Angry customers, including a Malibu resident, blame overloaded power poles for causing a major electrical outage last year as well as the 2007 Malibu Canyon wildfire.
By Paul Sisolak / Special to The Malibu Times
Regulators from the state Public Utilities Commission heard complaints last Thursday from dozens of angry customers of Southern California Edison, including one from Malibu, regarding the company’s response to windstorms.
The occasion was a hearing into the windstorms on Nov. 30 and Dec. 1 last year, which blew down 211 Edison-owned power poles and knocked out power to nearly half a million customers in the San Gabriel Valley.
As many as one-third of the poles that went down may have been overloaded with excessive telecommunications equipment, according to a report by the Consumer Protection and Safety Division (CPSD), the PUC’s investigative arm.
Edison is also accused by the CPSD of overloading at least one of the three power poles that snapped and caused the 2007 Malibu Canyon wildfire.
More than 200 people squeezed into Temple City High School hall last Thursday for the PUC’s first public hearing into the matter.
Malibu resident Hans Laetz read statements sent to the PUC by Malibu City Councilmember Pamela Conley Ulich and Mayor Laura Rosenthal regarding the 2007 fire.
“The people of the entire state of California are being placed at grave risk due to power pole overloading,” Rosenthal wrote. “In Malibu, we know this firsthand, as it has become apparent that the 2007 Malibu Canyon Fire was caused by an overloaded, decrepit power pole, in a canyon where very strong winds were known to occur.”
Southern California Edison President Ron Litzinger said at the meeting that he “truly regrets the inconvenience caused by this storm and the service restoration estimates we were not able to meet,” according to the Pasadena Star News. “We can’t control the weather, but we can and we will improve our response to it.”
Still, Litzinger defended Edison and said it was premature to assume that any of the poles that fell in the recent San Gabriel Valley windstorm were overloaded. He added that many of the poles that fell were not overloaded.
Laetz, who is running for Malibu City Council, called for more accountability-and a resolution to a multimillion-dollar fine against Edison-so disasters like the 2007 canyon fire can be prevented in the future.
Laetz, who has been following the case as a citizen investigator after being granted intervenor status by the PUC, was photographed in another publication gesturing emphatically at Temple City Mayor Tom Chavez as he said Edison failed to help that city’s residents like it did for Malibu.
“I didn’t keep my cool. I was not a happy camper,” Laetz said. “I said, look, (Edison) promised you a prompt investigation and they would cooperate fully with state investigators. That’s not what they said in Malibu.”
Edison and four telecommunications companies currently face $99.2 million in potential fines from the PUC for their roles in the 2007 Malibu fire.
The Oct. 21, 2007 fire began when three power poles owned by Edison snapped in high winds, causing live electrical wires to ignite nearby brush. The blaze swept down Malibu Canyon, destroying 14 structures and 36 vehicles and causing central Malibu to be evacuated for three days.
In October, CPSD officials alleged in a prehearing conference into the Malibu fire that the five companies overloaded the power poles and in doing so “failed to provide safe service.” They also accused Edison’s accident investigator of lying under oath about the potential cause of the fire.
Edison argued the winds were so high that any pole could have been broken by them, and said the poles may not have been overloaded.
An administrative law judge on Jan. 10 rejected a request by Edison to dismiss claims that it misled investigators and destroyed evidence.
A five-week evidentiary hearing on the 2007 fire is set to begin March 5 in front of the PUC in San Francisco.