An investigation has found gaps in Baltimore Gas and Electric’s safety protocols after an employee was accused of failing to properly inspect gas pipelines and filing false reports.

The Maryland Public Service Commission asked its staff to investigate after 14 former BGE employees accused the utility in December of mismanaging pipeline safety contract work. Those allegations were part of the former employees’ petition to intervene in a BGE rate-setting case before the commission, in which they argued consumers should not bear rate increases tied to mismanaged projects.

The commission, a state agency that regulates utilities, denied the former employees’ petition to intervene in the rate case in February. But in the same order, it directed its engineering division to look into “troubling allegations” that “natural gas infrastructure may have been compromised.”

In its report, filed Friday, the PSC staff said the “acknowledged pattern of falsification of records suggests a non-trivial violation of inspection integrity and safety protocols, increasing the potential for risks to the gas distribution system and public safety.”

The petitioners had alleged that an employee logged hours on gas inspections that were instead spent on a boat in Rock Hall Landing Marina. In the petition, they said the employee had submitted false inspection reports and timesheets on a daily basis for more than four years. They said they have evidence the employee did fewer than 100 inspections instead of the thousands claimed.

BGE, which has disputed the allegations, said Tuesday that it cooperated with the PSC during the staff investigation.

“We respectfully disagree with the PSC Engineering Division’s conclusions that suggest the actions of a single former employee compromised our gas system safety or resulted in any imprudent costs,” Richard Yost, a BGE spokesman, said in an email.

He said the utility has built-in redundancy in its safety protocols. And he said BGE has sought recovery of costs only for necessary and completed work.

“Safety remains our highest priority at BGE,” Yost said.

The report coincides with last week’s end to the state legislative session in which lowering energy costs for consumers became a priority. Lawmakers approved a bill aimed at making Maryland more energy-independent and lowering utility bills for ratepayers.

The PSC staff report recommended the commission order BGE to produce a list of all projects that were to have been inspected by the discredited employee, consider compensatory refunds to ratepayers and develop a corrective action plan. The report called for an independent audit of the utility’s adherence to inspection protocols.

The report said BGE confirmed the inspection falsification during an internal investigation but took limited disciplinary action. It found no evidence that BGE reinspected any projects associated with falsified reports or took steps to validate the safety of affected infrastructure.

The engineering staff said it was unable to independently verify “whether the physical integrity of the gas infrastructure was definitively compromised. However, based on standard engineering practice and pipeline safety protocols, the integrity of a gas system cannot be presumed where the inspection and documentation chain has been compromised.”

Tori Leonard, a PSC spokeswoman, said the commission is assessing the report and its recommendations and considering the next steps. It had said in its February order that after the investigation was complete, it could open additional proceedings to further look into or remediate the situation.

An attorney for the petitioners said the findings validate the whistleblower concerns after BGE had characterized their allegations as “outrageous” and “filled with inaccuracies and misrepresentations.”

“Instead of attacking whistleblowers who exposed this serious public safety issue, BGE’s leadership should demonstrate accountability by implementing meaningful corrective actions and terminating those who approved the strategy of denying systemic problems and attempting to discredit those who brought them to light,” said David Manuel Baña, attorney for the whistleblowers, in an email to The Baltimore Sun.

Baña said the report raises questions about whether BGE customers have been paying for services that were not properly performed. He called the recommendations a “critical first step, particularly the call for BGE to produce a complete list of compromised projects so that people can learn whether potentially unsafe gas infrastructure is near their homes, schools, or workplaces.”

The petitioners are included among 17 plaintiffs in an ongoing civil suit against BGE for alleged racial harassment and disparate treatment in the workplace, saying some white employees openly used racial slurs against Black employees and tied nooses in the workplace. That suit is represented primarily by Baña’s wife, attorney Tonya Baña, and former Deputy Attorney General of Maryland Thiru Vignarajah.

The petitioners in the PSC case are calling on the U.S. Department of Transportation to investigate for potential violations of the Natural Gas Pipeline Safety Act and related regulations. They also are calling on Maryland Attorney General Anthony Brown to look into whether BGE bills tainted by gas pipeline inspection fraud were sent to state and local government facilities, buildings and agencies.

A spokeswoman for the attorney general’s office, Jennifer Donelan, said the office neither confirms nor denies investigations unless required by law.

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