Ponderosa Telephone Co. v. California Public Utilities Commission

Petitioners, three rural telephone companies, challenged the Commissions' decision establishing petitioners' "cost of capital," which reflects a company's cost of generating or obtaining capital investment in assets that provide utility services to customers. Petitioners alleged that the Commission failed to adequately consider certain risks that exist for investing in small, rural telephone companies, and therefore the cost of capital was set at an unreasonably low level, resulting in a confiscatory rate of return.The Court of Appeal affirmed the trial court's judgment, holding that petitioners failed to meet their burden of demonstrating that the Commission's cost of capital determination was arbitrary, capricious, lacking in any evidentiary support, or that it otherwise fell short of constitutional standards regarding a reasonable rate of return. View "Ponderosa Telephone Co. v. California Public Utilities Commission" on Justia Law