SCOTT MERRILL, Acting Assistant General Counsel

Advocacy II

Scott Merrill is Assistant General Counsel in the Commission’s Legal Division, where he leads a team of advocacy attorneys supporting the Public Advocates Office and the Commission’s enforcement divisions. His primary areas of focus are utility ratemaking (including general rate cases and financing applications), electric and natural gas safety oversight, and telecommunications and water issues.

Scott has been a staff attorney in the Advocacy II group since 2021.  His work has focused on representing the Public Advocates Office in telecommunications matters and the Safety and Enforcement Division on Public Safety Power Shut-Offs.  Prior to joining the Commission, Scott worked as a staff attorney for the State Controller’s Office for six years where he worked on numerous issues such as unclaimed property, education funding, cryptocurrency, property taxes, election law, and property tax law.  Scott also spent a year with the California Newspaper Publishers Association (CNPA), serving as a staff attorney and legislative advocate.  Before working with CNPA, Scott worked at the Department of Corrections and Rehabilitation and Governor Schwarzenegger’s Office of Legal Affairs.

He received his undergraduate degree at California State University, Long Beach and his JD from the University of the Pacific, McGeorge School of Law.