Pre-filed December 1, 1995, and 1,000 copies ordered printed.

Read 2nd time January 4, 1996, and referred to the Committee on Commerce and Environment.

Reported from the Committee February 12, 1996, with recommendation that the bill do pass with Senate Committee Amendment No. 1 and be placed on the Consent Calendar.

Senate Committee Amendment No. 1 adopted February 21, 1996.

Taken up February 21, 1996. Read 3rd time and placed upon its final passage; bill passed.

TERRY L. SPIELER, Secretary.

S2213.01P

To repeal section 386.310, RSMo 1994, relating to public utility and natural gas safety, and to enact in lieu thereof one new section relating to the same subject.

Be it enacted by the General Assembly of the State of Missouri, as follows:

Section A. Section 386.310, RSMo 1994, is repealed and one new section enacted in lieu thereof, to be known as section 386.310, to read as follows:

386.310. 1. The commission shall have power, after a hearing had upon its own motion or upon complaint, by general or special orders, rules or regulations, or otherwise, to require every person, corporation, municipal gas system and public utility to maintain and operate its line, plant, system, equipment, apparatus, tracks and premises in such manner as to promote and safeguard the health and safety of its employees, passengers, customers, and the public, and to this end to prescribe, among other things, the installation, use, maintenance and operation of appropriate safety and other devices or appliances, including interlocking and other protective devices at grade crossings or junctions and block and other systems of signaling, to establish uniform or other standards of equipment, and to require the performance of any other act which the health or safety of its employees, passengers, customers or the public may demand, including the power to minimize retail distribution electric line duplication for the sole purpose of providing for the safety of employees and the general public in those cases when, upon complaint, the commission finds that a proposed retail distribution electric line cannot be constructed in compliance with commission safety rules. The commission may waive the requirements for notice and hearing and provide for expeditious issuance of an order in any case in which the commission determines that the failure to do so would result in the likelihood of imminent threat of serious harm to life or property, provided that the commission shall include in such an order an opportunity for hearing as soon as practicable after the issuance of such order.

2. The commission shall not make any rule, regulation, decree or order with respect to allocation of territory or territorial rights among electric suppliers pursuant to sections 386.310 and 394.160, RSMo.

3. No person, partnership, firm or corporation shall set up, install, operate or cause to be operated, upon his or their premises, any sign or light commonly known as red neon" or any other kind of red signs, along, adjacent to or in line of vision of any main line track of a railroad in this state, except the same be shaded or shielded, so as to prevent them from being observed from the line of vision, as viewed from an approaching locomotive cab, or where they may cause confusion to the men in the locomotive cab, thereby endangering the safe and efficient operating of such train or locomotive. It shall be the duty of the state public service commission to inspect such confusing signs, upon complaint, and determine if such sign or signs are confusing or dangerous, and advise the owner or operator of their findings and prescribe an adequate shield therefor.

4. For the purposes of gas pipeline safety regulation, the jurisdiction, supervision, powers and duties created and established by this chapter will extend to [operators of distribution systems where natural gas, excluding petroleum gas, is measured by a single meter and distributed to other users within a single structure or to multiple structures.] the following:

(1) Operators and owners of distribution systems where natural gas, excluding petroleum gas, is measured by a single meter and distributed to other users within a single structure or to multiple structures;

(2) Operators and owners of high pressure pipelines which are supplied, directly or indirectly, by an intrastate and interstate pipeline, where natural gas, excluding petroleum gas, is supplied to the owner or operator of the high pressure pipeline solely for consumption by the owner or operator;

(3) Intrastate natural gas facilities owned and operated by interstate natural gas pipeline companies serving direct sales customers would be subject to enforcement of federally mandated pipeline safety standards; and

(4) Operators and owners of gas plants where natural gas is supplied directly or indirectly, other than for consumption by and on the property of the supplier, to institutional buildings including, but not limited to, schools and hospitals.