| Dear Lanier County News Editor, | | | | Two years ago this month Georgia Power completed Plant Vogtle, the only nuclear reactors built in the United States in the last 30 years. The actual date reactor 4 entered commercial service was April 30, 2024. Lickedy split, one day later on May 1, 2024, Georgia Power raised rates for residential and small business customers 15.9% to begin paying for construction costs for Unit 4 and cost overruns for both reactors. Unit 3 had already entered commercial service the prior year on July 31, 2023, and on August 1, 2023, Georgia Power raised rates 7.8% for that one, totaling 25%, the largest rate increase in state history. People felt it immediately. This is the tariff showing the rate increase for reactor #4 for small businesses, an enormous 15.19%. | | | | | | These are tariffs for residential rate increases for both reactors. | | | | | | Yesterday Utility Dive, an energy trade news site, published my essay marking the two-year anniversary which I did not want to go unremarked. I included Georgia’s “Let them eat cake” moment when Energy Secretary Jennifer Granholm called for 200 more Westinghouse AP1000 reactors be built across the U.S. while making no remark about cost overruns or Georgia Power customers’ rate increases. Neither Secretary Granholm nor any Georgia Public Service Commissioner was impacted by Vogtle or the historic rate increases: none of them were Georgia Power customers. And neither DOE, whose loans enabled Vogtle to stagger on when cost overruns caused Westinghouse to file for bankruptcy, nor commissioners, nor Georgia Power, has ever apologized to Georgians for what they had done. Click image to access my surly essay. | | | | | | The failure of state leaders from the Governor to legislators to Georgia Public Service Commissioners are why Vogtle happened. These state officials consider building Vogtle a triumph, but that’s to cover their embarrassment. No other state built nuclear in the past 30 years not because they couldn’t, but because they wouldn’t, since far more affordable alternative sources of energy were available. But while public opposition and protestors couldn’t stop Vogtle, at least we were able to generate political fallout. Let’s turn to that now: PSC elections. Last year, incumbent Commissioner Fitz Johnson was soundly defeated by Peter Hubbard, one of two new commissioners, in just blowout numbers. | | | | | | And yet that man, Fitz Johnson, wants to lose a second time. He’s trying to beat Peter again this year, because as he says, “Reliable, affordable power is not a luxury. Conservative policy is the path to keeping the lights on and costs under control.” What nonsense. The grid isn’t reliable if your bills are so high you can’t pay and your home is disconnected. In 2025 one in every nine Georgia Power residential customer was disconnected. The grid wasn’t very reliable for them. And second, conservative policy is what led to Plant Vogtle, the most expensive power plant ever built on Earth that generated the stunning rate increases that led to his loss. Conservative policy also led to a 37% increase in bills between 2022 & 2024, higher than any other utility in the United States. | | | | | | And costs are most definitely not under control with former Commissioner Fitz Johnson having voted for every Georgia Power rate increase he could get his hands on, including his December 19, 2025, vote just 10 days before his term expired, where he approved a data center grid buildout that is so big and so expensive that it is going to be close for five times more expensive than Vogtle, although nobody knows for sure since costs are hidden. | | | | | | But forget all that: let’s look closely at Commissioner Johnson since he wants to win his seat back. First, he is a very wealthy man with no regard for the poor. He is a real estate agent with no energy background so of course did not know what energy burden meant when asked during a deposition during 2022 litigation over PSC elections if he knew what that term meant and he said, “no, but I can look it up.” He didn’t look it up though. Or at least, he’s done nothing about Georgia’s extraordinary high energy burden. In that same deposition Fitz said he didn’t think a Public Service Commissioner needed to know anything about energy. And maybe you don’t if you just rubber stamp whatever Georgia Power wants. Not all, but many many wealthy people have no idea what it’s like to struggle to pay bills and do nothing to help others, even when they have enormous power and ability to do so. Mr. Johnson is one of them. This is how he lives. | | | | | | When I first saw this news article I thought this photo was an ad for a hotel or country club so I skipped it. Only when I was near the end of the article did I realize this photo was his luxury compound that he had just completed building in Cobb County…which is not the district he must live in to run for the District 3 PSC seat. Oops! See those garages? They hold his luxury car collection. Some people collect figurines or Disney memorabilia. Mr. Johnson collects Bentleys, Porches, Mercedes Benz – all the cars, and stores them at this gorgeous new home in Cobb County where he signed a mortgage