SENATE ECONOMIC GROWTH COMMITTEE

STATEMENT TO

SENATE, No. 274

with committee amendments

STATE OF NEW JERSEY

DATED:  MAY 16, 2024

      The Senate Economic Growth Committee reports favorably and with committee amendments Senate Bill No. 274.

      As amended and reported, this bill requires an electric, gas, and water public utility (utility) to develop and implement a plan to notify customers that opt into receiving such information about service outages in duration of one hour or longer.  The utility is to provide notifications in a format requested by the customer, which format may include an autodialed telephone call (robocall), text message, or electronic mail alert service maintained by the utility.  The notifications are to include information such as: the location and estimated length of the service outage; contact information for the utility and emergency services; information on how to report any other service problem related to the service outage; and any relevant updates as the situation progresses.  The bill also allows appropriate State, county, and municipal entities to disseminate information made available by a utility.

      This bill was prefiled for introduction in the 2024-2025 session pending technical review.  As amended and reported, the bill includes the changes required by technical review, which has been performed.

COMMITTEE AMENDMENTS:

      The committee amended the bill to:

      (1)  require that a utility develop and implement a plan to notify customers that opt into receiving such notifications from the utility of information relating to certain outages in the customer’s requested format.  The bill as introduced required a utility to disseminate to customers through certain means information concerning a service outage using the customer contact information on record with the utility;

      (2)  require that a utility provide notification of a service outage only if the service outage lasts one hour or longer in duration;

      (3)  provide that the bill’s provisions take effect 180 days after its enactment; and

      (4)  update the title and synopsis to reflect changes to the bill.