CITIZEN POWER ALLIANCE

Two of National Grid's top U.S. executives will get a chance to state their case to one of the utility's most outspoken critics as it is mired in an accounting and expense account scandal.

U.S. Sen. Charles Schumer, D-N.Y., is scheduled to meet Friday in New York City with Tom King, the president of National Grid's U.S. operations, and Marcy Reed, the head of U.S. public affairs for the British utility company.

The previously scheduled meeting comes as Schumer and other political leaders in New York have been blasting the London-based business for including millions of dollars of apparently frivolous spending as part of its $400 million electric rate increase request for upstate New York.

National Grid has since slashed $4 million from the rate plan that had been charged to expenses by company executives, such as private school tuition for their children, gifts for people outside the company and even toilet repairs at their homes.

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