Natural gas prices overshadow PSC races

ATLANTA - The five candidates running for the Public Service Commission want to fix Georgia&#39;s natural gas deregulation or at least make sure it doesn&#39;t get any worse. <br> <br> The PSC oversees utilities that sell natural gas, electricity and telephone services across the state. Commissioners, which make $106,031 a year and oversee a $9.5 million annual budget, are responsible for setting rules and rates that show up in consumers&#39; monthly bills. <br> <br> This year, two of the five seats are open for election statewide. Incumbents hold the advantage in each race. <br> <br> Democrat Lauren ``Bubba&#39;&#39; McDonald faces Republican Angela Speir and Libertarian Jimmy Harris, neither of whom have raised much money or campaigned. <br> <br> Democrat Earleen Sizemore, who became the first woman to serve on the commission when she was appointed in spring, competes against Republican state Rep. Doug Everett. <br> <br> Natural gas prices have risen since the Legislature deregulated the industry in 1998, which opened the door to a dozen or more gas marketers competing for customers. Atlanta Gas Light, which had served as a local distributor for hundreds of thousands of customers, was limited to the role of supplying the marketers. <br> <br> McDonald said deregulation hasn&#39;t taken hold and prices are bound to fall in when the free market stabilizes. Most of the price increases have been caused by higher demand for gas during cold winters the last few years. <br> <br> ``People feel the pain. I&#39;m a consumer, I feel it. I cook with it, I heat with it,&#39;&#39; McDonald said. Prices would be even higher if natural gas hadn&#39;t been deregulated, he said. <br> <br> Libertarian Jimmy Harris couldn&#39;t disagree more. He said the state&#39;s so-called deregulation didn&#39;t accomplish anything but ensure Atlanta Gas Light&#39;s monopoly power as gas prices go up. If elected, Harris said he would redo deregulation to allow any company to lay pipe and set their own rates. <br> <br> ``Just the threat of competition would do tremendous good to people who are now served by monopolies,&#39;&#39; Harris said. ``A company knows if it raises its price or has bad service, other companies will come in.&#39;&#39; <br> <br> Speir has been out of town leading up to the election and didn&#39;t return repeated calls seeking comment. <br> <br> Sizemore has held a series of town-hall meetings around the state to hear from the public. She said the state may not have been ready for natural gas deregulation, but it was the right thing to do. <br> <br> ``It seemed to be a popular thing at the time, and people were jumping on the bandwagon,&#39;&#39; Sizemore said. ``Things are much better now than they were two or three years ago more service, more competition, more companies are now coming in.&#39;&#39; <br> <br> Everett, an Albany representative who sponsored a bill this year making grits the state&#39;s official prepared food, said his experience in the Statehouse has educated him in how to save people money. <br> <br> Trying to fix deregulation now would be a disaster, he said. <br> <br> ``I doubt there&#39;s anything that can be done about natural gas now,&#39;&#39; he said. ``We had eight or nine companies spend a tremendous amount of money after deregulation, and it would open a Pandora&#39;s box (of lawsuits) against the state if we tried to reregulate.&#39;&#39;