May, Martinez Spar Over Power Lines, Tolls

Elevating the rhetoric in the race for the 33rd House of Delegates seat, Leesburg Councilman Fernando "Marty" Martinez (D) this week launched an attack in an area where incumbent Joe T. May (R) and many of his supporters feel his record is strongest.

For much of the past two years, May has led the fight to change the way the three-member State Corporation Commission conducts business, including its review of applications for new power line and the approval of toll increases for the Dulles Greenway.

Martinez issued a press release Monday implying he could do more than May to implement SCC reforms. Martinez said he would press to make the commissioners elected, not appointed, so they would "represent the people of Virginia and not just roll over for the powerful interests." He also wants to expand the number from three commissioners to five and to have one of those members be from Northern Virginia.

"No one on the SCC has ever comes from Northern Virginia. The members have always been downstate people who just don't know or care about our problems, such as overhead power lines and huge rate increases for toll roads," Martinez said.

These ideas were first proposed by former Virginia State Senator Charles L. Waddell (D), who retired in 1998 after 26 years in the Virginia Senate, and who endorsed Martinez' candidacy this week.

In 1974, Waddell proposed a constitutional amendment to have commissioners elected, not appointed, and enlarge the commission from three members to five, among other suggested reforms.

This week, Waddell proposed that the name of the commission be changed to the more common Public Service Commission, noting the "very title says it is concerned with corporations, not the people of Virginia."

Martinez accused May of being unwilling to oppose Dominion Power because "the company is May's largest campaign contributor."

An angry May shot back Tuesday: "That is a bald-faced lie."

May said his top five campaign contributors, in order, were the Virginia Republic House Campaign Office ($13,650); the Virginia Automobile Dealers ($11,998); the Virginia Dental Association ($4,000); the Virginia Bankers Association ($3,750); and Virginia Dominion Power of Richmond ($3,000).

"How come Marty can't read?" said May, who has been leading the efforts to force Dominion to place its transmission lines underground. "That impugns my integrity," he said, calling on Martinez to be more accurate.

As to Martinez' charge that he would not go up against Dominion, May retorted that it is because of his efforts to overhaul SCC criteria that the power companies are now willing to come to the table to negotiate over the design and alignment of new power lines.

"Dominion and the electrical utilities were not willing until we put legislation in that showed a real chance of success," he said, referring to the legislation that will be submitted in the next session of the legislature and to recent talks with Dominion.

May said he previously had been involved with legislation to expand membership on the commission to five people, but, just as when Waddell made the effort decades ago, that had not resulted in change.

May challenged several other Martinez claims, one being that the SCC is comprised of three people, "always male former legislators."

That statement is untrue, May said, noting that not all members have been male and that not all have been legislators, pointing out that current Commissioner Judith Jagman was formerly Virginia Attorney General, and Mark Christie had not served as an elected official.

Also, the SCC commissioners are judges, who are required to make their decisions according to the Code of Virginia-and it is those provisions that May said he wishes to change.

"I have met with them, and they are specific that they will follow their instructions from the General Assembly. That is the Code, and we are working on the Code," he said.

As to whether the commissioners should be elected, May said "they are judges, and we don't elect other judges. This would put them in a different category."

Martinez also challenged May's position on the Dulles Greenway toll increases, saying the delegate has not worked to oppose continuing increases in tolls and has been supportive of the toll road's owners. "... Mr. May has not lifted a finger to oppose his friends on the commission."

It is the SCC that has allowed these "huge increases," Martinez stated, calling on the new ownership of the Dulles Greenway to "suspend any new toll increases until we can have a thorough reexamination of the operation of the Greenway."

Martinez said if the new tolls go into effect, he would consider legislation to revoke the state agreement on the operation of the toll road and return it to public control.

May noted that Waddell, a leading proponent of constructing the Dulles Greenway as a privately owned toll road during his General Assembly tenure when he was chairman of the Senate Transportation Committee, helped to craft the legislation that permitted the recent toll hikes to be approved.

In his position as chairman of the Commission on Transportation Accountability, May has initiated an investigation to change the law under which the Dulles Greenway was created.

"There is a flaw in it," he said, because the law allows tolls to increase continuously.

Last October, as chairman of the House Appropriations Committee Transportation Subcommittee, May had asked the CEO of TRIP II, the owner of the Greenway, what basis the company had to raise the fees, receiving the answer that it was because of the way the legislation was written.

Noting Martinez' claim he was supportive of the Greenway's ownership, May said dryly, "the [TRIP II] CEO didn't think I was being cozy."

"My first action is to seek to change the law to cap the tolls," he said.