Senate Standing Committee on Energy, Utilities and Communications

Senate Committee on Energy, Utilities and Communications will come to order. I'd like to welcome everyone to our first bill hearing of the 2025-2026 session. We have five bills on today's agenda. We also need to adopt the Committee rules. So first, let's establish a quorum. Assistant, please call the roll.

Becker.

Here.

Becker, here. Ochoa Bogh.

Present.

Ochoa Bogh, present. Allen.

Here.

Allen, here. Archuleta.

Here.

Archuleta, here. Arreguin. Ashby. Caballero. Dahle. Gonzalez. Grove.

Here.

Grove, here. Hurtado. Limon. McNerney.

Here.

McNerney. Here. Rubio.

Present.

Rubio. Present. Stern.

Here.

Stern, here. Strickland.

Here.

Strickland, here. Wahab.

Here.

Wahab, here. Yes. We have a quorum.

A quorum has been established. A copy of the committee rules, as provided to all members. I'm sure you read them all diligently, without objection, the committee rules for the 2025-2026 legislative session will be adopted. No objections? It was without objection. Yeah. Okay. So let's hear from our first author, Senator Laird. He is ready.

Has two bills here before us. First up will be SB 491. Go ahead when ready.

Thank you, Mr. Chair.

Excuse me, sir. One moment. Are you ready?

Go ahead.

Happy birthday to you. Happy birthday to you. Happy birthday, dear Senator. Happy birthday to you.

Thank you, Mr. Chair.

I would suggest you all keep your mic off.

Mr. Chair, before he begins--Mr. Chair?

And congrats to our newest governor's appointee as well.

Mr. Chair, before he begins, I'd like to say I thought there was something very fishy about his presentation this morning, but I'll accept.

You know, come on. Not two hazings in a day, just one. Do I get to present my bill now?

Yes. Go ahead, please. Yes.

The first thing I was going to say is I hope you had gotten the hazing out of your system earlier. This bill you've seen before. Senate Bill 491 will direct the Chair of the California Energy Commission to appear annually before the Legislature to report on the commission's clean energy plans and responsibilities. It'll do meaningful engagement with the Legislature. When it passed through before, there were bipartisan support. No no votes. I would respectfully ask for aye vote, and I'm here to answer any questions.

Thank you. Do you have any--any witnesses here with us? Okay.

Or no planned ones.

No planned ones. Any, anybody in support who would like to speak?

Sir, I'd like to move the bill.

All right. Well, first let's see if there's any opposition witnesses in the Chamber. Seeing none, any opposition add-ons? No? Well, we have a motion.

May I make a comment real quickly?

Yes. Discussion first. Senator Rubio.

Trying to cut us out so soon in the meeting, right? But thank you so much. You know, I'm just excited about this bill in particular. You know, we talked about being a co-author. I really do appreciate what you're saying, which is meaningful, meaningful conversation.

I think that a lot of the times, as you know, things happen behind the scenes once we let something out and we don't have this dialogue back and forth, so the fact that things this bill brings transparency and accountability, but more importantly, we also have to focus on what's success, but focus on what's not succeeding and try to figure out how to fix that, so thank you for bringing this forward. I think it's important for our constituents to know that there's transparency. So thank you.

Thank you.

Thank you, Senator Rubio. Senator Stern.

Thank you, Mr. Chair. Support the bill. I just want to ask a brief question. On page three of the analysis, there's a couple programs mentioned that I think fit within the framework of the bill. I just wanted to get a sense from the author.

The analysis mentions permitting--new permit streamlining authorities we've given, the Strategic Reliability Reserve, including DSGS and DBA, as well as DPMO, the Department of Petroleum Market Oversight. Just as you move forward, I wanted to get a sense--are you--is the sort of current list of issues in the bill the full scope? Are you open to--

If you will note the last sentence on the previous page, it says 'includes but not limited to.' Yes. So I think we're open to if there's a thing of major import included that's not on that list of including it.

Thank you. Thank you.

I see no other comments. Would you like--Senator Laird--would you like to close?

I appreciate the comments. Respectfully ask for an aye vote.

All right. We have a motion from Senator Strickland. Assistant, please call the roll.

SB 491: do pass but first referred to the Committee on Appropriations. [Roll Call]. So the current vote is 12/zero and we'll hold the roll open for Senators.

Yes. The current vote is 12 to zero. We will hold the roll open for add-ons, and you may now proceed, Senator Laird, to your second bill, SB 544.

Thank you very much, Mr. Chair. Senate Bill 544 streamlines the review process for rail crossing applications by allowing the California Public Utilities Commission to establish expedited review for uncontested rail crossing applications. There was legislation passed in 2016 that changed the process in a good way, but a significant number of these are uncontested and it takes an extra amount of time--when they're uncontested, they could move expeditiously.

This bill allows for that and would fix that and allow some that are uncontested to move quickly so that opportunities aren't lost with the rail guard crossing. So I would respectfully ask for an aye vote.

Thank you. Are there any--do you have any support witnesses for this bill? Any support add-ons? No. Seeing none, any opposition here today? Okay. Seeing none, we'll move on to discussion from the committee.

Move the bill.

Okay. Let's see if there's any other discussion. I just wanted to add my own comments quickly before I give you a chance to close. I just want to say this is a common sense measure, thank you, and we should be looking for other opportunities like this to streamline processes in a way that help the CPUC maximize resources and render decisions in a timely fashion, so I thank you for this bill. We'll be supporting this bill today. We do have a motion. Oh, you have a discussion point? Senator Grove.

Thank you, Mr. Chair. You know, I just wanted to bring something forth that you're bringing it under--this is the Railroad Commission one on the railroad crossings. Did you know that the State of Texas approves oil permits within 24 hours from the Railroad Department? Just curious.

Well, one thing I do know is that if Kern County were a state, it would be the fourth largest oil producing state in the United States. As long as we're just on a tangent here, we're going off the rails.

Thank you, Mr. Chair.

Okay. With that, we have a motion from Senator Archuleta since--oh. Would you please make a closing statement?

I appreciate the animated debate and respectfully ask for an aye vote.

