By Elizabeth Whitman | Phoenix New Times
We are under investigation by the Attorney General’s Office, but you can’t say anything about it.
That was the message from Arizona Public Service representatives to the offices of at least two Arizona Corporation Commissioners the morning of December 11, about an hour before a public meeting in which regulators were set to question the utility’s executives about problems with the company’s rate comparison tool, which happened to be the subject of the AG’s investigation.
Commission staff also told commissioners that they had to keep mum about the investigation, because it was “confidential,” Arizona Corporation Commissioner Lea Márquez Peterson wrote in a letter filed Wednesday afternoon.
“According to Chief Counsel, the prohibition against disclosure was written in statute and bringing up the investigation during Open Meeting would violate Arizona law,” she wrote.
Yet two days later, APS disclosed the investigation to 12 News.
