Maximizing the Public Benefit

When Consumers Power Company abandoned construction of a $6.2 billion nuclear plant in Midland in the 1980s, it sought to recover roughly $4.2 billion of those costs from Michigan ratepayers through higher utility bills. 

“If it had been approved, it would have increased people’s monthly bills by at least 30 to 35%,” recalls Paul Novak. 

At the time he stepped into the rate dispute, Novak was still early in his career and new to Michigan’s Department of Attorney General, serving as an assistant AG. 

“To this day, it’s the largest rate case in the history of the Michigan Public Service Commission,” says Novak, now an antitrust and environmental litigator. “I had probably 80 days of cross-examination hearings in the commission’s basement.”

He questioned a range of experts testifying on Consumers Power’s behalf in fields such as engineering, economics, capital markets and nuclear regulation, helping assemble a record exceeding 45,000 pages of live witness testimony. The utility also proposed a $1.5 billion transfer of assets to its parent company. Novak and his team successfully blocked the move, and the commission reduced the rate request by more than 80% to just $735 million. 

As for what made the difference, he says: “I think the biggest thing was just delving into boxes and boxes and boxes of documents.” 

The case set the tone for Novak’s decades-long public service career, expanding on interests from college. 

As an undergraduate at Michigan State, he spent the summer of 1980 in Washington, D.C., on Capitol Hill as part of the Lyndon Baines Johnson Congressional Intern Program. An externship with the Michigan Public Service Commission soon followed, where he got to know Commissioner Edwyna Anderson, whom he remembers as “a strong advocate for everyday consumers, but an even better human being.” 

During law school at Emory University, Novak clerked at the Federal Trade Commission’s Atlanta office, gaining experience in antitrust matters. Though the stints were brief, each exposed him to the legislative, regulatory and enforcement sides of public policy at key times in his education. “I’ve always been drawn to public interest law, so each of those experiences was a natural fit,” he says. 

That focus only deepened once he joined the AG’s office under Frank Kelley. “The hallmarks of Kelley’s career were consumer advocacy, environmental advocacy and being a spokesperson for the regular guy,” Novak says. “For a young attorney like me, it was a tremendous opportunity.”

Over the next 15 years, Novak worked closely with Assistant AG Luis Fernandez—his “all-time favorite boss”—handling utility rate cases along with antitrust and environmental enforcement actions. Novak eventually led the office’s Special Litigation Division. 

I had probably 80 days of cross-examination hearings in the commission’s basement.

He also took aim at the pharmaceutical industry’s so-called “pay-for-delay” tactics in a case involving the heart medication Cardizem CD. 

“It was one of the first cases to take on these pharmaceutical agreements and challenge anticompetitive conduct under antitrust law,” Novak says. “Brand-name drug manufacturers were essentially paying generics millions to stay off the market, which allowed them to maintain higher revenues but also kept prices higher for consumers.” 

Appointed co-lead counsel for all 50 states, Novak was responsible for coordinating state-by-state positions in discovery and other litigation matters, which sometimes felt more like herding cats. But the effort paid off: He obtained an $80 million recovery for consumers and third-party payers whose access to generics had been restricted.     

Now a partner at Weitz & Luxenberg, Novak continues to take on large-scale cases with deep public impact. He was part of the team that litigated and negotiated settlements with state, city and private entities in the Flint water crisis, including arguing it before the state Supreme Court with Julie Hurwitz. He also represented 62 Michigan cities and counties in opioid litigation against drug manufacturers and distributors, helping secure more than $600 million in recoveries since 2017. The funds are earmarked for much-needed opioid abatement, including treatment and prevention programs. 

“The opioid epidemic has been so widely distributed, destroying people’s lives from Southeastern Michigan to the Upper Peninsula, rural and urban, every race and ethnicity,” he says. 

Novak is quick to credit the local firms that partnered with him on the suits—The Sam Bernstein Law Firm, Smith & Johnson Attorneys, Behm & Behm, Conybeare Injury and Accident Lawyers and Grewal Law—as well as the collaborative approach that has carried him from public service into private practice.

“It’s important for AG offices to have good relationships with plaintiff firms,” he says. “Both sides must respect each other’s capabilities and roles to maximize the public benefit.”