Sec. 210. 

The Board of Public Utilities and Transportation shall have the following powers and duties:

(1)  To investigate all privately owned public utilities in the City of Los Angeles (except utilities at the harbor placed by this Charter under the jurisdiction of the Harbor Department) and compile such data as may be necessary to determine the proper services to be furnished by such utilities or the charges to be made therefor. The board shall have the right of access at all reasonable times to the property and records of said utilities for the purpose of investigation and may require reports respecting said matters from such utilities at such time and in such form as said board may prescribe.

(2)  To establish and prescribe by resolution regulations providing for the operation of, the extent, character and quality of service, the rates to be charged by and the extensions to be required of, any said utility, all in a manner not in conflict with any paramount regulation, rate fixing or extension requirements for any such utility by the state or nation. The secretary of the board shall publish once in the official newspaper a certified copy of every such proposed regulation, tentatively approved by the board, together with a notice to any and all persons to show cause, if any, within five days from the date of publication of said notice, why the proposed regulation should not be made effective. Any person interested in or affected by the proposed regulation may, within five days after the expiration of such publication, file objections thereto with the secretary of the board, specifying the grounds of such objections. The secretary shall lay all such objections before the board at its next regular meeting after the expiration of the time for filing the same, and the board shall then fix a date, not less than five days later, for hearing any and all objections, and shall, after said hearing, finally act on said proposed regulation by approving, changing or rejecting the same, providing that any resolution of the board approving any such regulation shall be published once before becoming effective and shall be subject to the referendum provisions of this Charter relating to ordinances. Any resolution fixing rates must be approved by the Council, by ordinance, before taking effect.

A corporation, engaged in the business of supplying gas and electricity to the inhabitants of a city, in furnishing electricity for power to be used by a private person in his private business, acts in the performance of a public service which can be regulated by the municipality.

The rate-fixing powers of a municipality, in its reasonable use of its police power, is not limited to the establishment of the maximum charge which a public utility may make, leaving it open to the utility by agreement to fix a less charge for an individual consumer. Such a limitation on its power would open the door for abuse by way of favoritism and discrimination within the limit, the prevention of which is one of the primary objects to be attained by rate regulation.

A contract between a public service corporation and a private consumer will be conclusively presumed to have been executed in contemplation of the power of the proper board or tribunal to thereafter fix rates in every case where such power exists and may have been legally exercised.

Pinney & Boyle Co. v. L.A. Gas & Electric Corp., 168 Cal. 12.

The regulation and fixing of charges to be made by telephone companies doing business within the city is none the less a municipal affair within the jurisdiction of the city, because rates so fixed would not be uniform throughout the state.

The power given by the state to one of its municipalities to “fix and determine rates” does not authorize that municipality to abandon the power and to irrevocably establish rates for the entire period of a franchise.

Home Tel. & Tel. Co. v. City of Los Angeles, 155 Fed. 554  (Affirmed in 211 U.S. 265).

Where a city having power to do so makes a contract with a public utility fixing the rates which it may charge, the courts may not relieve the utility from its obligation to serve at such rates, no matter how inadequate they may prove to be.

Railroad Commission v. L.A. Ry. Corp., 280 U.S. 145  (Affirming 29 Fed. (2d) 140).

(3)  To investigate complaints against the services or charges of any said utility and to make orders adjusting the same.

(4)  To inspect all such utilities as to their compliance with their franchises, the ordinances of the City and the laws of the state, and as to their service generally; and to enforce in the manner prescribed by law a compliance with the terms of such franchises and ordinances or laws applicable thereto.

(5)  To keep a record of all public utility franchises granted by the City or exercised therein.  (Sec. Added, 1925.)