Kendall County Times

Republican state Rep. David Welter has thrown his support behind legislation that seeks to uphold greater diversity in the state’s clean energy jobs sector.

Introduced by Democratic Rep. William Davis, House Bill 4217 seeks to amend the Public Utilities Act “to provide that any supplier of energy that generates more than 500 kilowatt hours of electricity annually within the state (rather than any supplier of energy within the state) and all companies that develop, build, install, or maintain a renewable energy project with total annual revenues over $15,000,000 shall submit an annual report on all procurement goals and actual spending for female-owned, minority-owned, veteran-owned, and small business enterprises in the previous calendar year.”

Welter sees merit in the policy.

“I like the direction that Rep. Davis is trying to go with this,” he said at a recent House Energy & Environment Committee hearing focused on House Bill 4217. “I know you all have to work on some of that language but having that open, out there and transparent will lead to some better results from what we’ve seen now. As a Republican member, we often talk about limited government cutting mandates or compliances, regulations, that kind of stuff. I can tell you just from what I’ve seen it is increased, that transparency has increased participation and that’s a good thing.”

HB 4217 would also do away with language that exempts specified wind energy and solar energy from having to submit an annual report, along with stipulating that each participating company in its annual report shall “include an explanation of the plan for the next year to increase participation, including a buying plan for the specific goods and services the company intends to buy in the next 6 to 18 months, including any procurement codes used by the company, to assist entrepreneurs and diverse companies to understand upcoming opportunities to work with the company submitting the buying plan.”