Em Perry of Michigan United was featured in the pages of Planet Detroit this week. In an article, "Will DTE face consequences for ghostwritten rate case comments?", she reacts to the news that DTE, Michigan's largest utility company, was found creating fraudulent comments to be read into the public record at regulatory meetings.

Tap here to join the fight against DTE and the influence of money in politics.

Here's an extended excerpt from the story and her reaction:

"Environmental advocates are calling on Michigan regulators to deny DTE Energy’s proposed $456 million electricity rate increase after Planet Detroit reported the utility was ghostwriting comments in support of its rate hike.

Data in the PDF documents containing comments submitted by businesses to support the rate hike in late September showed that a DTE spokesperson had authored four of the documents, while several others showed textual similarities that suggested that a shared template had been used.

A DTE spokesperson told Planet Detroit that the company wrote the comments for its vendors at their request.

DTE’s actions have drawn scrutiny from the Michigan Public Service Commission, which called the comment writing “disappointing,” and Michigan Attorney General Dana Nessel’s office.

“The department is not currently investigating the submitted comments, though the matter has caught our attention as we continue our work to combat incessant and excessive rate hike requests for the State’s utility corporations,” Danny Wimmer, a spokesperson for the Attorney General’s office, told Planet Detroit in a statement.

Nessel previously said that DTE’s proposed 10% rate hike for residential customers should be reduced to 2.5% and submitted a brief in October, saying the utility shouldn’t be “rewarded for subpar performance by simply dumping more money into the machine...

...Could DTE ghostwriting controversy give energy justice groups a boost?

Em Perry, organizing director for the nonprofit Michigan United, doubts that any disciplinary actions or fines by the MPSC, beyond potentially rejecting the rate increase, would be significant enough to influence DTE’s future behavior.

She said the utility’s actions underscore the need for lawmakers to pass two bills, HB 5520 and HB 5521, to prevent monopoly utilities and companies seeking government contracts from making political donations, an issue supported by the Taking Back Our Power Coalition.

“Realistically, they’re not going to face any real consequences until our legislature passes the taking back our power legislation,” Perry said, arguing that utilities have previously used their influence with legislators to defeat accountability measures like more generous outage credits.

The coalition currently has support from 22 lawmakers, and Perry said meetings are planned with 10 more. She’s optimistic that the legislation could move in the lame duck period following the general election, based on growing awareness of the campaign and engagement from constituents,

But even if the legislation fails, Perry said the effort could set up a ballot proposal for the next election to block utilities and other companies seeking state contracts from making political contributions....."