PG&E To Become A Public Utility Under Proposed Legislation

Under a newly planned bill being written by Senator Scott Wiener (D-San Francisco), PG&E would become a public utility through the state of California.

PG&E has faced public scrutiny for years, but recently in the past year, numerous events have made the company less and less trusted to the public, local government, and state government. Notably, PG&E accidentally started the Camp wildfire in 2018 that resulted in the deaths of dozens of people, was subsequently bankrupted over tens of billions of dollars in liabilities and settlements, and has purposely cast millions of people throughout Northern California into the dark for days over wildfire concerns.

Lawmakers like Senator Wiener have argued that the company should have foreseen and dealt with these problems years ago and that customers have paid the price. So many have grown irritated at their practices and hindsight that currently one-third of PG&E customers want it to become a public utility. Major cities like San Jose and San Francisco have even been giving proposals to buy up PG&E infrastructure within their cities and start their own city-wide public utility.

California Governor Gavin Newsom. (Kevin Sanders for California Globe)

It culminated last week with Governor Gavin Newsom telling the company in a meeting, if PG&E didn’t work to get itself out of bankruptcy, that the state might take over the entire company as early as June.

All of this led to Tuesday’s announcement of California itself possibly taking over through state legislation next year through Senator Wiener’s bill.

“We are looking at legislation to force PG&E to become a public utility, but that’s still in the early planning stages and we haven’t settled on the exact details yet,” Senator Wiener told Bloomberg News on Tuesday. “[I plan to introduce] some sort of legislation forcing them to become a public utility.”

Senator Wiener is planning to introduce the new bill by February and has said that it’s “desirable” to give the public control of PG&E.

This isn’t Senator Wiener’s first time trying to send a message to the utility company. Earlier this year he introduced Senate Bill 378. SB 378 would have placed the burden of outages on power companies and would have mandated compensation and longer notices before outages. It didn’t make it out of debate, but it received a considerable amount of renewed interest following the blackouts caused by PG&E and the widespread misery it caused.

“This is make or break time for everyone involved,” explained Dana, an employee in the State Capitol who has been involved with some of the issues surrounding PG&E with the state. “PG&E does not want to be bought out so badly that it turned down billions from San Francisco over the city buying some of their infrastructure, but has been dragging their feet in getting out of bankruptcy. The Governor’s office wants a solution that will both limit wildfires and not have millions lose power, but they’re breathing down PG&E’s neck about taking over. The Senate now has this bill coming up that’s also threatening to take PG&E off the map. And then there are the citizens, who are all pissed about this and simply don’t want to be screwed over again and not be harmed.”

“It’s really all on PG&E to get out of this, because they know if they don’t, they stand to lose everything, legally, in California.”

With PG&E currently in bankruptcy and facing offers and threats from the Governor, major cities, and now the state Senate, Senator Wiener’s bill is turning up the pressure on PG&E to come up with a plan, and to come up with one fast.

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Evan Symon

Evan V. Symon is the Senior Editor for the California Globe. Prior to the Globe, he reported for the Pasadena Independent, the Cleveland Plain Dealer, and was head of the Personal Experiences section at Cracked. He can be reached at evan@californiaglobe.com.

4 thoughts on “PG&E To Become A Public Utility Under Proposed Legislation”

showandtell says:

November 13, 2019 at 10:15 am

It’s been pretty obvious for awhile that the big theatrical production of Gov Gav and the Gang in Sacramento would come to this.
And, as if you needed more evidence of Newsom’s shamelessness:
https://www.breitbart.com/politics/2019/11/12/wapo-pge-gave-hundreds-of-thousands-to-gov-gavin-newsom-wife-to-boost-their-careers/

Zach says:

November 14, 2019 at 3:04 am

Dies that mean the state would become responsible for PG&Es massive liabilities, as well as future liabilities for fires, etc? I’d rather PG&E file bankruptcy every few years than the state. But Wiener has no common sense, and now we have a governor who is equally dense.

Liz says:

November 14, 2019 at 1:27 pm

RecallGavinNow dot com…..I’m moving I can’t take this state anymore. You think we’ve seen corruption it will be nothing compared to gavin hand on the switch…The four families that have destroyed California for decades should all be charged with Treason.

Hedwig Frankenmuth says:

November 14, 2019 at 10:02 pm

So…. California pensions sre a trillion dollars short, there is no more water, the DMV can’t issue proper driver’s licenses, the DMV accidentally gave voter registration to thousands of illegal immigrants, typhus is spreading because the state won’t kill rats, and now they want to take over electricity. What in the name of God is the CPUC for? A utility can’t buy toilet paper without CPUC approval.

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