Okay. With our motion from Senator Archuleta, ask the assistant to please call the roll.

Okay. SB 544: do pass to Senate Transportation Committee. [Roll Call].

The vote is 12 to zero. We will leave that one on call as well. Thank you, Senator Laird. You thought you said you would be fast and you were. Thank you. We now move on to--I see Senator Richardson up next for SB 533.

Well, not to say that I'm competitive, but you should know my birthday's in 21 days, so if you'd like to sing early, I would welcome it to have that special-

21 shopping days left. Yes. Okay.

Yes. There we go. Well, first of all, let me say good afternoon to the chair and members of this committee. This is my first opportunity to present a bill, so I'm kind of excited to be here with you all today.

I'd like to start by thanking the committee and the staff for all of their hard work regarding this measure and to let you know that I am aware of the recommended amendments that have been presented to help us to make sure that this bill is narrow in scope and ensures that it is worthwhile legislation to all Californians.

And so I'm prepared to accept those amendments today in light of the 2035, zero emission goals and the increase of electrical vehicles, which I will subsequently refer to as EVs. SB123 was passed in 2023 to standardize a payment system.

Since that time, only two short years ago, EVs have made up for 22% of all the new cars sold in the state through September 2024. Further, California has approximately 1.77 million cumulative plug in electrical vehicle registrations since 2010, making California the largest stock of electrical vehicles in the United States. On Thursday,

just last week, March 20, Governor Newsom announced that California reached 178,549 public and shared private electrical vehicle EV charges installed statewide, which means California now has 48% more EV charges than gasoline nozzles in the state.

SB533 introduces a technology driven option for larger private entities that support the need for charging status at major public venues while understanding the complexity to do so.

For example, in my district, the 35th district, I have four major concert and sport venues that have a capacity ranging from 17,505 people, 18,000 people, 27,000 people, and then of course a SoFi at 70,000 where each of these locations has been modernizing and adapting an APP based system to assist in being more efficient and also to have a safer process for individuals to do parking, charging, ticketing, food and beverages and more.

In addition to the venues, nine out of the top 15 charging providers that's more than 60% are already operating and utilizing app based systems. App based systems provide enhanced security through advanced encryptions and fraud protection. While credit card readers are susceptible to theft and fraud, exposing consumers to unnecessary risk.

SB533 allows EV charging stations under specific conditions to use app based payments that are still derived from a credit card, but the credit card information is entered into the app versus a card reader which significantly reduces time and better protects the consumer as the address and info information provides a secondary check of the user.

App based approaches aligns with technological advancements that we are seeing that improves convenience and the user experience. SB533 is a common sense update, keeping in line with the accelerated times and the impact to our consumers. I respectfully asked for an aye vote on SB533. And here today I have with me Mr. Joe Lang.

He's a representative of several of the venues and I would point out to you that we are. This is mission critical, as my district is facing FIFA, the World Cup.

In conjunction with the Senator, also from up north in Hayward, we also have the Super Bowl coming the year after and then the year after that, the 2028 Olympics. So Mr. Lang with Lang, Hansen, Giroux and Kidane, he's here also as my lifeline. Should we have any follow up questions. With that I'll yield to the Chairman.

Well, thank you. Excellent job and you have a lot of exciting and fun venues in your district. I'm a little jealous. Mr. Lang, go ahead. You have two minutes.

Mr. Chairman, members, Joe Lang representing in this case both SOFI Stadium and the new Intuit Dome arena in the center's district. I just want to thank the committee staff for identifying a technical drafting error in the broadness of the bill and agreeing to take the amendments and here to answer any questions.

But the Senator did a great job opening and I want to expedite your consideration today.

Okay, thank you. We'll see if anyone else here today wants to come out up and support.

Mr. Chairman, members, James Jack here on behalf of General Motors, we are in support of the bill and thank the author for efforts to support EV infrastructure.

Excellent.

Do we have any opposition witnesses here today? Okay, no opposition here today. With that, we'll bring it back to the members and see if anyone has any questions. Senator Caballero.

I have a question. My apologies, I walked in a little bit late, but my understanding is the bill is being amended to not apply to state statewide. I just- I'm just checking or there's an agreement that it'll be just in-

Yes.

Okay, great. Very good. Thank you. That's all I have. Thank you very much.

I wish I had a technical question, but I wouldn't know how to ask one.

Thank you. I have a couple questions and so I understand you took an amendment, right to narrow the scope of this bill. And I just want to highlight.

Any other- Senator Wahab.

Okay, if a person does not have a phone, are they able to enter the facility, utilize it just regularly with their credit card, like in the sense of like a parallel structure because for example, if I'm on a weaker Wi-Fi or my carrier doesn't have coverage, which sometimes happens in these particular arenas, how does somebody still do their job?

Directed at the?

Whoever.

At the witness.

I'll first take, I'll address part of it and then turn to my lifeline over here. First of all, regarding the EV charging, which is what the whole point of this app based system has to do with. The whole point, here's a will call number.

So if someone doesn't have a phone, wants to do a charging, doesn't have the mechanism to download the app, there is a will call number that they can call to get assistance, to walk through and to be able to receive service.

However, I think the biggest question that you're bringing up is when I go to Sofi, for example, to a Rams game, my ticket, you now for most of these venues today, you have to. Your ticket is a mobile app. That's your way of getting in. They do have, you know, the will call stations for people with emergencies.

But in most venues today, it's not just related to EV charging, it's related to actually your ticketing being able to enter into the facility. But I'll turn to my lifeline here, Mr. Lang.

Go ahead, Mr. Lang.

Senator Wahab, Senator Richardson. Correct. With the advent of COVID paper tickets like we used to get for concerts and sporting events went away and so everybody transitioned to electronic apps which allowed you to purchase your ticket on the phone. You then get a barcode.

When you do that purchase and you show the barcode and you get entrance to the facility.

In the case of newer technology, with the newer venues in Senator Richardson's district, who we represent, they actually took that one further and said, we'll use this app, we'll use the highest level of encryption security to make sure that the consumer's personal information and credit card number is protected and then allow you to purchase all of your concessions, not just your tickets, but your concessions.

