Heather Sanborn, a former state lawmaker and Portland business owner, will be nominated by Gov. Janet Mills to become Maine’s public advocate, the state’s consumer representative who speaks for utility ratepayers.

Heather Sanborn, photographed at Rising Tide Brewing in 2019, will be nominated to become Maine public advocate. Portland Press Herald file photo

Sanborn, a Democrat who represented parts of Falmouth, Portland and Westbrook in the state House of Representatives and state Senate from 2016 to 2022, backed legislation to reduce energy costs and help the state reach its energy efficiency goals, the governor said in announcing the nomination Thursday.

“My experiences as a small business owner and as a legislator have made me acutely aware of the burden of high energy prices on Mainers,” Sanborn said in the statement.

Her nomination must be confirmed by the Legislature’s Energy, Utilities and Technology Committee and Senate. Mills said she will formally post Sanborn’s nomination in the coming weeks.

Sanborn would succeed William Harwood, who will retire at the end of January after serving three years.

“As a small-business owner, Heather Sanborn knows just how important it is to have stable, affordable energy costs for Maine people and businesses, and, as a lawmaker, she has championed bipartisan legislation to make energy costs more affordable and to improve energy efficiency across the state,” the governor said.

Sanborn “brings the right combination of experiences to this important job,” Mills said.

Sanborn has been director of business operations at Rising Tide Brewing Co., a craft brewery in Portland that she co-founded with her husband, Nathan. She also is president of the Maine Brewers Guild, a trade association representing more than 80 craft brewers in Maine.

Oxbow Brewing Co. recently announced plans to buy Rising Tide Brewing by the end of the year.

Sanborn did not respond to phone calls and an email Thursday asking about her nomination and her priorities as public advocate if she’s confirmed.

Sanborn, a lawyer who practiced in Boston, was law clerk to Judge Kermit V. Lipez of the 1st U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals, and taught at Cape Elizabeth High School.

Harwood, 72, was an energy and utilities lawyer for 42 years and an adviser in the Governor’s Energy Office before Mills appointed him public advocate in 2022. He said he will turn his attention to family and friends.

William Harwood Contributed photo

“I’ve shortchanged them,” Harwood said in an interview.

His immediate task, he said, will be to work with Sanborn to ensure a smooth transition.

Harwood’s salary as of 2023 was $156,090.

He said a top priority of the Office of the Public Advocate will be to work with the Legislature in 2025 on issues related to energy, and the state’s electricity and gas utilities.

He also said competitive electricity providers that entered the market when Maine deregulated energy in the early 2000s must continue to be watched carefully. The Public Utilities Commission in October ordered Electricity Maine, a competitive electricity provider, to refund $6 million to about 20,000 current and former customers and pay a $315,000 penalty over practices criticized by regulators and Harwood.

Competitive electricity providers have been in Harwood’s sights over high prices charged to customers. A recent state report said more than three-fourths of residential customers of competitive electricity providers paid more last year than if they had purchased standard offer service.

“It’s a frustrating area,” Harwood said.

And he said the consumer advocate must watch public subsidies for renewable energy. The cost to utility customers for Maine’s offshore wind research project in the Gulf of Maine is the subject of negotiations among state regulators, the project’s developers and the Office of the Public Advocate.

“We’ve got to move ahead with it,” Harwood said.

Without offshore wind, Mainers “haven’t got a prayer” to meet the state’s goals to reduce greenhouse gas emissions, he said.