SB3683enr 96TH GENERAL ASSEMBLY

SB3683 Enrolled LRB096 20708 RLJ 36435 b

AN ACT concerning local government.

Be it enacted by the People of the State of Illinois, represented in the General Assembly:

Section 5. The River Edge Redevelopment Zone Act is amended by adding Section 10-10.1 as follows:

(65 ILCS 115/10-10.1 new)

Sec. 10-10.1. Utility facilities.

(a) It is in the public interest that costs for redevelopment in a River Edge Redevelopment Zone impacting a public utility, as defined by Section 3-105 of the Public Utilities Act, or a public utility's property, as described in subsection (b) of this Section, should not be allocated solely to the entity engaging in economic redevelopment because this economic redevelopment benefits the utility service territory as a whole and not just the particular area where the redevelopment occurs.

(b) A public utility that has facilities or land affected by the clean-up, remediation, and redevelopment of a River Edge Redevelopment Zone and that incurs costs related to the remediation or the removing or relocating of utility facilities in the River Edge Redevelopment Zone may recover these costs pursuant to subsections (c) and (d) of this Section.

(c) The reasonable and prudent costs incurred by a public utility for facility removal or relocation described in subsection (b) of this Section shall be shared equally among the public utility, the municipality in which the facility is located, and any landowner that is located within 100 feet of the utility facility and that directly benefits from the removal or relocation of the utility facility or the redevelopment of the public utility's land. In no event shall the costs incurred by each municipality or landowner for a given project exceed an equal percentage of the total direct, indirect, and overhead project costs, or $3,667,000 each, whichever amount is less. The reasonable and prudent costs incurred by the public utility for facility removal or relocation that are not the responsibility of the municipality or landowner under this subsection (c) shall be recovered by the public utility from all retail customers located in the municipality or municipalities in which the removal or relocation occurs through an appropriate tariff mechanism, and the public utility may record and defer such costs as a regulatory asset until they are so recovered.

(d) The Illinois Commerce Commission shall allow a public utility described in subsection (b) to fully recover from all retail customers in its service territory all reasonable and prudent costs that it incurs in conducting environmental remediation in the River Edge Redevelopment Zone related to the removal or relocation of utility facilities in the River Edge Redevelopment Zone, including, but not limited to, transmission and distribution lines, transformers, and poles. These environmental remediation costs also include, but are not limited to, direct, indirect, and overhead costs calculated by the public utility for taxes or other charges, cost adjustments made after the project has begun, and any other environmental remediation-related charges. The public utility shall record and defer such costs as a regulatory asset to be included in the public utility's total rate base and amortized in the public utility's next filing for a general increase in rates over a reasonable period that is shorter than the life of the affected facility or facilities. Such regulatory assets shall be collected from all residential and commercial ratepayers system-wide, and not only from ratepayers in the municipality's corporate limits. In the event the River Edge Redevelopment Zone is decertified, the public utility shall be permitted to recover all reasonable and prudent costs incurred as of the date of the decertification, as well as all reasonable and prudent costs incurred subsequent to decertification that are necessary to complete any projects commenced while the River Edge Redevelopment Zone was certified, consistent with this Section.

(e) This Section is repealed 7 years after the effective date of this amendatory Act of the 96th General Assembly.

Section 99. Effective date. This Act takes effect upon becoming law.