CLEVELAND, Ohio – Cleveland City Council President Kevin Kelley this week signed two additional subpoenas for documents addressing FirstEnergy’s funding efforts for a group seeking to discredit Cleveland Public Power.
The summons follow a request for documents sent to consumers against misleading charges a week ago, a now disbanded advocacy group that had publicly criticized the city’s electricity supplier. Cleveland City Council is investigating funding for the group received from FirstEnergy through a nonprofit passage. The so-called dark money organization does not have to publicly announce its donors.
Records have shown that consumers received $ 200,000 from Partners in Progress against fraudulent charges in 2019. It was part of a larger sum of money that the pass received from FirstEnergy.
The council is attempting to confirm the source of $ 351,000 that consumers received and used in against fraudulent charges for 2018 a leaflet campaign lowering the prices and service of CPP.
The new subpoenas will be sent to the legal representatives of Generation Now Inc. in Delaware and Generation Now Ohio Inc. in Columbus.
Generation Now signed a guilty plea filed on February 5, in which it admitted its part in the HB 6 statehouse bribery scandal. The group pleaded guilty to charges under the Racketeer-influenced and Corrupt Organizations Act.
“We are awaiting information from consumers against fraudulent charges, but we know they received much more than the $ 200,000 attributed to another dark money group from FirstEnergy,” said Kelley. “Generation Now seems like the first stop for a huge amount of money that then passed out. We want to know where it was going and if it was used against the City of Cleveland and CPP. “
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