By Michael Shepherd with David Marino Jr. - Dec. 28, 2022
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📷 A power line worker from New Brunswick travels through Yarmouth to be on hand for a major winter storm on Thursday, Dec. 22, 2022. (AP photo by Robert F. Bukaty)

Good morning from Augusta. The Daily Brief will be off through the New Year holiday and will return on Jan. 3, 2023. Here's your soundtrack.

What we're watching today

Under pressure, Maine's big utilities respond to yet another massive winter storm. The state's outage map was nearly cleared on Wednesday morning, five days after the windstorm that saw outages peak above 365,000 across the two major utilities. That was more than the 1998 ice storm and neared the total from a historic 2017 windstorm that changed how the companies are viewed and left incentives for a quick response.

Both Central Maine Power Co. and Versant Power ranked last again in customer approval again in a recent J.D. Power survey. CMP's $1 billion corridor project was rejected by voters last year and remains stalled. The futures of both companies are now on the 2023 ballot in the form of a referendum to establish a consumer-owned electric utility that would borrow billions to buy out power infrastructure and be controlled by an elected board.

A similar proposal was vetoed by Gov. Janet Mills in 2021, but the referendum would circumvent her pen. In Augusta, former Rep. Seth Berry, D-Bowdoinham, focused his early pitches on cost, arguing that the new utility could take advantage of lower public bargaining rates and free up money to improve service. A 2020 study done for Maine's energy regulator expected higher rates at first but lower ones in the long run under this regime.

The counterargument, led so far by a massive and early campaign funded by CMP's parent, has focused on the uncertainty. The two utilities say the infrastructure buyout alone will cost $13.5 billion and opponents have also predicted to a long legal fight over the question if it passes, with major questions about constitutionality and how much the buyout price would be.

But the corridor campaign showed us that these serious policy issues cannot be separated from the visceral distrust of CMP following the customer service and billing issues, plus some of the nation's worst outages. That is a risk for the two utilities entering this new campaign.

Our Power, the group running the consumer-owned utility bid, is leaning into that, posting and soliciting anti-utility memes on Facebook over the Christmas weekend while singling out union linemen for praise in restoration efforts. CMP was more communicative about their response than it had been in the past, also sharing praise for their workers, including one cake from a Sam's Club.

The quality of the response to Friday's storm may not be clear for a while, with hundreds still without power Down East. But the companies said that recent preparations to harden and segment the grid paid off and shortened response times. Versant reported conditions in some areas that were worse than the 2017 storm. The Maine Public Utilities Commission could investigate the restoration efforts, which could provide a fuller picture of the work.

With the utilities now drawn into another political campaign, every storm brings a little more peril for them. This winter, you will see their sensitivity to that reality and their opponents exploiting any hint of weakness.

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News and notes

📷 FTX founder Sam Bankman-Fried leaves court following his extradition to the U.S. on Dec. 22, 2022, in New York. (AP photo by Yuki Iwamura)

💰 Maine Democrats still have no plan for an FTX executive's big donation.

◉ Political giving linked to the collapsed crypto firm came under heavy scrutiny even before CEO Sam Bankman-Fried was arrested on federal charges alleging that he defrauded investors and violated campaign finance law. Others in the company were charged federally as well.

◉ The Maine Democratic Party got $100,000 in August from Nishad Singh, the company's director of engineering, while Bankman-Fried gave Sen. Susan Collins, R-Maine, more than $17,000 last year. Singh has not been charged and has remained out of the public eye of late but reportedly knew that the company was misusing public funds.

◉ Collins and other colleagues have said they will donate the Bankman-Fried money to charity. The situation is more complicated for state Democrats, since they spent the money during the 2022 campaign. A spokesperson said the party is monitoring court cases.

◉ "I need a lot more information," said Bev Uhlenhake, the state party's vice chair and a candidate for chair in next month's committee election. "What I will say is that we will navigate in the most ethical way possible."

📝 Lawmakers, file your bills!

◉ The cloture date — or the deadline for legislators to file non-emergency bills for the upcoming session — is Friday. After that, a panel of legislative leaders must vote to allow the full Legislature to consider proposals.

◉ Maine lawmakers are usually good for 2,000 or so bills at the beginning of a legislative session. We are expecting to see the full list of titles sometime next week, with lawmakers convening in Augusta on Wednesday.

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What we're reading

⏩ Maine lobstermen see reasons for hope after a challenging 2022.

🔶 A lawsuit testing the Sunday hunting ban is destined for Maine's high court.

🔪 Sears is not long for Maine with the closures of two dealer-owned stores.

🐋 The right whale must remain on the endangered species list.

🚢 Meet the former soldier tasked with running Bath Iron Works.

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