Everything is streamlined from the word go. And what we found out afterwards that there was this one technical provision in the law relating to the EV charging that didn't account for that. Technology is moving so quickly.

But Senator Wahab, to your question, specifically, the purchase of the tickets to attend an event, sporting event, concert, as well as purchase your concessions, do your age verification for the purchase of alcoholic beverages is all now done through the app in a highly secure manner.

If for some reason you're going to attend, you purchase your ticket, don't have your phone, or let's say your phone battery dies as you're getting to the arena. There is a will call station which allows you to reconstruct using your credit card, the purchase of the ticket.

And they'll give you that barcode which will then allow you to do all the other things in the arena as well. The idea was to do two things, make it easier for the consumer, streamline everything so that you don't have to wait in a lot of lines.

And secondly, to make sure that security is the highest it could be. So, by combining these technologies now, it's really streamlined, made it an easier consumer experience and added a level of security that didn't exist before too.

So I understand that and I will say that I fully support technology and advancements in technology. However, my concern is. So for example, if I were to buy a ticket for a friend to go enjoy themselves, right? One, I'm not, I'll just say it, I will support the bill.

So I just want to make sure everyone's fully aware. My concern with some of the movement that I see in this industry is, number one, everyone having to download more and more apps, right? That is a big problem for me, right.

I don't want extra apps on my phone that, you know, I'm only going to use once a year, maybe twice a year for a show or something, number one. Number two, the amount of notifications and yes, it's settings and this and that, but it is problematic.

Three, sharing my information through the app with limited accountability on security that your app would have to control, right? Where that's not necessarily the expertise of whoever is developing the app. Right? And so there are security concerns and we can talk about encryption, we can talk about a lot of things, but hackers are hackers, right?

They hack some government agencies and much more, right? So a for profit type of app doesn't make me feel any more comfortable. I'm just gonna be very honest about this, right? And then what if I just prefer to use Apple Pay or any of the other, you know, credit card functions that are now online, right?

Where I just tap it and move on versus, again, handing over my data to an organization that's constantly wanting to upsell me and then again, dynamic pricing and everything that's online that I know that this is the direction that so many organizations are trying to go for.

So I have my reservations of, again, sharing data unnecessarily with organizations that are primarily, you know, streamlining is one word. It's also making sure that people spend money very quickly. Right. Without thinking, should I, should I do this or not?

So I just say that I have deep concerns about privacy and data sharing, especially with organizations that are not necessarily qualified enough to protect people's data. So thank you.

I think, Senator Wahab, thank you so much for your questions and your concerns. Certainly when we think of countries like Sweden, cashless societies, it really does bring us to the point of, you know, what happens for the person who doesn't have that access.

But unfortunately, given the size and the complexity and also when you look at the future security that's going to be required, being able to move people through as quickly and efficiently as required. I will point out, though, that also in my district, it's equally dangerous to have people walking around with their credit cards.

And when a person is going up and they're going to use a credit card reader to charge for a vehicle, that leads for someone who's standing there in the wings to come up and take their credit card, do other, all sorts of things.

So I would say that unfortunately nothing is perfect and in this instance, that's an example of it. But that's one of the challenges.

I fully understand privacy and security, you cannot guarantee, nobody can guarantee. But I also want to highlight the fact that, you know, when we're moving into this arena, and I think that we're moving very quickly into these, you know, advancements without enough safeguards. Because you mentioned Sweden, I can mention China. Right?

A cashless society moving forward, as well as biometrics as well as artificial intelligence, scanning your face, scanning your palm scanning, this is what they are capable of doing. Right. Even in WhatsApp today. So again, I just don't, I'm not a fan of continuously giving out our data. And I've been pretty consistent.

And I know, you know, you have not heard that directly from me, but now I guess, you know, it's very transparent. But I do just want to highlight I have concerns without saying safeguards, you know, it's problematic. Thank you.

Thank you for your questions.

Senator Ashby.

Yeah, is this go to Judic here? Goes straight to a Probes from here.

No, it goes to Transportation afterwards.

Okay, Transportation. Okay.

And then the majority leader and I have a serious question. Which is why would you go to SOFI to see the Rams when you could see the Chargers? We need an answer.

You can choose whether to answer that or not.

Actually, occasionally I go to see the Chargers as well.

Okay, that's the correct answer.

Occasionally, yes.

Scored some votes there with that one. Any other- any other questions?

Move the Bill.

Okay, we do. Yeah. Do have a motion. Again, the amendments clarify the bill applies to only EV chargers that are solely accessible at venues that require an internet based application for entry. Just wanted to clarify that. With that, would you like a closing statement?

I thank the Chairman and the members of the committee for your time and your very thoughtful comments and questions. And we look forward to sharing with you the successes as many of you will come to these venues in a very short order. With that, I ask for an aye vote of SB533.

Excellent. We do have a motion from Senator Grove. Do pass as amended to the Senate Committee on Transportation. Assistant, please call the roll.

[ROLL CALL]

Okay, the vote is 13 to 0. We will hold the roll open for other members. Thank you Senator Richardson.

Thank you for your time.

Next up, we have- I see Senator Blakespear for SCR25.

Hello.

There's a co presenter. We're just waiting to see if we should wait one moment here or go ahead. Give us one second.

Why don't we go ahead and have Senator Blakespear present and Senator McNerney can comment as a member of the committee if he comes back. Okay? Excellent. So, Senator Blakespear, please go ahead. SCR 25.

Okay, thank you, Chair and members. First, I'd like to start by accepting the committee's amendments. Today I would like to present Senate Concurrent Resolution 25 to recognize California's leadership and vast potential in the field of nuclear fusion energy. California is committed to a clean energy future, as you all know, aiming for 100% clean energy by 2045.

This resolution highlights the potential fusion has to help us manifest that future as fusion offers the promise of a nearly limitless, clean, safe energy source. Unlike traditional fossil fuels, it produces no air pollution or harmful emissions, and unlike nuclear energy, it produces no long lasting dangerous waste. My district is home to DIII-D National Fusion Facility.

