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General Assembly appoints Bagot, Towell to State Corporation Commission [1]

['Charlie Paullin', 'More From Author', '- January']

Date: 2024-01 

Virginia’s three-member State Corporation Commission is now complete after the General Assembly appointed two new members to fill seats that have been vacant for almost two years because of political disagreements.

Kelsey Bagot, an attorney with NextEra Energy and former adviser to a Federal Energy Regulatory Commission member, and Sam Towell, an attorney for Smithfield Foods and former lawyer with the Office of the Attorney General, were unanimously elected to the positions by the legislature Wednesday.

“It’s been a while,” said Del. Jeion Ward, D-Hampton, who was charged by her party with finding candidates to fill the vacancies. Sen. Creigh Deeds, D-Charlottesville, took on the responsibility for the Senate. “I’m glad that we can finally unclog some of that jam, that work that the SCC had.”

The State Corporation Commission, with nearly 700 employees, is the arm of state government that regulates public utilities, business and insurance.

Bagot will take the seat vacated by former Judge Judith Jagdmann, which he will hold for a six-year term starting on April 1. Because of the calendar of appointment cycles, the remaining seat that will be occupied by Towell carries a four-year term.

The two will join Chairman Jehmal Hudson, who has been the lone judge on the commission after the divided legislature failed to fill a vacancy created in 2021 and another created at the end of 2022.

In order to maintain a quorum during the vacancies to issue orders and final decisions, the SCC has been recalling retired judges, including former Commissioner James Dimtri, for 90-day periods.

Members of environmental and ratepayer advocacy groups have spoken positively of both Bagot and Towell. Gov. Glenn Youngkin, who only has the power to appoint SCC judges when a vacancy occurs while the General Assembly is not in session, told reporters Tuesday that he hopes the new judges are “reasonable.”

“The policies that have been put in place can’t work for Virginia,” said Youngkin, who has criticized the Virginia Clean Economy Act, a 2020 law that seeks to decarbonize the state’s electric grid by midcentury. “We’ve just got to get reasonable people in a room and work through how are we going to develop a power base that powers Virginia.”

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