Lobbying at the state capitol:

According to January-April 2012 disclosure forms available on the Secretary of State’s Web site, Xcel Energy paid $126,393.90 for seven lobbyists at the state capitol. This included two lobbying firms and three Xcel in-house lobbyists.  The highest paid was 5280 Strategies run by Mike Beasley, well-known Capital Hill insider and former staffer for Governor Bill Owens.

Some of the ratepayer-friendly bills Xcel successfully lobbied to kill in 2012 include:

• HB 1016 Ex-parte communication with the PUC
• HB 1121 Ratepayer’s Bill of Rights
• HB 1172 Repeal Colorado’s Carbon Tax

In contrast, the Colorado Education Association spent a mere $45,384.80 on four lobbyists during the same period.

Xcel Energy spends even more on lobbying in its home state of Minnesota. According to the Minneapolis/St. Paul Business Journal, Xcel shelled out a whopping $2.43 million for 39 lobbyists in 2011 alone, making it the champion of lobbyist spending.

Xcel “the Corporate Tax Dodger”:

Citizens for Tax Justice and the Institute on Taxation and Economic Policy released their list of “Corporate Taxpayers & Corporate Tax Dodgers, 2008-2010.” The left-leaning organizations describe their report:

This study takes a hard look at the federal income taxes paid or not paid by 280 of America’s largest and most profitable corporations in 2008, 2009 and 2010. The companies in our report are all from Fortune’s annual list of America’s 500 largest corporations, and all of them were profitable in each of the three years analyzed. Over the three years, the 280 companies in our survey reported total pretax U.S. profits of $1.4 trillion.

• In 2009, Xcel’s profit was $1.048 billion, with a tax rate of -3.8 percent.
• Between 2005-2009, the tax rate for Colorado’s largest investor owned utility was 1.78 percent.

Furthermore, In an article titled “Lobbyists help lower corporate tax rates for companies investing in alternative energy” the Sunlight Foundation reported last year that Xcel was one of several energy companies that spent millions on lobbying for lower tax rates at the federal level:

Taxes have been a focal lobbying point for many of these companies…Two of them—NextEra Energy and Xcel Energy—reported spending millions on lobbying while listing taxes on their disclosures more than any other issue in 2010. Xcel reportedly paid a 1.78 percent tax rate over the 2005-2009 period.

The teams assembled by NextEra and Xcel included lobbyists with years of tax experience, often on the appropriate congressional committees or in the executive branch. They include a former member of the Ways and Means Committee, a former tax counsel for the Ways and Means Committee, a former political advisor to Senate Finance Committee chairman Max Baucus, and a former tax counsel to the Senate Finance Committee.

In the fourth quarter of 2010, six out of the fifteen outside lobbying firms hired by NextEra and Xcel listed energy tax provisions as the sole issue they lobbied on. Six other firms lobbied on a mix of issues including taxes.

Additional Numbers:

• In 2008, former Xcel CEO Richard Kelly received $5.1 million in total compensation. In 2010, Kelly received $11.3 million, an increase of more than 120 percent.
• Ben Fowke replaced Kelly who retired last year. Bloomberg Businessweek reports Fowke’s total compensation for 2011 was $9,676,420.
• Over the last several years, the Public Utilities Commission (PUC) has approved Xcel rate increases of roughly 20 percent on Colorado consumers, with another 20 percent in increases expected within the next several years as well. Most recently the PUC approved a $114 million rate increase.
• In his “Letter to Shareholders” in the 2011 Annual Report, Fowke wrote, “Ongoing earnings per share were $1.72 in 2011, compared with $1.62 in 2010. That means we achieved the upper half of our guidance range, making 2011 the seventh consecutive year in which we have met or exceeded our earnings guidance.  Ongoing earnings increased primarily due to higher electric margins as a result of warmer-than-normal summer weather across our service territory and rate increases in various states.” [Emphasis mine] Translation: Tiered rates penalize working families and line shareholders pockets.
• Fowke also wrote, “stock price rose 17 percent in 2011 hitting a nine-year high in December.”
• Xcel brags about being the number one provider of wind energy, which is more expensive and heavily subsidized.
• According to the first quarter 2012 earnings report, Xcel earned 38 cents per share (EPS). Colorado’s roughly 1.4 million ratepayers representing slightly more than 25 percent of Xcel’s total customers accounted for 19 cents, or 50 percent, of the company’s EPS.  A trend we noticed in 2010.

Xcel Energy lobbies for consumers to pay more and for it to pay less, which would be fine if ratepayers had a choice in service providers.  But we don’t. As a result, Xcel profits handsomely as a state-sanctioned monopoly while consumers have no choice but to pay ever-higher energy bills.