During the recent heat wave, Rachelle Chong was sweating more than just about anybody else in the state.

"It was kind of a tense week for me," the Stockton native, attorney and mother of 7-year-old twins said. But it comes with the territory for the newest member of the California Public Utilities Commission, the five-member panel charged with regulating privately owned electric, telecommunications, natural gas, water and transportation companies.

Ensuring there's enough electricity to supply power-sucking air conditioners for 36 million fellow Californians is only part of her job. For instance, she'll be in Stockton today to hear public input on the experiences of telecommunications consumers with limited English proficiency.

In her day-to-day activities as a CPUC commissioner, Chong, 47 - appointed Jan. 11 by Gov. Schwarzenegger - meets constantly with telephone, wireless and utility company officials and their lawyers, ratepayers and their advocates, and commission staff.

"It's a lot of reading and a lot of meetings with people. Sometimes we hold public hearings where the public can come and testify or they're evidentiary hearings where you have to be a party to the proceedings to testify," Chong said.

One thing she particularly enjoys is touring utility sites, especially new telecommunications facilities, her area of expertise.

"It's a job that touches every important job and one I take very seriously. I listen to all the parties in a particular proceeding," she said.

Chong's family recognized her talents early. The daughter of retired optometrist Edmond Chong and the late Barbara Ah Tye Chong, she claims to be related to half the Chinese-Americans in Stockton. At Lincoln High School in the mid-1970s, Chong was editor in chief of the student newspaper, copy editor of the yearbook and president of the Asian Club.

"We all knew she was going to be something," said her older brother, Curtis Chong, a Stockton business owner.

Her nationally recognized newspaper adviser at Lincoln High, Gary Daloyan, inspired her to pursue a career in journalism.

"If I were to describe Rachelle in one word, it would be 'superlative.' Among the over 2,000 students I had the pleasure of working with in Lincoln Unified and Stockton Unified schools, she was No. 1," said Daloyan, now retired from teaching and working as a walnut broker.

After graduating from Lincoln High in 1977, she went on to the University of California, Berkeley, graduating Phi Beta Kappa in 1981 with dual degrees in journalism and political science. In 1984, she graduated from University of California Hastings College of the Law in San Francisco, where she served as editor in chief of Comm/Ent Law Journal.

Education and law are deeply embedded in Chong's family, which can trace its roots to California's Gold Rush with the arrival of her great-grandfather Yee Ah Tye in San Francisco in 1852. Chong's great uncle, Hong Yen Chang, was the first Chinese lawyer in the United States when he graduated from Columbia University in 1886.

Chong's family history was chronicled with the 1998 publication of "Bury My Bones in America: The Saga of a Chinese Family in California 1852-1996," by now-retired Stockton Unified elementary teacher Lani Ah Tye Farkas, Chong's first cousin.

Chong has carried on the family legacy.

After nine years as a successful telecommunications lawyer in Washington, D.C., and San Francisco, President Clinton nominated Chong to a Republican seat on the Federal Communications Commission. Upon Senate confirmation in May 1994, she took office at age 34 as the first Asian-American FCC commissioner in the history of the regulatory agency.

"We were quite proud of her when she was confirmed. The whole family flew out to Washington," Curtis Chong said.

After her stint in Washington, Chong and her husband - lawyer and Stagg High School graduate Kirk Del Prete - returned to California in 1997, where she worked in private practice representing Internet and communications clients. She also operated her own small retail business and e-commerce Web site, while working as a mediator, arbitrator and expert witness for communications companies.

Chong, filling the term of Commissioner Susan Kennedy, which ends Jan. 1, 2009, had her first full day on the job Jan. 12, during which the commission passed the landmark California Solar Initiative.

On her official Web site, Chong describes herself as "a strong advocate of competition in all communications markets. At the FCC, I advocated simple, pragmatic regulation. I encouraged regulators and local authorities to think outside of the box - meaning to radically rethink regulations - given the swift changes in technology and the more competitive marketplace.

"At the CPUC, I expect to continue the formidable work to update its regulatory environment in a fast-changing world. I share the governor's goal of an upgraded, state-of-the-art infrastructure available for all Californians and businesses," she wrote.

On June 29, the commission launched www.calphoneinfo.com, a Web site in multiple languages that explains the confusing world of telephones, cell phones and other wireless communications.

"I was the one who pushed this through. We started work on it in March. It has tons of very useful telecom information," Chong said.

"We're trying to tell people about competition and how to be a smart shopper when shopping for telephone and wireless services," she said.

The new Web site and today's public meeting in Stockton are part of Chong's effort to break down language barriers in telecommunications in order to protect all California consumers.

"We've heard some in the minority community were targets of fraudulent marketing practices - it's deceptive in how it is advertised. At the time, we didn't have a lot of information, just anecdotal information, so we've asked the staff to publish a report on in-language practices. I thought Stockton was important to hear from because there is a large Asian community and Spanish community."

Contact reporter Joe Goldeen at (209) 546-8278 or jgoldeen@recordnet.com

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