contract that said that was his primary residence. And that’s a problem: Mr. Johnson is running for a seat on the Metro Atlanta district of the PSC map, District 3 which is only three counties: Fulton, DeKalb and Clayton. He is a resident of District 5, which is where Cobb County and this luxury compound and his luxury cars are housed and registered. That PSC election is not until 2028. That discrepancy led to the residency challenge you see above. The hearing was Monday April 13th and I attended several hours. That’s where I learned about Mr. Johnson’s luxury car collection which he told the judge and that he houses them in his Cobb County. But he also told the judge that this luxury house and those luxury cars are not his primary residence, despite his name being on the mortgage. Hmm. A conundrum. And here’s how he got out of it: he told the judge he did not understand the mortgage contract and therefore didn’t realize he took out a mortgage that requires him to occupy the Cobb County home as his primary residence. He told the judge that he had no idea that car insurance costs change depending on where a vehicle is registered, something I learned when I was 16 years old, but okay. Oh, and he told the judge that he has a bedroom at this home below in Fulton County, which he claims is his primary residence, but admitted he keeps no clothes nor sleeps here. Such a modest home to live in for a man who collects luxury cars isn’t it? | | | | | | His lawyer showed the judge that Fitz is registered to vote at this Fulton County home and that his driver license address lists that Fulton County home, and he pays insurance and taxes for the home, and he voted in Fulton County using that address. And that was enough for the judge to rule in his favor: we learned Friday April 17th that he can stay on the ballot as a Fulton County resident. | | | | | | The ruling is really quite bizarre. I walked out of there certain that he he lost and was gob smacked to learn four days later the judge decided otherwise. I really cannot imagine how someone can take out a mortgage on a home in Cobb County, put their signature on it that this is your primary home, deny understanding the mortgage contract despite your being a lawyer and a real estate agent, register your vehicle collection at that Cobb County home, then convincing a judge that your Fulton County home is your primary home – not the one where you signed the mortgage as your primary home. And even admit that you do not sleep at or have clothes in this Fulton County home. Somehow the judge concludes that you are a Fulton County resident because you voted and paid the bills at that Fulton County home. Does Mr. Johnson not also pay the bills at his Cobb County home? Cobb County is where he lives – let’s be real. He lives where he sleeps and keeps his clothes and where he keeps his cars and where he records his campaign ads from this sleek modern kitchen. You can bet this kitchen is not in that dark home in Fulton. And by the way? There is no Green New Deal to *stop*. | | | | | | | | This spreadsheet totaling blow totaling up the cost of his votes for Georgia Power customers is off by half: it now exceeds $50 billion. | | | | | | What you can do This ruling is so absurd that we want the attorney for the complainant to research if an appeal could succeed. If you can help fund that research and appeal that would be greatly appreciated. I am not sure an appeal it will go forward without community support because lawyers are expensive. But given the extensive help I’ve received from them I will never tell another lawyer joke again. | | | | | | Sorry – couldn’t help it. Joking aside, if you have capacity to help please donate $50 or $100 or $250 or whatever you can directly to my nonprofit. 100% of the donations coming in from this newsletter will go towards legal fees challenging Fitz Johnson’s fake residency. Because the last thing we need is him back on the PSC. My guess is these Georgia Power customers don’t find the grid very reliable. These are disconnection numbers from 2025 under his tenure. Look at February. Wow. | | | | | | | | In total 273,800 households were disconnected from power last year, a record. That is 11% of Georgia Power’s customer base of 2.4 million residential customers, a figure 10 times the national average. What did luxury car collector and mortgage contract non-reader Commissioner Fitz Johnson do to lower that horrible number while on the commission? Zero. Instead, he voted for a president seeking to cut the only bill pay assistance coming into Georgia, LIHEAP, the Low Income Heating & Energy Assistance Program. Georgia is one of only 10 states with no state or utility funded bill pay assistance. Our poor, sick, and vulnerable get LIHEAP or they get cut off. Let them eat cake! Am I right, Commissioner Johnson? Did you eat cake in the shape of Plant Vogtle during the ribbon-cutting ceremony while collecting luxury cars and signing a $1.3 million mortgage that isn’t your primary home while claiming to the lender it is? Then did you vote for a president who did this? | | | | | | | | | | Was this cake delicious? Let’s hope it was worth it: eighteen months later, Fitz was gone. | | | | | | | |