The name DIII-D signifies the three experimental devices called tokamaks housed in this facility. DIII-D is the largest and most productive magnetic fusion energy research facility in the United States and it is operated by General Atomics. As a state, California is at the forefront of fusion energy, research, and development.

Just recently, facilities in the state passed significant milestones to demonstrate the feasibility of commercial fusion energy generation. The National Ignition Facility at Lawrence Livermore National Labs achieved the first controlled fusion ignition in a lab setting and has successfully repeated ignition with higher fusion yields at least five times.

California is also home to nationally recognized academic fusion energy programs based at our UC and CSU campuses, including UC San Diego, our polytechnic universities, and our vocational schools. These programs conduct groundbreaking research and train the next generation of bright minds that will enter the fusion energy workforce.

This resolution recognizes the accomplishments of our state's nuclear fusion industry and expresses California's support for developing the entire fusion energy ecosystem from workforce training to supply chain development. Nuclear fusion is remarkable for its potential to provide nearly limitless around-the-clock energy for our grid. Harnessing fusion would propel us toward a carbon-free future. And for this reason, I respectfully request your support of this resolution and I'm happy to have my co-author join me here and say a few words.

Excellent. Go ahead, Senator McNerney, when ready.

Thanks, Chair and the members of the committee. I joined my colleague today as a joint author of SCR 25. Listen, this resolution will raise awareness about the vast potential of fusion energy for California and the world. As my colleague mentioned, fusion is a game changer.

It produces unlimited amount of clean energy, very little and low level radioactive waste. There's no threat at all of a disastrous accident because fusion has to be maintained at extremely high temperatures and pressures. If there's a power failure or any other kind of disruption, the reaction will cease immediately.

When I was in college, fusion--people were talking about fusion being 50 years in the future and always will be 50 years in the future. And it seemed right because it was such a difficult technology, but now we see ten years, maybe, maybe a little bit longer, but we're really on the road.

I see investment, I see excitement. I go to these labs and people are just chomping at the bit to get this done and to make this happen in our lifetime, so I'm very excited about it. Private investors are pouring billions of dollars, private money. Now private money in my mind says something.

It's not--I mean, these are people that have wallets and have bank accounts, and they want their money to come back to them in one way or another. They don't want to wait 50 years. They want that money back right away. So it's a real indication of the viability of this technology. Oh, and we do have really serious technology.

I mean, the Brits, you got to respect their work, the Chinese, they're all over this thing--everybody wants to be first, and we can't afford to let that happen. We want to make sure that fusion energy happens in our country first and it can happen in California. It can happen right here.

You know, I've been down to UC San Diego, I've been to Livermore Labs, and I've been to the East Coast. The East Coast wants this. We have the lead right now with--as my colleague mentioned--Lawrence Livermore Laboratory is the only laboratory, the only place in the world that's actually had fusion ignition.

So we have the lead, and we don't want let that slip away from us. We should benefit from that. It's going to create jobs. If you look at Silicon Valley, it's created thousands and thousands, hundreds of thousands of jobs, a lot of wealthy people. Fusion is going to be bigger because it's going to supply energy to the entire world.

So we want that to be here in California. It can be in your district, it can be in your district, it can be in my district, it can be everywhere in the state. So I want to see that happen, and again, we are leading it. With that, I ask for--enthusiastically--I ask you for an aye vote. Thank you.

Thank you. Yes.

All right. Well, I thank both of you for your passion, both for your leadership.

We do have one witness.

Yes. Actually--yeah. We'd love that. We're going to bring--

Evan Polisar, the Director of Public Affairs for General Atomics has joined us today. Thank you for joining us here.

Thank you.

Great. Mr. Polisar, you have two minutes. Go ahead.

Thank you, Mr. Chair, and thank you, members of the committee. My name is Evan Polisar. I am the Director of Public Affairs for the Energy Group at General Atomics. GA is a privately held company headquartered in San Diego.

Our first programs were in the 1950s, working on peaceful uses of nuclear fission technology, and then in 1956, we started our first program on fusion research and development. So GA is the oldest private fusion company in the United States. As the Senator mentioned just a few minutes ago, we operate today the DIII-D National Fusion Facility.

This is the largest magnetic fusion machine in the United States. It's a user facility, which means that it is owned by the U.S. Department of Energy, but we have about 700 users there, which means that we have people from around the country and oftentimes around the world, world-leading researchers, academics, folks from the private fusion industry, all working collaboratively to advance fusion research and development.

Not to belabor the points; what I would just note very quickly is that as Senator McNerney mentioned, California really is leading the way in fusion energy research and development right now. We have the largest workforce in fusion of any state in the country, we have the two largest public sector fusion research machines of any state in the country, and we also have the largest share of private fusion startups of any other state in the country.

So we really are the fusion leaders, and in our industry we like to call ourselves the fusion state when we refer to California. So we really appreciate the Committee's thoughtful deliberation on this resolution and we respectfully urge an aye vote. Thank you.

Thank you.

Thank you. Now we'll go--first of all, are there any other support witnesses or anyone else want to comment in support? Okay, then we will move to opposition. Any opposition witnesses? Okay, seeing none, we'll turn it back to the committee and start with Senator Archuleta.

Thank you, and trying to get a little technical--hydrogen. Is this going to be in conjunction with--and the energy sources we have now? What do we foresee in the next five years how this is going to light up our cities and what are we looking at?

Well, I would ask Mr. Polisar if there's any connection with hydrogen at the DIII-D or otherwise.

Yes, Senator. So fusion is the process that powers the stars. So the fuel is actually isotopes of hydrogen. So we'd be using two different types of hydrogen, deuterium and tritium. What I would comment on is that there are several fusion startup companies that are making very ambitious plans for fusion as soon as the next five years.

We're looking at this as a longer term development of an ecosystem. So in addition to clean energy five years, ten years, 15 years from now, we are looking at all of the aspects that go into developing an ecosystem and being able to make sure that's being done in California as well.

And let me follow up with, in Southern California, we have Southern California Edison Company. Of course, up here, North, it's a little different. Are you working in conjunction with them? Because we're talking about fires that just took place and if we could, you know, harbor our energy and eliminate some of the things that were there, do you see that?

