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Energy rewrite gets new opponents BY ROB EURE Wall Street Journal An advocacy group headed by Southern Oregon businessmen has made its opposition to the state's energy-deregulation law official by registering with the Public Utilities Commission. "We are concerned that the small-and medium-sized customers will not have enough clout in a marketplace" to get the best prices, says Bill Thorndike Jr., a member of Oregon Power Users Alliance. Thorndike is president and chief executive officer of Medford Fabrication of Medford. OPUA's board chairman is Greg Applen, an executive with Medford Moulding and Western Veneer. The step of registering with the PUC will let the alliance participate in the public rule-writing process the PUC is engaged in as it implements the Oregon Electric Restructuring Act, designed to end regulated electricity service for most businesses starting in October 2001. Both the alliance and PacifiCorp, a unit of Glasgow-based Scottish Power PLC, want rules that allow businesses to stay with their current electricity providers, whose rates are regulated. The PUC has proposed requiring commercial users that use more than 30 kilowatts in any given hour to drop their regulated provider and shop on the open market beginning in 18 months. When it founded the alliance with an undisclosed amount of money in January, PacifiCorp said it was providing a voice for firms that don't want to shop for power. And Jim Whitty, a Salem lobbyist who is director of OPUA, insists it isn't a mouthpiece for the firm. Alliance members "have no reason to bow to PacifiCorp," he says. Earlier this year, Whitty declined to name alliance members, but in registering it had to identify its board: Thorndike, Applen, officials with timber concerns in Roseburg and Joseph, an administrator with Roseburg's public-school district. Thorndike, whose company fabricates specialty industrial metal pieces, says his electric bill is about $12,000 a month. "The open market doesn't care about everybody equally," says board member Howard Sohn, president of Sun Studs, a lumber mill in Roseburg. "It tends to favor concentration of demand." Today's Edition : News | Sports | Business | Weather | Tempo | Classifieds Mail Tribune Copyright � The Mail Tribune 2000, Medford, Oregon USA