Subject: Illinois legislative update
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Date: Mon, 17 Apr 2000 06:31:00 -0700 (PDT)

Ladies and Gentlemen--the Illiniois legislature adjourned this past Saturday 
night..  They will reconvene sometime in the fall of 2000, most likely after 
elections, for the fall Veto session.  As most of you know who have been 
included in periodic e-mail updates during the session, we were tracking a 
number of bills throughout the session, and as we predicted mid way thru, no 
major bills that could negatively impact our businesses made it out as law.  
Here's a short re cap on each issue:

"Coal scrubber" bills on both sides fizzled out mid way thru the session and 
did not ever make it to the floor for a vote.

"Peaking plant moratorium" bills (there were between 3 and 4 that we tracked 
ranging from riparian rights to outright moratoriums on development) 
continued to show up throughout the session, including a flurry of activilty 
about 2 weeks ago.  The general consensus would be that a resolution would be 
passed to convene an advisory board, under the auspices of the the Governors 
office, which would make recommendations to the legislature next year with an 
emphasis on groundwater issues.  That resolution (#71) passed out of the 
Senate on Friday and the House rules committee allowed it to be available for 
vote on the floor, but for some reason, it did not get called for a vote 
before the session adjourned on Saturday.  Despite not passing, I am sure 
that the Governor's office will convene such an advisory committee on it's 
own.  The resolution only included 1 representative from the "energy 
supplier" community, so we will probably petition the governor's office to 
add at least one more to voice the concerns of the IPPs.

"Metering and Billing mortatorium" bill, although pushed by the IBEW and 
their legislative sponsors all thru the session, was not ultimately passed.  
We had been active blocking and trying to add our own language to the bill as 
it moved, and had success in killing it in the Senate.  The unions tried many 
many tactics on this bill, and I am confident that they will now turn their 
efforts to the ICC and will appeal the ICC's order if/when it is issued.

"Reliablity" bills generally dealing with residential 
customers/penalites/outages, floundered throughout the session, and did not 
have a direct impact on our interests.

Enron Broadband Services issues were generally non issues this session--we 
expect to see some significant action next year as the newly appointed joint 
committees will consider an overhaul of the current Illinois telecom statutes.

Please feel free to give me a call if I can provide any specific information 
that you might be looking for on any of these issues. #612-339-4599