Fourteen former employees of Baltimore Gas and Electric are petitioning to intervene in the utility’s case with the Maryland Public Service Commission over proposed rate increases. They claim the company is wasting money and passing the costs on to consumers.
BGE, owned by utility conglomerate Exelon, must demonstrate to the PSC that it used “good management judgment” and “prudence” on its infrastructure projects to justify the multi-year rate plan increase, according to a commission order in November.
The petitioners, represented by Baltimore attorney David Manuel Baña, believe that a 2023 incident specifically indicates that BGE failed to exercise good management judgment as an employee on his boat at Rock Hall Landing Marina recorded those hours as time spent on gas inspections .
They allege the employee “failed to conduct proper inspections of gas infrastructure work and submitted false inspection reports and timesheets on a daily basis for more than four years,” the petition states.
The former employees claim to have evidence showing that the employee performed fewer than 100 inspections in a time frame in which he claimed to have performed thousands of inspections.
When the fraud was reported to BGE in 2023, the petition alleges that the employee was given a nine-week paid suspension and a one-week unpaid suspension as a disciplinary measure. Top HR officials at BGE later testified that he should have been fired, the petition said.
The petitioners have also filed a civil suit against BGE for racial harassment and disparate treatment in the workplace, saying white employees openly made racist comments to black employees and tied nooses in the workplace. That lawsuit now has 17 plaintiffs, represented primarily by Baña’s wife, Tonya Baña, and former Maryland Deputy Attorney General Thiru Vignarajah.
Other workers sued BGE over injuries suffered in an explosion in 2020. This year, a BGE contractor also died on the job after a house exploded while he was making electrical repairs during a gas leak.
“I urge any BGE employee with knowledge or evidence of compromised gas infrastructure inspections, cover-ups or other irregularities to come forward,” David Baña said in a press release.
“No one wants an avoidable gas explosion on their conscience. Those with information can contact the Maryland Public Service Commission (PSC) and the U.S. Department of Transportation (DOT) or contact me directly.”
“I further challenge BGE and Exelon to make a public commitment – in writing – to protect whistleblowers who report safety concerns to regulators or an attorney from retaliation,” he said.
BGE’s multi-year rate plan to raise energy costs is controversial and has been criticized by both consumer advocates and the state’s top attorneys, Attorney General Anthony G. Brown and Assemblyman David S. Lapp.
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