Yes. So General Atomics at the moment in terms of fusion energy deployment is not working with them. However, I think when you're looking at moving the needle on getting to the point where you're going from science to commercial deployment at scale, because it also needs to be something that's affordable to ratepayers, then in that case, yes, there will be a large amount of community engagement that's going to need to happen, especially with companies like that as we look to move it from research and development towards wide-scale commercial deployment.

Well, I've got to congratulate both Senators for having this in their district and what an innovation that we see here in California. Congratulations. And I will move the bill at the appropriate time.

Let's see if there's any other discussion. Would you like to close, Senator Blakespear?

Yes. Well, thank you, Senator Archuleta, for your positive comments, I appreciate that, and we respectfully ask for your aye vote.

Okay. I would like to, again, thank both of you for your leadership on this topic. The motion is to be adopted as amended to the Senate Floor. And the motion--we have a motion from Senator Archuleta. Committee Assistant, please call the roll.

Thank you. [Roll Call].

The vote is 14 to zero and we will keep the roll open for absent members to add on. All right, we now move on to our last bill of the day. This is SB 559 by Senator Stern.

Thank you, Mr. Chair. Very excited to have you presiding over our first policy hearing of the year. This is a tough issue: public safety power shutoffs. Those of you who lived anywhere in the Southern California region are probably well familiar with this. I've been trying to address this issue for a long time and it's a difficult balance.

We know that we don't want utilities to ignite new fires by having lines that are live right in the middle of a 85, 95-mile-an-hour windstorm, and often they're actually sued for keeping those lines on, but on the flip side, we've had not just momentary outages, but multi-day outages affecting people and especially the most vulnerable people with life-saving equipment that needs to be powered on without not just enough accommodation but enough information to be able to make life-saving decisions for themselves.

This bill--I appreciate the committee's work on it and their acute analysis. You'll see some amendments on, I think, page eight of the analysis--and I just want to make clear to the chair and the committee that will be accepting those. And just to talk through those, for members, as you're sort of puzzling through this bill, you know, we know the critique from the utilities is that we're micromanaging a process that we've already set out in law as well as protocols adopted by the PUC.

And so, for instance, deciding on particular wind speeds at which they ought to be looking to restore and maybe not taking other factors into account. This analysis and, I think, the amendments give a fair amount of discretion to the utilities as to exactly how to manage not just the shutoff but the restoration, and it also gives them some accommodation for exactly what kind of information they're foreclosing to the--or disclosing to the public.

But we, we still think it's worthy of a legislative solution here when, you know, when your power's off and you have nowhere to turn and you don't know what's going to happen and you're in the dark, not just for 12 hours, but for six days and you don't know exactly when a circuit's going to be visited.

Is line work being done? Is everyone even--anyone looking at this? You know, they call my office, thousands and thousands of people do, and I feel powerless. So I think we're making progress with the utilities here, and I want to thank--as frustrated as I've been with Edison about this, I also appreciate that they've sat down and met with us and started talking some of this through, and I frankly think a lot of this work could be done by the IOUs on their own.

But we hope this bill pushes that process forward and gets us to a place where the next time we have these wind events, not only that people are not going to be left in the dark, but that they're going to know when they might have some hope for coming back online.

People, you know, the deadliest situations happen when the power's down, your cell phone's off, and the fire's coming over the mountain or the ridge or whatever it is. And we've seen this happen and we've lost life over it, so thanks for wrestling with this, members, and would respectfully ask for your aye vote.

You know, I have one of our leaders, Ventura County is a sponsor of this measure. We know this impacts many counties. It's not just a Ventura County bill, but the lead Disability Access Manager, Danielle Anderson is here, who's been a guide for me for many years on how to make this work. So I welcome her up, Mr. Chair, at your discretion. I think Jean Hurst is also available for technical follow-up.

Good. Well, thank you, Senator Stern. Obviously this has been a big issue in our state recently. We will go ahead with your witness when ready. You have two minutes. Thank you.

Chair Becker, members of the committee, I'm Dani Anderson, Disability Access Manager for the County of Ventura and also someone who is affected by these PSPS events. When you're a member of the AFN, Access and Functional Needs Community, or support someone who is, time is a necessity, and whether it's securing or getting assistance to set up heavy backup power for medical devices, arranging transportation, or relocating to a safer environment, early and clear information is key to making safe and informed decisions.

During the January PSPS event, I, someone who's well-educated in PSPS, personally experienced the fear and frustration of not knowing when power would be restored. That was very scary, but I couldn't imagine also being someone who didn't know where to go for support or what to do to get updated information like many others.

Relying on an electrically powered medical device to literally move to be able to get out of bed is very scary when you don't have power or know when it's coming back. So across Ventura County, people with disabilities, older adults, and caregivers faced medical, mobility, and communication barriers, significant financial strain, including spoiled food and refrigerated medication, and it should be noted that these challenges were faced even by those of us who are the most prepared, including being enrolled in SCE's programs to assist those of us with AFN.

When every hour counts, re-energization delays disproportionately affect those of us with AFN. While we understand the safety benefits of PSPS events, people with disabilities would really benefit from additional information, timely updates, and knowing that their local utility is working with their local government to prioritize restoration efforts together.

We must remember that all of us at some point in our life are going to experience disability. So the decisions that we make today are affecting all of us. That's why SB 559 is so critical, and I thank you for your support and leadership.

Thank you. Thank you for being here with us today. We'll go on to your second witness.

Thank you, Mr. Chair and members. I'm Jean Hurst. I'm here today on behalf of the Ventura County Board of Supervisors, who are the proud sponsors of Senate Bill 559. First, we want to extend our appreciation to Senator Stern and his team, as well as the committee and their staff for their efforts in this area. I did want to share with you briefly about the impetus for this bill.

As many of you know, in January 2025, in light of the massive wildfires in Southern California, the county experienced a prolonged PSPS event during which 61 electrical circuits were de-energized, nearly 40% of the circuits in the region with some being out for more than four consecutive days.

The entire City of Fillmore and the community of Piru were de-energized, forcing both of their local grocery stores to close and leaving residents to drive up to 20 miles for basic supplies. Also during this event, critical infrastructure was compromised. Traffic lights in several communities went dark, increasing the number of traffic incidents and near misses.

