Tomorrow, the attorney general's Public Counsel Section will announce its recommendation on whether Puget Sound Energy should be sold to a group of Australian and Canadian private equity investors.

The matter is before Washington Utilities and Transportation Commission.

The public counsel's recommendation is one part of a complex regulatory process, but an important one for consumers. The public counsel represents residential and small business customers in utility rate cases for state-regulated, investor-owned utility companies such as PSE.

At the hearing in Olympia that I wrote about on June 5, consumers had concerns about a state utility being sold to foreign interests and how a foreign company would be regulated under state law.

It's important for consumers to study the issues and make their voices heard.

The deadline for sending a comment to the commission about the proposed sale of PSE is July 31.

In another petition before the commission, PSE has requested permission to raise rates to customers to generate an additional $237 million in revenues. The deadline for comments is Aug. 31.

Written comments can be sent to UTC, P.O. Box 47250, Olympia, WA, 98504 or e-mail comments@utc.wa.gov. Include your name and mailing address, the name of the company (PSE), and Docket No. UE-072300/UG-072301 (electric and gas) or U-072375 (sale).

Bellevue-based PSE serves more than 1 million electric customers and 725,000 gas customers in Western Washington.