Rigazio named president of Nevada Power

Thursday, June 1, 2000 | 11:28 a.m.

A longtime Nevada Power Co. executive was named president of the Las Vegas electric utility.

Steve Rigazio, 45, senior vice president of energy delivery and a corporate executive since 1984, was selected for the position by the board of directors of Sierra Pacific Resources Inc., which met in Las Vegas Wednesday.

Reno-based Sierra Pacific is Nevada Power's parent company.

Rigazio will report to Sierra Pacific Chief Executive Officer Michael Niggli and oversee 1,600 employees in the Las Vegas area. He will be responsible for operations, customer service and financial results for Nevada Power, which has about 567,000 customers in Southern Nevada.

The move is part of a corporate restructuring in preparation for Sierra Pacific's $3.1 billion acquisition of Portland General Electric, announced in November.

"This is the first step toward building a corporate structure that will include three distinct operating subsidiaries, as well as a service company, which will be required following completion of our acquisition of Portland General Electric," Niggli said in a statement.

The three subsidiaries will be Portland General Electric, Nevada Power and Sierra Pacific Power Co., the utility serving Northern Nevada.

The move follows the company's loss of its No. 2 executive, Malyn Malquist, who resigned as president and chief operating officer of Sierra Pacific April 18.

Malquist has not given interviews about his resignation, but analysts said Malquist, who joined Sierra Pacific in 1994 and helped engineer its 1999 merger with Nevada Power, was frustrated with a 50 percent decline in the company's stock price since the merger and regulatory rulings that have cut into the company's revenues.

Rigazio, who takes his new position immediately, learned last summer that he has amyotrophic lateral sclerosis, commonly known as Lou Gehrig's disease. He established a foundation called Nevadans for Prevention of ALS and has helped raise money for the ALS Association Nevada Chapter. He recently testified before a Senate committee to lobby for increased funding for ALS research.