§ 158-91. Filing of application to change rates or services.

(a)

An application to change rates or service shall be filed by depositing, in duplicate, together with all related filings, with the clerk of council and on the date of filing with the clerk, serve one copy each with each councilmember, the mayor, the city attorney, the director of the department of finance, and the director of the council research staff or to a member of the city council's staff as directed by the president of the council. The utility shall also file its application in electronic format. In addition, all statements, schedules, spreadsheets, and working papers included in the filing and used in support of the application(s), or contained in discovery responses, shall be provided in an operable electronic format , i.e. models and spreadsheets are to be provided with formulae intact and source data included. To the extent electronic data is provided in PDF format, the PDF shall not contain any security settings that limit the usability or the extraction of data. Electronic data shall include any work sheets linked to these calculations or any data utilized in the performance of these calculations. The related and relevant data must be provided in a format usable by the council. All information required by these standard filing requirements, or any other applicable law, ordinance or order and/or rule of the council shall be included in and/or attached to the application at the time it is filed and served. The fact that any information or data is required by this article shall not be construed as a statement of or evidence of regulatory policy or as an endorsement of any concept, principle, methodology, or allowance, hitherto, presently, or in the future employed or proposed to be employed in this or any other jurisdiction in the calculation of rate base, rate of return, revenue requirements, rate design or any other aspect of regulation of rates and services. A copy of any pending or simultaneous application for waiver under section 158-48 shall also be filed and served at the same time. The council and its designees, the department of finance, department of law and the council utilities regulatory office, shall examine each proposed application with respect to its compliance with all applicable laws, ordinances, orders, and/or rules of the council and these standard filing requirements. If any application patently fails to substantially comply with any applicable laws, ordinances, orders or rules of the council or these standard filing requirements, and if the area of such deficiency is not the subject of a timely filed and served waiver application, the council or its designees, the department of finance, the department of law or the council utilities regulatory office, shall notify the utility of such deficiencies within 14 days of the date the application is filed and served. The utility shall respond to such notification of deficiencies by curing such deficiencies within 28 days of the date such notification by the council is served upon the applicant. If the utility has failed to cure the deficiencies within such 28-day period, the council may reject the filings, in which case the application would have to be refilled de novo according to the standard filing requirements. Any failure of the council or its designees to notify the utility of any deficiency during the 14-day period described above, following filing and service, shall not prohibit the council or its designees from giving a notice of deficiency whenever such deficiency becomes apparent, and does not waive any obligation of the utility to comply with any laws, ordinances, orders, rules of the council or these standard filing requirements.

(b)

Where deficiencies are noted by the council the filing shall be deemed as accepted on the dates that such deficiencies are cured and approved by the council or when the council has granted a waiver to the standard filing requirements. In the instance where filing deficiencies have been noted by the council or its designees, the department of finance, the department of law or the council utilities regulatory office, and where the utility has provided remedies to the deficiencies, the council or its designee shall notify the utility at the earliest practicable date that the filing has been accepted. Where no deficiency is noted by the council or its designees, the department of finance, the department of law or the council utilities regulatory office, within 14 days of the date the filing is served, the filing shall automatically be deemed as accepted beginning on the 15th day following such date. Upon such acceptance, the council shall have 12 months in which to review the filing and to render a determination as to the proper rates to be charged by the utility. If the council has not made this determination by 12 months plus one day after the date of acceptance, the rates as submitted by the utility in the accepted filing shall become effective subject to refund. During the period of time during which the rates are being collected subject to refund, the utility shall keep an accurate account of all amounts received under the increased rates, including:

(1)

The monthly billing determinants of gas, heat, electricity, and power sold and delivered to each purchaser; and

(2)

The amount of revenue collected from each customer class which is in excess of that amount which would have been collected using the rates in effect immediately prior.

If, after the utility has implemented rate relief, the council determines that the utility is entitled to a different amount of relief, the utility shall compute the amount of revenue to be refunded or collected and shall present to the council within 60 days of such council determination a plan to make the customers and utility whole. The council shall then authorize refunds or surcharges or both so that the level of revenue collected equals that determined by the council to be appropriate. Interest on the revenue to be refunded shall be charged at an average prime rate for each calendar quarter. The applicable average prime rate for each calendar quarter shall be the arithmetic mean, to the nearest 0.01 percent, of the prime rate values published in the Federal Reserve Bulletin, or in the Federal Reserve's Selected Interest Rates (Statistical Release G. 13), for the fourth, third, and second months preceding the first month of the calendar quarter. The interests shall be compounded quarterly. The costs of such refunding shall not be deducted from the amounts refunded.

(M.C.S., Ord. No. 22930, § 1, 12-6-07)