Bell Telephone Co. v. Public Service Commission

253 P.2d 602, 70 Nev. 25, 1953 Nev. LEXIS 47
CourtNevada Supreme Court
DecidedFebruary 16, 1953
Docket3715
StatusPublished
Cited by14 cases

This text of 253 P.2d 602 (Bell Telephone Co. v. Public Service Commission) is published on Counsel Stack Legal Research, covering Nevada Supreme Court primary law. Counsel Stack provides free access to over 12 million legal documents including statutes, case law, regulations, and constitutions.

Bluebook
Bell Telephone Co. v. Public Service Commission, 253 P.2d 602, 70 Nev. 25, 1953 Nev. LEXIS 47 (Neb. 1953).

Opinion

*26 OPINION

By the Court,

Badt, J.:

This appeal requires us to determine whether the telephone rates now in effect as the result of respondent commission’s order afford appellant a just and reasonable return. We hold that they do not, that the rates presently enforced are unreasonable, inadequate and confiscatory, and that the collection of the increased rates sought by the utility’s new schedules may no longer be suspended.

This proceeding was initiated by the filing by Bell Telephone Company of Nevada on April 14, 1950 of new schedules of intrastate rates and charges calculated to increase its gross annual intrastate revenue by $304,-000. 1 The cities of Reno and Sparks, the county of Washoe and sundry individuals filed protests through their respective counsel and other representatives. After hearing, the commission filed an opinion and order *27 January 4, 1951, holding that because of the then present unsettled world conditions and the inadequacy of present trends as to plant growth, costs and prices, no guide was afforded as to either costs or earnings for the next few years. It held specifically “that applicant’s current rates as fixed by order of the commission on November 19, 1949, 2 have not been in effect a sufficient length of time to accurately determine whether or not they should be again revised.” It accordingly denied the increase without prejudice. Thereafter a rehearing was granted by the commission upon the company’s petition alleging that more recent information demonstrated that its estimate of future earnings had been conservative, and that the present rates had proved inadequate to provide a reasonable return upon intrastate operations for over a year of trial. The general nature of the company’s testimony at the rehearing was to show a downward trend of earnings and increased costs due to inflationary forces. On June 25, 1951 the commission again indefinitely suspended the new rates and the utility sought a judicial review by filing its complaint in the district court under the provisions of sec. 33 of the public service commission law, N.C.L.1929, sec. 6133. Additional evidence was presented to the court by the company and by the commission, and the court, pursuant to the statute, ordered the same transmitted to the commission. On December 14, 1951 the commission reaffirmed its previous orders. It specifically based its suspension of the proposed increased, rates upon its consideration of the total- interstate and intrastate operation. The entire matter was then submitted to the court, and the attorney general (who apparently had not represented the commission in the proceedings *28 before it) then moved to remand the case again to the commission for findings (1) of an intrastate rate base 3 and (2) a fair rate of return on the intrastate operation. Over the objection of the utility (which contended that no authority existed for such second remand and that the only action open to the court was to set aside the alleged erroneous order of the commission), the court again remanded the matter to the commission for the purpose of making such findings. Thereafter, on March 5, 1952, the commission specifically found (1) that the fair value of the telephone property and plant used solely for intrastate rate making purposes was $3,499,496, and (2) that the rate of return the utility was entitled to earn on its intrastate base was 6.47%. It found that it was actually obtaining such return and again rejected the rates filed by the company. The district court then, upon submission of the entire matter, filed its opinion *29 and decision presented to this court for review on the present appeal. The district court revised the commission’s figures in several respects, mostly by way of correction of mathematical errors, found that the company was earning 6.28% on its intrastate operations, sustained the theories and the findings of the commission throughout and dismissed the action.

Issues Narrowed

In the consideration of the appeal as submitted to us and by reason of our conclusions upon certain of the issues which are determinative of the appeal, the court is relieved of the necessity of discussing and determining a number of points to which counsel have devoted much attention in their briefs. We proceed first to eliminate these matters from consideration.

1. Jurisdiction of Court to Make Second Remand to Commission.

A very material part of the briefs of both parties is devoted to this question. As above noted, after the first hearing by the commission and the filing of the action in the district court and the introduction of further evidence there, that court properly, under the provisions of the statute, remanded the case to the commission for further determination. When the commission thereafter again suspended the operation of the new rates, basing its action upon the company’s property and earnings both interstate and intrastate, and the attorney general, in effect confessing error, moved for a further remand for a finding on the intrastate plant and intrastate earnings, the utility strenuously opposed the motion and insisted that the jurisdiction of the court had been exhausted. Some 30 pages of its printed brief in this court are devoted to this point as an assignment of error.

However, as we are satisfied that for other reasons the order of the commission must be set aside, it becomes unnecessary for us to determine the question of the court’s jurisdiction to order the second remand.

*30 2. The Method to be Used to Establish the Bate Base.

There is likewise eliminated from the present appeal any controversy as to the method to be used in arriving at the rate base. In City of Fort Smith v. Southwestern Bell Tel. Co. (Ark.), 247 S.W.2d 474, the court cites Pond on Public Utilities in discussing such separate methods as (a) original cost, (b) cost of reproduction, (c) outstanding capitalization, (d) present value, (e) prudent investment and (f) net earnings. In an informative article by Mr. Everett C. McKeage in the December 1948 American Bar Association Journal, 34 A.B.A. Journal 1096, the author presents a historical analysis of the various tests and rules applied over a long period of years by the United States Supreme Court. The Journal editors, in a preface to the article, refer to the problem of valuation as “one that has troubled the courts and state commissions for many years * * * a field where the ‘glorious uncertainty of the law’ reigns * * The various schedules filed by the utility and the figures used by it in the several hearings before the commission and in the district court and in its brief in this court indicate the rate of return resulting from application of net revenue to a rate base fixed in any one of three ways. 1. The highest rate base results from establishing what is called “current cost rate base.” 4 2.

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Cite This Page — Counsel Stack

Bluebook (online)
253 P.2d 602, 70 Nev. 25, 1953 Nev. LEXIS 47, Counsel Stack Legal Research, https://law.counselstack.com/opinion/bell-telephone-co-v-public-service-commission-nev-1953.