WPCNR WHITE PLAINS LAW JOURNAL. From The Office of the NYS Attorney General. July 24, 2006: Eliot Spitzer, candidate for New York Governor and Attorney General of the State of New York issued a statement Monday called the Public Service Commission oversight of Con Edison "wholly inadequate."

Spitzer said in a written statement to media said the PSC should "compel Con Edison to  develop a test for detecting equipment vulnerable to heat stress, overload or sudden failure, establish a protocaol for power grid management that includes mandatory reporting to local and state officials, and improve crisis communications with customers, government and the public, including more accurate reporting to local and state officials."

Spitzer said more accurate reporting was needed in the area of customers out of power, and the time needed to bring cutomers back "online," and demanded the PSC increase the amount Con Edison "pays customers for food and perishables ruined by lack of refrigeration and covering appliances damaged by power outages."

Spitzer's release did not indicate how much more in payments he felt Con Edison should be required to pay, and what constituted an acceptable degree of accuracy. The Attorney General said his office had identified the same Con Edison failures in the summer of 1999, when his office lised 13 actions the utility and the Public Service Commission should take "to prevent another similar blackout." Spitzer's release did not say if the Attorney General's office was going to launch any action against Con Edison for its continuance of its alleged failures without addressing them.