a piece of the energy mix as lawmakers weigh price, reliability and demand issues that will be exacerbated with the Pilgrim Nuclear Plant shutdown."

 

I know that many of you support renewable energy, and the use of net metering - many of you have contacted me about this issue.  Here are some things you can do: