By Matthew Mosk
Washington Post Staff Writer
Sunday, June 18, 2006; C05
In his three years as Maryland governor, Robert L. Ehrlich Jr. has issued dozens of vetoes, typically after putting legislation through a careful, personal review and conferring with a small coterie of advisers.
But this week, before deciding whether to follow his gut and reject special legislation that the General Assembly crafted to ease the sting of rising energy costs, Ehrlich will set aside custom and invoke an unusual deliberative tool: a veto hearing.
The public hearing, scheduled for five hours Tuesday afternoon, is the first in Annapolis since 1991, when then-Gov. William Donald Schaefer was deciding whether to raise the speed limit on rural highways. The public hearing will enable all sides to sit before the governor and offer opinions.
"I'm going to have a very transparent, very public analysis of this bill," Ehrlich told reporters.
At stake is a proposal drafted last week during a marathon workday for members of the General Assembly, whom Ehrlich ordered into a rare special session. The bill would temporarily cap at 15 percent the amount that the state's largest electricity supplier can increase its rates. Baltimore Gas and Electric Co. had planned to increase rates for more than 1 million central Maryland customers by 72 percent starting July 1.
The measure would phase in the increase, overhaul the way power companies are regulated in Maryland and remove the current members of the state's regulatory commission.
Ehrlich said he had numerous problems with the legislation but stopped short of announcing a veto and, instead, announced a public hearing. It is an approach the governor has strongly resisted in the past.
Two years ago, Sen. Brian Frosh (D-Montgomery) urged Ehrlich to hold a veto hearing before tossing out legislation to freeze university tuition. Ehrlich refused the request on the advice of one of his legislative specialists, Kenneth Masters, who called such a hearing "a very, very, very unusual practice" that was "unwise to indulge in."
Frosh said Friday that he could envision only two reasons the governor would indulge in the practice now: "Either he is looking for a back-door excuse to sign it" by announcing that he heard persuasive testimony supporting the legislation, Frosh said, "or he wants a show trial."
Republican lawmakers said they believe the governor wants to be fully informed before making his decision -- something they say could not have happened in the rush of a special session that brought the bill from rough draft to final passage in about 12 hours.
"He's wise to be deliberative and collect more information," said Senate Minority Leader J. Lowell Stoltzfus (R-Somerset), who opposes the measure.
But Democratic lawmakers, who have by their own admission been quick to see the worst in the state's first Republican governor in decades, are suspecting the worst.
Senate President Thomas V. Mike Miller Jr. (D-Calvert) called it "political theater."
"All it does is give him the bully pulpit," Miller said. "What he's trying to do is orchestrate this hearing to make his decision seem halfway responsible."
But there is nothing Ehrlich has done to suggest this will be a contrived event.
Ehrlich spokesman Henry Fawell said anyone who signs up will be permitted to speak, and the governor plans to ensure that there is equal time for both supporters and opponents of the bill.
The hearing is set to be similar to the 1991 veto hearing, which was the third and final hearing of Schaefer's eight-year tenure. Schaefer said he had heard conflicting information about a bill proposing speed limit increases on some rural Maryland highways to 65 mph. "I want another chance to hear from both sides," he said at the time.
Two days after hearing a cascade of statistics and anecdotes, much of it contradictory, Schaefer went ahead with his veto.
There have been other hearings, too. Then-Gov. Harry R. Hughes held one in 1983 before rejecting a bill designed to protect Maryland corporations from hostile takeovers. And then-Gov. Marvin Mandel convened several over hot-button issues such as abortion and the death penalty. Before one 1977 veto hearing, Mandel suffered a small stroke, so three television cameras were set up at the front of a room, and witnesses testified on film.
As it was reported in a news account, witnesses filed in over five hours to gesture, wave signs and urge the unseen governor to veto or spare various bills, including one that would force physicians to notify the parents of unmarried minors prior to performing an abortion.
Glen Middleton, executive director of the American Federation of State, County and Municipal Employees District Council 67, said he does not expect the hearing over electricity rates to be a circus. Last week, members of Middleton's union -- including one who came dressed as a chicken -- waved signs and protested the governor's opposition to the electricity legislation.
"We will be at this hearing and want our views to be heard," Middleton said. "But we won't be bringing the chicken."