Even in cities that had invested in battery backups for signals, those batteries are only designed to last a finite amount of time, and when outages extend past two or three days, those backup cannot recharge, leaving intersections dark and unprotected. From an emergency management perspective, we think timely and accurate communication is essential.

When utilities aren't providing that information, local governments step in to fill the gaps. The county has invested in a real-time dashboard to track power outages and restoration efforts and implemented a system to send direct notifications via text and phone.

These redundancies were developed to offset the number of calls that local officials have received when constituents cannot get information from the utility. We believe that SB 559 is a critical step towards holding electrical corporations accountable, and we respectfully request your aye vote at the appropriate time.

Thank you very much. Are there any other witnesses in the room that would like to say something in support? If not, we'll move on to opposition, opposition witnesses. We'll have two witnesses; can get two minutes each.

Thanks very much, Chair and Members. I appreciate the well intentioned bill. I am a wildfire survivor from the 2017 PGE Tubbs Fire. Been engaged as a party at the California Public Utilities Commission focused on de-energization events. And certainly I appreciate the focus on ensuring that these are more managed and we're holding the utilities to account.

I attended a hearing from PG&E shortly after those fires with them talking about that deenergization is more of an art rather than a science. And that certainly gave me pause. However, this legislation approaches deenergization mostly as sort of a one size fits all. And as we know, there's lots of different reasons why there is a power shutoff.

And we need to be focused on providing enough leeway so that the utilities can report based on that power shutoff. So we wouldn't want to just report on the circuit as an example that has the most amount of critical facilities.

It might just be one critical facility and it might be important for them to report out on that. We're talking about communications, but we're talking about communications in a unidirection. And we really need to be talking about communications more broadly. We need to have communications from the emergency operations centers.

And so just providing mandates for the utility to communicate really leaves off all the partners that they rely on. We're talking about other private companies that may have to report. So if you have a natural gas plant as an example. Right.

We want them to report to the utilities about what that power shut off should do for them. So there are just ways that we really need to make sure that this legislation holds the utilities to account, but also provides flexibility in terms of how these are managed.

And I would also agree that there are some things currently going on through the California public utilities and requirements that this would undo. And I would just caution that we don't move forward with the legislation that undoes protections to access and functional need populations and others by moving forward legislation in a hasty way.

I certainly would offer to the author of the bill to sit down and sort of go line by line through those changes, but I think currently we need to take a step back from this. Okay.

And wrap up. And thank you. And your name was? Zero, sorry. My name is Will Abrams. Will, thank you. Thank you. Do we have a second opposition witness?

I thought you wanted me to second his testimony. Hi, My Chairman Becker. Senator, Senate Energy Committee Members. My name is Kathryn Borg from Southern California Edison. We appreciate the direction that SB559 by Senator Stern is headed with the proposed amendments by Committee.

Public safety power shutoffs or PSPS events are crucial for grid reliability and resiliency during extreme weather events. Acting as a last resort tool. Safety is our key concern and that should be shared a shared goal with the author and the Legislature. And that's why we unfortunately do PSPS occasionally.

During January's historic windstorm and wildfires, SCE found nearly 100 instances of where facilities, if energized, could potentially have started catastrophic fires. In SCE's service territory, we had toppled trees into power lines, snapped power poles and downed conductors.

While SCE recognizes the author's intent to enhance safety and communication during De energization events, SE has significant concerns about the operational impact, feasibility and redundancy of separate SB 559's requirements, or we had until the amendments. We appreciate that the timeliness based solely on weather were reconsidered because SB559 restoration requirements could have created more safety risks.

Electrical corporations are currently responsible for determining safe operational thresholds and initiating restoration inspections only after conditions are met. Maintaining safety is paramount, and over prescribing restoration efforts and notifications could jeopardize both safety and effective restoration efforts. During the two January PSPS events this year, SE issued over 10 million notifications to customers, both voluntarily and required.

Despite the complexities introduced by the extreme weather and wildfires, SE worked diligently to mitigate customer confusion, provide notifications and maintain compliance with PSPS requirements.

Thank you. We do have to start wrapping up.

Okay. We look forward to reviewing the amendments in print. Thank you.

Okay. Thank you very much.

Do we have others who want to add on? Yeah. Kent Cow with San Diego Gas and Electric. Thank you, Chair and Senator Tado, for visiting our Emergency Operations center about a week and a half ago. We anticipate removing opposition with the analysis and thank the Committee consultant for raising our concerns. Appreciate that.

Mr. Chair. Members, Melissa Cosier with Pacific Gas and Electric Company. We align our comments with those of SCE and SCG and E. We look forward to reviewing the amendments in print and reviewing our position. Thank you.

Okay, with that, we'd like to bring it back for discussion.

Senator Strickland, if I could get Ms. Borg up from Edison. I just want to ask Senator K.

For the opposition witness, take a question for Senator Strickland.

So, historically, I've been through this. Historically, you're liable if there's fires that move forward, and that's the reason why you turn off the energy, isn't that correct?

Correct. It's the strict liability of our lines.

Correct.

So you'd want to carve into the line.

The IOUS have massive liability concerns and that's one of the main reasons and safety is the main reason why you turn off. What's the process. What's the process of you going to the PSPs? So who makes that determination within the IOU? Who makes that determination whether you turn the energy off or not?

Our incident commander makes that decision. It's based on a lot of evidence between our weather people and other testing that we're looking at as far as thresholds of the lines that they can, you know, withstand the wind. You know, weather is depending on the.

It's the wind speed, it's the ground level dryness, it's the dryness of the material. All those factors are taken into consideration.

And once, once that, obviously it's not easy to make that determination, but once you do, what's the communication process? Do you inform emergency services to.

Yeah, 72 hours ahead. We inform the, you know, county emergency and different governmental agencies. And then at the 48 hour line, then we start notifying customers.

Where are you now in discussions with PUC on items like this? I'm sure you're ongoing discussion.

It's always a constant ongoing discussion. We had two big reports that we filed with them regarding the January events and we have a lot of details in there that we're working with.

