Welcome to

A coalition of public interest groups which had backed an amendment for this fall’s ballot now says they will fall short of the required number of signatures because big utility company’s sabotaged their effort at every step. The utilities mounted a similar petition gathering effort and drove up the price from as little as a dollar a signature to six dollars. Steven Smith of the Southern Alliance for Clean Energy says the utilities also misrepresented for which amendment they were gathering signatures.

“They were carrying both. they were being paid more, so part of their game was to driver the cost up on each signature. So we started at one price, and overtime we moved up to try and stay competitive, they would double what we did.”

The consumer groups say they are now aiming for the 2018 ballot, but hope some progress will be made this legislative session to open the solar market and give utilities more competition.