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Titus becomes latest major Democrat to oppose Energy Choice ballot question

Riley Snyder
Riley Snyder
EnergyIndyBlog
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Democratic Rep. Dina Titus announced Tuesday that she plans to oppose the Energy Choice Initiative on the 2018 ballot, the latest high-profile Democrat to come out in opposition to the ballot question.

Titus, a longtime former state senator, said in a statement sent by the Coalition to Defeat Question 3 campaign that she opposed a similar effort in the 1990s to open Nevada’s electric markets to retail competition and prohibit a single entity from having monopoly control over the state’s electric market and has the same fears with the new ballot question.

“As the author of Nevada’s original rooftop solar law, I am deeply concerned that Question 3 would undermine Nevada’s clean energy future,” she said in a statement. “If passed, it would reopen and undo Nevada’s progressive and settled net energy metering rooftop solar policies. It also would jeopardize other new clean energy projects that can put us well on our way to doubling renewable energy generation in Nevada. At the same time, Question 3 would raise electricity rates on Nevadans, roll back consumer protections, and make our electricity system less reliable. I urge all Nevadans to join me in voting NO on Question 3 this November.”

If approved by voters in 2018, the ballot question would amend Nevada’s Constitution requiring the state to create a retail electric market, where multiple companies could compete to generate and sell electricity by 2023.

NV Energy, which has almost entirely funded the opposition campaign against the ballot measure, said in May that it planned to double the company’s renewable energy capacity by 2023 and add six new major solar projects through its three-year Integrated Resource Plan, but only if the ballot measure doesn’t pass.

Groups supporting the ballot measure, which passed 72 to 28 percent in 2016, have mainly been funded by the Las Vegas Sands and Switch.

Other Democratic candidates and left-leaning groups, including gubernatorial candidate Steve Sisolak and the Nevada AFL-CIO, have said they plan to oppose the ballot measure in 2018.

Between 2008 and 2018, NV Energy’s federal PAC has contributed $30,000 to Titus’s campaigns, according to the Center for Responsive Politics.

Disclosure: Switch, NV Energy and Steve Sisolak have donated to The Nevada Independent. You can see a full list of donors here.
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