SDG&E;, SCE Reaffirm Their Merger Intent : Utilities: The two firms extend by a year the date after which they can pull out after merger foes announces a plan to lobby the SDG&E; board.

San Diego Gas & Electric unanimously reaffirmed Monday a plan to merge with Southern California Edison when it extended the merger agreement until March 31, 1991.

Edison’s 16-member board “did exactly the same thing” during a regularly scheduled meeting March 15, Edison spokeswoman Diane Wittenberg said.

The votes occurred at the same time that San Diego-based merger opponents were opening a campaign to persuade SDG&E;’s board members to back away from the $2.4-billion stock swap merger, which would create the nation’s largest gas-and-electric utility, with 4.5 million customers.

That campaign will continue, according to Bob Hudson, executive director of the Coalition for Local Control. The coalition has assembled a group of board members’ peers who are now lobbying the board to reconsider the controversial merger.

“Now more than ever San Diegans who know (SDG&E;) board members need to ask them the tough questions,” Hudson said Monday. “Board members who are San Diegans need to have some accountability to the community. . . . They are there to represent the community’s interest as well as the shareholders.”

The SDG&E; board “wanted to affirm its strong commitment to the merger by extending the agreement to a date which should provide ample time to complete the expected regulatory approvals,” SDG&E; Chairman Tom Page said in a prepared release issued Monday.

The agreement signed in early 1989 allowed either company to back away if the merger was not completed by Saturday. The original agreement did not require an extension because it contained an “evergreen” that kept it in force indefinitely, Page said. Monday’s vote served to reaffirm the board’s belief that the proposed merger with the Rosemead-based utility will serve SDG&E;’s shareholders, customers and employees, as well as the San Diego community at large.

During recent interviews with the Times, five of SGD&E;’s seven board members said they saw little reason to back away from the merger agreement. The board members said they have had relatively little direct contact with anti-merger forces.

Hudson said the board’s Monday vote will not stand the test of time.

“They could in the future change their minds on this” as state and federal regulators continue their in-depth reviews of the merger, Hudson said.

Merger opponents believe that SDG&E;’s board will be forced to reconsider the merger vote in early April, when the state Public Utilities Commission’s staff issues a report on the merger’s environmental impact. That report likely will describe air quality problems to be created by a the proposed merger, Hudson said.

Michael Shames, executive director of Utility Consumers Action Network, a San Diego-based consumer group opposing the proposed merger, challenged the board’s decision to renew the merger just days before the PUC staff issues the environmental review.

“To extend it a whole year, unchanged, is abominable,” Shames said. “Without having ever seen the (environmental impact review) it’s surprising. I didn’t believe they’d do that.”