Okay. And then I'm familiar with the county that is sponsoring this Bill. This county is known to have a lot of dryness and a lot of wind. In fact, Simi Valley is known as the Valley of the winds from my understanding. So what communications center has happened to Ventura County during these from Edison?

Has it been through the emergency services? The real reason, the thrust of this Bill? Because I do, I talked to you offline. I do think that we need to tighten up this Bill a little bit. And I think some of this is already happening with the discussions with the Puc.

And in some ways, I don't even think the Bill is necessary. But I understand the concerns of the Ventura County residents that come to you and say, hey, you know, our power's out. Where are we at like right now from your perspective?

We're still waiting to hear back from Edison how they're going to update their public communications process for the next time around. In our discussions, we found jointly with the county that a lot of the information exists of like, where line crews out, which circuit are they working on? What is the wind speed?

They have telemetry all over the place. They know the wind speeds near the circuit that's all internal facing data or maybe data that gets shared with Cal OES.

But what we're trying to do is find a public layer of data that's going to be empowering so that I can go on the website and no one knows what a circuit is.

When you get, you know, when you get the text alert and say you're on, you know, upland circuit or you're on, you know, whatever it is, Moorepark, they're not going to know what that means.

When you go on the PSPS website for Edison, it should show you what circuit you're on and it should give you a sense of what the winds are out there that they're looking at. And in some cases it'll actually start to make sense to you. Okay, this is why the power is out.

Because that Meter says it's 85 miles an hour. Here's the, you know, the vegetation moisture content, you know, being forthcoming about that kind of information.

We actually think it's not going to make a public safety power shut off any more, any less risky for people who don't have power, but it's going to make it make more sense to people.

So I think we're looking to see what, you know, what we can get out of the IOUS in terms of what that public interface and then that government to utility interface.

And I am interested in the opening lead opposition witnesses point about the two way communication because there's also a piece that during the incident county was having difficulty talking directly with Edison to sort of disentangle some of these things.

Granted you're in the middle of a catastrophic fire, so we get that it's crazy, but we've got to be able to have that be a back.

So as discussions move on, there could be a point where this Bill is not necessary. Yeah, I think it could be obvious as the discussions are going forward.

Yeah, I mean the real thing is, look, if this were codified in PUC protocol, I trust that a lot more the handshake, you know, things can change over time. zero, it's public, this incident, maybe we don't make it public in the future.

So if the, if there's some way to make it, you know, have that level of weight, a PUC protocol level of weight as opposed to just a sort of discretionary decision that the IOUS can make, I think I would trust that more. Which is why we're saying no, here's a statutory approach.

There could be a regulatory way to get this done too, though I do think there, there's a way it just hasn't happened yet.

Thanks. Yep. Thank you. If I could just follow on for that. Senator, what is the wingspeed velocity of an unladen swallow? zero, sorry. I just always wanted to ask that. Okay.

It's not 25 to 40 miles an hour.

Yeah. Senator McNerney.

Well, first of all, I want to thank Senator Stern for your build here. I think it's important to think about that. You know, it's extremely frustrating when the power goes out. You don't know when it's going to come back. And it could be more than frustrating. It could be dangerous.

On election night, had a large group over at my house and power went out and the dinner was in the oven and we had to go get pizzas and, you know, because we didn't know when it was going to come back, which was an hour later. I should have known that. So.

But I do want to say follow up on Mr. Strickland's. Senator Strickland's question. It's not just an individual that decides when to do a power safety, a public power safety shutdown. They have computer models based on evidence, based on past experiences that inform the decision makers. And they're pretty accurate.

But I do want to end by saying I have a rare compliment for PGE from my office. They are pretty good at this because they've had some very hard experiences over the years with some of these fires that have happened in Northern California. So it can be done.

I hate to see it go too long before these Southern California utilities get it together and do it right. Thank you. Senator Rubio, did you have a.

Yes, I do. Thank you. Thank you, Mr. Chair. Well, you know, I think the intent here is great, and I agree with it. And the reason my concern is a little different. You know, I've been here seven years on this Committee from, you know, the Woolsey fires to paradise to every single fire there is to.

And a lot of the conversations always centered around the PSPs and what to do. In fact, I remember I was around when we put some policies in place for, you know, for the AFN community because we wanted to make sure that they were safe. And so I'm always just worried. Like, every.

After every incident, we tend to kind of pass policies. And I'm just wondering if at some point we need a much bigger comprehensive study of the issue. So we're not, you know, doing piece by piece, but rather a comprehensive look as to what is needed and not continue to piecemeal it.

Because, like I said, I know we passed so many bills in which, rightfully so, we want to keep people safe. We want to do it right. But sometimes. I'm glad you changed it a little because it was very prescriptive. But I agree at some point we have to do it right, not just when incidents keep happening.

So I would just kind of look ahead and see we can just figure out a way to do it, a comprehensive way, not necessarily piece by piece. But that's my only comment. Thank you for bringing this forward.

Yes, Senator Grove.

Thank you, Mr. Chair. Again, you guys forget the Central Valley. You said Southern California, but the Central Valley has its PS Sh offs.

Your. Yours. I consider you quite Southern. zero, okay. Thank you.

Kern. Yeah. Okay. Chad Hathaway, City Attached. Greg Garrett, Allie and Tyler Yates, Mcpherson Corporation. Jack Lever's Ranch. Jill Day, Watt Ranch. I could go on and on and on about the people who are affected by PSPs shut offs on a consistent basis, some more than others. But saying that I am glad you took the amendments.

I do have serious questions on putting more responsibility on the utilities. Right. Their whole goal is to make sure your house doesn't burn down if there is a fire, but to make sure we have power as soon as we can get it back on.

And I think we put them in a weird position because, you know, it says in the Language Corporation must publish and make available in real time.

So if you don't have a laptop and your phone's not charged, you don't have electricity, how do you get a notification to thousands of residents in real time and adjust that if the wind changes? So I appreciate the amendments that you took. I see this as a problem that does need to be addressed.

And I think if I didn't vote for the Bill, I think my constituents would be really upset because they do get impacted by this on a daily basis almost in our valley. But I can't support the Bill until we tighten up that language because I can't continue.

