in the Matter of the Petition of Missouri-American Water Company for Approval to Change an Infrastructure System Replacement Surcharge v. Missouri Public Service Commission

CourtMissouri Court of Appeals
DecidedApril 21, 2020
DocketWD83067
StatusPublished

This text of in the Matter of the Petition of Missouri-American Water Company for Approval to Change an Infrastructure System Replacement Surcharge v. Missouri Public Service Commission (in the Matter of the Petition of Missouri-American Water Company for Approval to Change an Infrastructure System Replacement Surcharge v. Missouri Public Service Commission) is published on Counsel Stack Legal Research, covering Missouri Court of Appeals primary law. Counsel Stack provides free access to over 12 million legal documents including statutes, case law, regulations, and constitutions.

Bluebook
in the Matter of the Petition of Missouri-American Water Company for Approval to Change an Infrastructure System Replacement Surcharge v. Missouri Public Service Commission, (Mo. Ct. App. 2020).

Opinion

In the Missouri Court of Appeals Western District IN THE MATTER OF THE ) PETITION OF MISSOURI- ) AMERICAN WATER COMPANY ) WD83067 FOR APPROVAL TO CHANGE AN ) INFRASTRUCTURE SYSTEM ) OPINION FILED: April 21, 2020 REPLACEMENT SURCHARGE, ) ) Appellant, ) ) v. ) ) MISSOURI PUBLIC SERVICE ) COMMISSION, ) ) Respondent. )

Appeal from the Public Service Commission

Before Division One: Lisa White Hardwick, Presiding Judge, Cynthia L. Martin, Judge and Thomas N. Chapman, Judge

Missouri-American Water Company ("Missouri-American" or "the company")

appeals from the Public Service Commission's ("Commission") report and order approving

Missouri American's petition to change the company's infrastructure system replacement

surcharge ("ISRS") to recover costs the company incurred in connection with infrastructure

system replacements and relocations made from October 1, 2018, to March 31, 2019. Missouri-American asserts two points on appeal, both related to the Commission's

exclusion of estimated net operating loss from calculation of the ISRS. Finding no error,

we affirm.

Regulatory and Procedural Background

Missouri-American is a "water corporation" and a "public utility," as defined by

sections 386.020(59) and (43), and 393.1000(7).1 The company is wholly owned by its

parent company, American Water Works. Missouri-American provides water service to

approximately 468,000 customers in Missouri, including the majority of St. Louis County.

Missouri-American is subject to the jurisdiction of the Commission as provided in Chapters

386 and 393. The Commission is a creature of statute, created by the General Assembly

to regulate public utilities, including water corporations, in Missouri. See section 386.040;

section 386.250(3).

The General Assembly created ISRS to permit water corporations to recover costs

associated with eligible infrastructure system replacements outside a general ratemaking

case. See section 393.1003; section 393.1006.

[A]n approved ISRS can be collected only for three years at the most, at which point it then terminates (unless a new rate case is pending). Thereafter, the [utility] has to file revised rate schedules to reset the ISRS to zero upon resolution of a general rate case. [Section 393.1006.6(1)]. The [utility] may then seek to establish a new ISRS by filing a petition pursuant to section [393.1003].

Collectively, the ISRS statutes permit the [utility] to make single-issue rate increases between general rate cases in order to timely recover its costs for certain government-mandated infrastructure projects without the time and expense required to prepare and file a general rate case, while, at the same 1 All statutory references are to RSMo 2016, as supplemented through February 20, 2019, the date Missouri-American filed its petition to change its ISRS, unless otherwise indicated.

2 time, limiting the collection of the ISRS surcharge to three years to prevent its unlimited use outside of a general rate case.

Mo.-Am. Water Co. v. Pub. Serv. Comm'n, 591 S.W.3d 465, 468 (Mo. App. W.D. 2019)

(quoting In re Laclede Gas Co., 417 S.W.3d 815, 821-22 (Mo. App. W.D. 2014)).

