Public Service Commission begins investigation of Beauregard Electric

LAKE CHARLES, La. (KPLC) - The Louisiana Public Service Commission is moving ahead with an audit of the Beauregard Electric Co-op. The investigation was requested last month after the commissioner for this area asked for it. Commissioner Mike Francis said an investigation was needed and had these words for BECi employees attending the PSC meeting. “When you come to us with another rate increase, we’re going to be looking at those line items, and you need to do your business and do it in an economical way because all those people, and you’ve got a lot of constituents. They need to know that their operating expenses have been tremendously high compared to normal in the first quarter of this year. We’ll see you next month and I hope we’ll get a better report, or a good report,” Francis said. At the Commission Business and Executive Session Meeting Wednesday, PSC Executive Secretary Brandon Frey confirmed that the investigation is going forward. “We’ve had employees of the co-op reach out to us, we’ve had press inquiries as to while, ‘Well, wait. Isn’t there an investigation going on?’ There is. I mean we’ve got the docket open, discovery is going to go out today – it’s rather extensive, to the company. So I just wanted to assure the public out there and any members of Beauregard who are concerned that nothing is happening – we are digging this very deeply. And information will be out shortly,” Frey said.