Gas prices in the North Country still seem to be higher than in most other parts of the state, and people have long hoped for relief.

Meanwhile a state senator is concerned that a law he voted for in 2008, a measure to protect gasoline customers from predatory pricing, has been ignored, and that has resulted in higher gas prices in parts of his district.

Sen. Joseph Griffo (R-Rome) who represents northeast and south central St. Lawrence County plus Lewis and Oneida counties, is wondering why there is such wide variation in gasoline prices from one spot to another.

“When I filled up my gas tank today, the price was $2.99 per gallon at my local station near Utica. Fifty miles east in Syracuse, the price is between 20 and 28 cents cheaper per gallon,” said Griffo in a press release last week. Meanwhile the price of gas was even higher in St. Lawrence County.

“In 2008, I voted for a ban on ‘zone pricing,’ which had allowed wholesalers to increase profits by charging retailers different amounts for fuel based on competition, volume of traffic, affluence of nearby neighborhoods and all sort of other vague reasons. I was trying to protect the consumer by standardizing the cost at the pump statewide.”

The bill passed the Legislature and then-Gov. David Patterson signed it into law, Griffo said.

“Unfortunately, the lawyers screwed it up,” Griffo said.

“The state Attorney General told us in late 2011 that he found evidence that some wholesalers were continuing to charge different prices to different retailers, in violation of the law we had passed. However, the ban had been used to prosecute companies exactly zero times,” Griffo said.

The problem was – and still remains – a couple of key phrases in the bill, Griffo said.

The law prohibited wholesalers from charging different prices within a “relevant geographic market,” but failed to adequately define that term. It also prohibits “arbitrary” price differences, which made enforcement impossible. Wholesalers argued the price differences weren’t “arbitrary,” but instead based on sound business-related reasons, such as competition, cost of operation and so on.

“We’ve been trying to put some real teeth into this law for a while, but with limited success,” Griffo said. He said he and a colleague in the Assembly will be working for “successful resolution for this bill.”

“I believe as I did before: The best way to protect the consumer is to prohibit wholesalers from padding their profits based on factors that are not transparent to either station operators or customers,” Griffo said.