Baxley back at work at PSC after fall

MONTGOMERY - Lucy Baxley is back at work as president of the Alabama Public Service Commission after spending nearly a month recovering from a fall.

Baxley presided over her first monthly meeting of the utility regulatory commission on Monday.

She said it was a pleasant change from her four years as lieutenant governor, when she presided over the often argumentative state Senate.

“Nobody was ready to pounce on anybody,“ she said after the PSC meeting.

Baxley was elected Nov. 4 and was scheduled to preside over her first monthly meeting Dec. 2. But the meeting was postponed when Baxley fell on Thanksgiving and suffered a hairline fracture of her pelvis. She was released from HealthSouth Rehabilitation Hospital in Montgomery on Dec. 23.

Baxley, 71, said she is attending outpatient rehab sessions and working with a personal trainer as part of her recovery. The sessions are nothing new to her because she went through similar training after a stroke on Thanksgiving 2006.

The PSC’s monthly meeting was the first since Baxley’s election made Alabama’s three-member commission the only all-female state utility commission in the country.