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Senator Keenan seeks ability for municipal light plants to shield trade secrets from competitors
Summary
Sen. John Keenan told the committee S.2158 would let municipal light companies protect competitively sensitive materials such as marketing tactics and customer data from public disclosure requests while keeping meeting minutes and deliberations open to the public.
Sen. John Keenan told the committee he had filed S.2158 to allow municipal light plants to protect proprietary and competitively sensitive materials—such as customer lists, rates and marketing tactics—from public disclosure requests by large utility competitors, while retaining transparency in board meetings and minutes.
Keenan described the bill as striking a balance between the public’s right to transparency and the operational needs of municipal providers competing with large private communications and energy firms. “This information could include customer lists, rates, marketing, tactics, and more,” he said, and added that disclosing such materials can create an “imbalanced competition” that undermines local providers’ viability.
Keenan said the bill would preserve open meeting requirements for municipal light plant boards but allow narrowly tailored confidentiality protections for competitively sensitive materials. He asked the committee to consider the bill favorably as it had in a prior session.
Why it matters: Municipal light plants argue they face competition from large regional utilities and telecommunication companies and sometimes need confidentiality protections for commercially sensitive information in order to negotiate effectively or develop competitive services.
No committee action was taken at the hearing; senators and committee members asked for statutory language to define narrowly the scope of permitted confidentiality.
