Nobody has ever liked getting their power bill.
Three state legislators from Southwest Virginia say they’re mad enough about the power bills from Appalachian Power that they want to look into stripping the utility of its monopoly status in the region and/or forcing a sale of its Virginia assets to another utility.
This sounds like the sort of thing that might simply be a rhetorical move, the proverbial “shot across the bow,” but the three senators — Travis Hackworth of Tazewell County, Todd Pillion of Washington County and Bill Stanley of Franklin County, all Republicans — say they are quite serious.
This would not quite be an unprecedented move — Stanley says Virginia once revoked the monopoly status of a small water company in the eastern part of the state — but it would be much more consequential when it comes to a major electrical utility that serves about 530,000 customers in the western third of the state.
So far, all this has played out in two letters, one the legislators sent to the State Corporation Commission, the regulatory body that deals with utilities, and then the SCC’s response.
Cardinal’s Matt Busse reported on the first of those letters, sent Feb. 12. In it, the three legislators said their constituents had experienced “rate shock and high bills since 2007” and that “all attempts” to work with Appalachian had “seemingly fallen on deaf ears.” They asked the SCC what the procedure is for revoking a utility’s monopoly status. Appalachian said at the time it was “very disappointed in the inaccurate statements being made” by legislators.
The SCC has now responded: In the terse language of lawyers, the SCC points the legislators to five different sections of state law that deal with the regulation of utilities, one of which says that the General Assembly has the power to revoke a utility’s charter. Even more lawyerly, the SCC response advises: “The information provided above is not intended to provide or suggest guidance by the SCC Staff or the Commission concerning Appalachian Power in the context of your February 12, 2025 letter.”
Of the three legislators who made the inquiry, Stanley is the only lawyer. He’s also one of the cleverest around. As such, he probably knew that the provision was in the law all along. What he’s got now is SCC research that lays out all the legal options (and confirms there aren’t others hidden somewhere else). He’s also got an opportunity to talk up his next steps (including, yes, with journalists such as me).
“If you look at the SCC, they affirm, like life, that utility monopolies in Virginia are not forever,” he told me. “The SCC quotes Scripture or, as I like to call it, Virginia code.”
The section in question dates from at least 1919 and probably earlier. (That’s the year when the state code was revised, a form of legal copy editing to clean up technical problems, and so all laws in existence prior to that are now referred to in the code as being “Code 1919.”) As the law goes, it’s so straightforward even a layman can understand it: “The charter of every public service corporation heretofore or hereafter incorporated may be repealed by any future General Assembly; but no law shall be passed for taking from a company its works or property without making to it just compensation.” In other words, yes, the legislature can revoke a utility’s charter but the state has to pay the company for its assets.
Would the General Assembly really do this? “I think that momentum is building but is not there yet,” Stanley says. “Right now, the answer is probably no. The utilities do have a lot of influence.”
Stripping Appalachian of its monopoly status is not the only endgame, though, Stanley says. “We could force the sale of those assets to Dominion or some co-op. … Are there suitors, are there electric utilities that operate in Virginia, that would be willing to buy those assets? I’ve been told those assets are in the $1 billion range. I’m sure Dominion could do it or co-ops collectively could do it. I’ve been reaching out to discuss those options with executives of other utilities.”
Appalachian declined to comment for this column. Stanley, though, was quite willing to talk. He says making a serious run at revoking Appalachian’s monopoly status or forcing a sale seems to be the only way to get the utility’s attention. “How can we otherwise get these power rates down?” he says.
Some context: Hackworth introduced a bill this session that would have allowed local governments in Appalachian’s territory to shop for power from other utilities on behalf of their residents. That bill died in committee on an 8-7 partyline vote. It’s unclear how much that vote tally represented enthusiasm for allowing competition and how much of it was simply fellow Republicans sticking up for one of their own when they knew the bill was going to fail anyway. One commonly cited reason not to allow competition is that Virginia deregulated electric utilities once before, then went back to regulation, so whatever the legislature does a) ought to be on a statewide basis and b) should be done for more considered reasons than simply people right now being upset about their power bills. In other words, you shouldn’t make a big structural change like that just because of a temporary problem in one part of the state, no matter how unhappy people are about what they’re paying.
Nothing about utility regulation, or energy in general, is simple, and doing something big and dramatic about a utility is out of keeping with the measured (some might say plodding) way that the Virginia General Assembly normally does business, no matter which party is in charge. That is the nature of a legislature, which is basically one giant committee.
Nonetheless, there are several important things to take note of here.
One is that these senators are hopping mad at, and about, Appalachian. I’m accustomed to seeing Democrats critical of a utility, usually over fuel choices, but it’s quite unusual to see Republicans taking aim at one of the region’s most prominent companies.
“Appalachian Power has continued to raise rates without concern for the people of our region,” Pillion told me by text. “They clearly believe that they can continue this behavior without accountability, as if they believe that their utility monopoly over our region is for eternity. Our letter to the SCC, and their response proves that the General Assembly can do something about this, if it is willing to do so. Senators Stanley, Hackworth and I are determined to make a significant difference on this issue, even if it takes removing ApCo as the energy provider for the Southside and Southwest Virginia service territory.”
Are they really serious about that? “If they cannot be competitive and improve service, yes,” Hackworth says.
Another curiosity is that it’s not unusual to see the legislature dealing with Dominion Energy, the state’s largest utility and one whose service territory is in the eastern part of the state where the bulk of the state’s population is. (Disclosure: Dominion is one of our donors, but donors have no say in news decisions; see our policy.) It was quite the spectacle in this past session to see legislators, many of them not all that familiar with Appalachian territory, having to deal with bills related to the main utility out here. (Or, from their point of view, out there.) I’m not an Appalachian customer (my power comes from the Craig-Botetourt Electric Co-op) so I have no direct stake in the utility’s rate issues, but I did find it somewhat refreshing that legislators from the eastern side of the state had to grapple with an issue on the western side. Here’s how Stanley put it: “If you don’t represent the service territory and don’t get the phone calls we get all the time, you don’t have that concern.” Now some of them have at least a smidge more sense of what life is like out here.
While Hackworth’s bill was given the legislative equivalent of a black-out, the General Assembly did pass another Appalachian-related bill (by state Sen. Mark Peake, R-Lynchburg, and Del. Jason Ballard, R-Giles County) that would allow the utility to securitize its assets as a way to reduce its expenses. That’s also billed as a way to lower utility rates, but Hackworth, Pillion and Stanley don’t feel that’s enough. “What the power company wants is for spring time to come and all these high bills to go away and everybody to forget,” Stanley says. “But I can tell you that Senator Hackworth and Senator Pillion and I are not going to let it go.”
Reenactment of Patrick Henry’s ‘give me liberty or give me death’ speech on Sunday will be livestreamed
Sunday marks the 250th anniversary of Patrick Henry’s famous “give me liberty or give me death” speech that inspired Virginia to arm itself for the coming revolution. There will be a reenactment at St. John’s Church in Richmond; it will also be livestreamed at 1:30 p.m.
We had three stories about Henry’s speech this week in our monthly Cardinal 250 report about Virginia’s role in American independence. Stephen Wilson wrote about the upcoming observance, Brandy Centoloza wrote about how scholars regard Henry’s speech today and I wrote about what modern-day political commentators would say if they were transported back in time. We also had a podcast about Henry’s speech, which has been called one of the most influential in American history. Want more history from that era? Sign up for our monthly Cardinal 250 newsletter. Or our weekly political newsletter that goes out every Friday!