Electric and gas utility service: master-meter customers.

Existing law authorizes the owner of a master-metered mobilehome park or manufactured housing community that provides gas or electric service to residents to transfer ownership and operational responsibility for its gas or electric system to the gas or electrical corporation providing service in the area in which the park or community is located, pursuant to specified transfer and cost allocation procedures. This bill would require the Public Utilities Commission, by July 1, 2011, to open an investigation or other appropriate proceeding to evaluate and report to the Legislature, by January 1, 2014, when an owner of a mobilehome park or manufactured housing community that provides master-metered gas or electric service to its residents of the park or community should be required to transfer responsibility for gas or electric service to the gas or electrical corporation providing service in the area in which the park or community is located, along with those plant, facilities, and interests in real property that the commission, in consultation with the gas or electrical corporation, determines are necessary, convenient, or cost effective to provide service. The bill would require the commission to include in the report a recommended phase-in schedule for potential transfers, the estimated costs and benefits to the gas or electrical corporations for the transfer of responsibility, and the potential benefits or costs to affected residents and ratepayers. The bill would require the commission, in consultation with the Department of Housing and Community Development, to develop a system for any inspections that may be necessary to define, find, determine, or prioritize unsafe or substandard master-metered systems, but the bill would specify that this provision not be interpreted to require physical inspections of gas or electric systems.