Malibu Voices Hate Towards SCE Blackout Plan

Southern California Edison got an earful last night … nearly two hours of very angry people from Malibu and Topanga Canyon.

They were furious with the company’s plan to kill the electrical circuits in heavy wind storms.

The company gave a 15 minute rundown of its plan … the same presentation being made to local governments all across its service area.

Then … they got an earful. 

  NEWSCART 77685 VOICES :71 QQQQ SQUARE MILES OF THE SANTA MONICAS.

VOICE 1: “You’re basically saying ‘okay we’re going to turn off the power, we’re passing the buck’, so now the city has to deal, with this, the city has to figure it out , the people have to deal without everybody had bette switching year just have gotten their  generators.

“its not fair and again It’s particularly negligent” [CROSSFADES TO]

VOICE 2: “it would be prudent to try to nip this in the bud by going right to the CPUC now.

Maybe you need to hire some technical expertise, maybe some legalize specialized expertise and die with us at that level, otherwise this is going to gone for a long time.” [CROSSFADES TO]

VOICE 3:  “They’re really attempting to shift the liability to us.

“ ‘Everybody get a generator and it’ll be just fine.’

“But they have a responsibility to supply power to us, and they’ve taken on that responsibility.

“And while shifting the responsibility to us may make their shareholders happy, it doesn’t take care of their customers.” 

[CROSSFADES TO]

VOICE 4:  “I strongly oppose Edison’s plan for outages. They’re poorly devised plan poses a high level risk for many in the community.

“It is irresponsible for them to shut off our ability to communicate, at various times, over 400 square miles of Santa Monica Mountains.”

That’s a representative of the anger … the livid reaction in the region to the Edison blackout plan.

Not one person spoke in favor of it

The event was a presentation … no action scheduled from the city council …

All five of the elected officials voiced big worries.

Lou Lamonte said making the limited plan for blacking out the back country of San Diego County … a statewide policy … was a fallacy.

NEWSCART 77690 LA MONTE

“Maybe it works in San Diego but for Malibu this is a horrendous, disastrous idea.

“We have the PCH and two canyons (to get) out of here.

“If you are in San Diego there are probably 100 ways to get out of town, here we have these ways.

“And if we can’t tell people how to get to these places, or are which ones are open, there is nothing but disaster.”

Edison officials are confidant the blackout plan will not be used very often … and last night stressed that not every Red Flag Warning will trigger a blackout.

One Malibu resident has appealed to the state government to overturn the plan … but the California Public Utilities Commission says it is more important to prevent wildfires than cause the dangers and disruption that intentional outages will cause.

Less than 10 percent of wildfires in California are caused by down power lines … but the state is desperate to protect investor owned utilities from liability for causing them.

Southern California Edison may be on the hook for $2 billion in damages and cleanup costs for last year’s massive fire … which burned from Santa Paula through Ventura … all the way to Santa Barbara.

It’s been blamed for killing 22 people in mudslides and floods pouring out of fire damaged hillsides.

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And in Sacramento … debate over legislation to prevent wildfires and allow utilities to pass along costs to ratepayers is going down to the final hours as the lawmakers face a crucial deadline today.

The Associated Press is reporting no agreement yet on the plan.

The power companies are desperate to get off the hook for causing power line fires.

They want a shield from liability for many of the fires that electrical lines cause.

California utilities are held entirely liable for fires sparked by their equipment …  even if they followed all state safety standards.

That’s called strict liability … and the legislature has thrown back their attempts to get away from strict liability.

Instead … Sacramento lawmakers are proposing to allow the power companies to sell bonds to pay off wildfire-related debts … and pass along the costs as a surcharge on utility bills.

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