Missouri-American's most recent general rate case, WR-2017-0285, resulted in a

rate that took effect in May 2018 ("2017 general rate case"). The Commission thereafter

approved Missouri-American's request for an ISRS, Case No. WO-2018-0373, to recover

eligible costs incurred in connection with infrastructure system replacements and

relocations made from January 1, 2018, to September 30, 2018, in the amount of

$6,377,959. Missouri-American appealed, contesting the amount of the approved ISRS.

The Commission's report and order setting this ISRS was affirmed in Missouri-American

Water Co. v. Public Service Commission (Missouri-American I), 591 S.W.3d 465 (Mo.

App. W.D. 2019).

On February 20, 2019, Missouri-American filed a petition to change its ISRS

("petition") to recover eligible costs incurred in connection with infrastructure system

replacements and relocations made from October 1, 2018, to March 31, 2019 ("ISRS

period"), for its St. Louis County service territory.2 Missouri-American's petition proposed

a rate schedule that, if adopted, would have produced ISRS revenues of $8,405,079 on an

annualized basis, an increase of 4.1% on the base revenue established in the 2017 general

rate case. In its petition, Missouri-American noted that its prior ISRS case (Case No. WO-

2018-0373) "concerned an issue related to a potential tax normalization violation," and

2 Section 393.1003.1 only allows a water corporation to seek an ISRS if it provides "water service in a county with a charter form of government and with more than one million inhabitants."

3 advised the Commission that Missouri-American had informed the Internal Revenue

Service ("IRS") of that potential violation. The petition further indicated that Missouri-

American was in the process of formally requesting a private letter ruling from the IRS on

"this issue as it relates to treatment of deferred taxes in an ISRS case."

Missouri-American attached documentation to its petition which identified "the type

of additions, utility account, work order description, addition amount, depreciation rate,

accumulated depreciation, and depreciation expense" for those infrastructure replacements

and improvements made from October 2018 to January 2019. Missouri-American also

provided estimates for those projects set to be completed through March 31, 2019. Those

estimates were eventually replaced with actual cost information, which resulted in an

increase in the requested ISRS to produce revenues of $9,707,229.

The documents Missouri-American filed in support of its petition included a

calculation for accumulated deferred income taxes ("ADIT"), which is the difference

between what is being paid by customers attributable to Missouri-American's tax liability,

and the amount actually being paid by Missouri-American for taxes given the effect of

accelerated depreciation. The normalization method anticipates that the ADIT will be

retained by the company rather than passed on to customer's immediately in the form of a

rate reduction. In calculating the ADIT, Missouri-American included an estimated net

operating loss ("NOL") of $8,764,652 for the ISRS period. Missouri-American calculated

this ISRS NOL by subtracting expenditures during the ISRS period for eligible

infrastructure replacements and improvements (including related accelerated depreciation)

4 from zero ISRS revenue it would be collecting from these eligible expenditures during the

ISRS period.3

The Commission directed the Commission Staff ("PSC Staff")4 to review Missouri-

American's petition and to submit a report and recommendation to the Commission no later

than April 22, 2019, in accordance with section 393.1006.2(2). The PSC Staff proposed

corrections and adjustments to Missouri-American's proposed ISRS ("PSC Staff

recommendation" or "its recommendation") that reduced the requested ISRS to

$8,878,845. One adjustment involved removing NOL from Missouri-American's

calculation of the ADIT because it was the PSC Staff's "understanding . . . that no amount

of [NOL] has actually been generated for income tax purposes by [Missouri-American] on

an aggregate basis since October 1, 2018," and because the PSC Staff "[had] not been

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Bluebook (online)
in the Matter of the Petition of Missouri-American Water Company for Approval to Change an Infrastructure System Replacement Surcharge v. Missouri Public Service Commission, Counsel Stack Legal Research, https://law.counselstack.com/opinion/in-the-matter-of-the-petition-of-missouri-american-water-company-for-moctapp-2020.