Summary of Original Version

Create a new section of KRS Chapter 278 to establish the membership of the Public Service Commission; provide for the appointment, confirmation, and replacement of commissioners; establish the qualifications of the commissioners; set the terms and term limits for commissioners; amend KRS 278.040 to provide that the commission is an independent department of state government that is administratively attached to the Energy and Environment Cabinet only for the limited functions and purposes that the commission requests; allow the commission, in its sole discretion, to identify and determine the compensation for categories of its professional employees; prohibit the commission from being reorganized under KRS Chapter 12; amend KRS 278.060 to prohibit the immediate family members of commissioners from having any official relationship to any utility; allow for a commissioner or an immediate family member to have a pension or a retirement savings account with utility as long as no contributions have been made to it for at least one year prior to the commissioner's appointment; amend KRS 278.070 to allow the officer who appointed a commissioner to remove the commissioner for cause; amend KRS 278.120 to allow the commission to have sole discretion in fixing the compensation of the executive director; amend KRS 278.702, 64.640, and 160.617 to conform; repeal KRS 278.050, relating to membership of the Public Service Commission; require the Auditor of Public Accounts to make initial appointments to the commission on or before July 1, 2025, and provide for the staggering of the appointments; allow current members of the commission to serve out the remainders of their terms provided that they meet the qualification requirements of the Act; terminate the terms of current commissioners who do not meet the qualification requirements of the Act and provide for their replacement; direct the transfer of all records, files, or documents associated with functions previously performed by the Energy and Environment Cabinet to the Public Service Commission.