We as a body should not continue to put requirements on our IOUS that make it more expensive. We already pay the most costly energy in the entire United States to make it more expensive and to also not give them the, you know, the whole goal is to not let a fire take place.

The whole goal with strict liability, and not just because they're liable. They don't want people's houses to burn down. They don't want people's businesses and properties to burn down. So they have to be able to address this.

They should be looking at Quantum Physics and Quantum Technology and fiber optic Lines and signals in picoseconds and all this stuff that's really out there so that they could address this instantaneously and get a pin drop where, you know where the issue is at instead of some of the things driving around hours and hours and hours on a truck or a quad to try to find something days later for a sag or a tree line.

But I appreciate you taking the amendments. I'm going to look at the amendments when they come into print, but I'm going to stay off the Bill today.

Thank you, Senator Caballero.

Thank you, Mr. Chair. I think some really good comments have been, have been made. I just wanted to make sure that. Let me just say that I appreciate the direction the Bill is going in to the extent that it was very prescriptive.

My thought was to give direction to the CPUC because one of the things that is important about the administrative process is that you have to take in information and adjust the rules. In other words, once we pass something into legislation, if anything changes, it's very difficult to make changes because you got to come back to this body.

But in an administrative process, they can come up with the changes fairly rapidly by listening to the IOUS and looking at some of the real life issues that have happened on the ground. As was stated, the wind can change, the temperatures can change.

I mean, some of the, the video that I saw of the last fires were horrific because of the wind and that was somewhat predictable because of the Santa Anas. But they've gotten worse over the years and I don't think anybody thought it was going to end up being as disastrous as it was.

So my point is think about giving the direction to the CPUC to do rulemaking. If you get the agreement of the IOUS and you don't need it, that's fine. But also want to make sure that you. There was mention of amendments that you're willing to take.

We've worked real hard to make sure that the amendments are in writing so that we know what we're voting on. And so I just need to know that you're accepting all of the amendments that are recommended by the Committee that are located on page eight. Yes. Okay, good. Thank you so much. Appreciate that. Senator Grove.

Sorry, Mr. Chair, I did just Google something and I realized that all IOUS update weather and winds and humidity on the public website. Updated every 10 minutes. Again, there is a struggle of not having electricity access to a website. That's my main concern. Like if it's updated every 10 minutes, is that satisfactory to you?

Does it need to be sooner? I mean, what's real time? I guess.

Well, I'm not aware of them making that available every 10 minutes. During, during the event we had circuits where there was zero miles an hour and no wind whatsoever. That was not known. Like there was no interface publicly.

There were notices that were given of areas that supposed to have like community resource centers to charge that weren't actually open. So people all went to a church in Chatsworth and nobody was there to help them.

So I think there's this Bill kind of does come down to like how good's your website and are you talking to local government? Simply put, I don't think it needs a whole PUC rulemaking to do that per se. But I'm not aware that Edison has that 10 minute level data. So maybe we should run that to ground.

But that, that, that would help. I mean if it's not exactly real time and it's a 10 minute delay, that, that's certainly a lot better than a, you know. Okay, five day.

Yeah, no, I just, I was just looking and I saw that's helpful that it's updated every 10 minutes. And I didn't think, I didn't know if that would qualify as real time under your Bill.

I'm not aware that that's required for their PSPS maps. Okay. Now, but maybe we could, we could ask them if they're asking. Yeah, I mean it might help just to get you clarity before you vote.

Yes, would you go ahead and just take that question? San Diego Gas and Electric. We do update ours. Sdgeweather.com it's by circuit every 10 minutes. We update all of those conditions even during a PSPS shut off. Yeah, you can pull up right now. It's anytime. We also provide daily emails to the local emergency responders.

However the weather is good, bad or indifferent.

So does every 10 minutes qualify under the definition of real? I'm trying to get to the definition of real time. I guess real time to me likes right now. But is that, does that meet your definition?

I don't think we define real time, so we're open to looking more closely at that. But I think SDG and E may have a different setup than Edison does. And I don't think any of this is required by the. Edison's here.

Edison's here. Do you have to.

Maybe they could clarify. I'll take that. Yes, if that's okay. Would you like to clarify?

I am not aware that we have it by circuit like they do on their public website. Okay, thank you. Great, thank you.

Thank you. Thank you for clearing that. I was just trying to figure out that.

Thank you, sir. Thank you. Okay. Any other discussion, Senator Wahab?

Senator, this Bill would apply to the entire State of California, correct? Yes. Okay. So I want to bring it back to the Bay Area in particular. So what we're talking about here in regards to just, you know, giving notice is, you know, something that's needed, but it should be standard in my personal opinion.

I want to highlight how our infrastructure has been affected just based on rain. Right. You know, you're talking about winds, we're talking about rain. The fact that we have a lack of redundancy in the Bay Area. So in the month of February and March, there were power outages because of rain. Right.

In fact, thousands upon thousands of people throughout the Bay Area were affected with a power outage. Oftentimes those residents don't know when the power is going to be put back on. Right.

Does your Bill also touch if there, if it's not about the weather but about, let's say a line went down or some type of defect in some aspect?

I want to say it's, it's specific to De energization events exclusively, I believe. So it's not all emergency, all weather related emergencies. So if they, if it was shut down and they didn't De energize it themselves, I don't know that that would qualify.

But I do think it's something I'm open to looking at in terms of improving that public notification interface, especially dealing with emergency operations. So.

So the reason why I have a concern is, for example, Santa Clara County, just in this past month of March, two weeks ago or so, a week and a half ago, they actually had roughly 10,000 residents affected just because of a little rain. Right. We're not talking about severe.

The infrastructure is not where it needs to be, in my personal opinion, for 21st century America, let alone California. Right. Number one.

Number two is the fact that, for example, you have counties like Santa Clara County that also, you know, have to maintain the electricity for their county jails as well as the number of hospitals that are under their purview if power outage is there. Right.

And these organizations are not even necessarily required to have consistent communication with the county. Right. Is that not problematic? Yes, it is. Okay, so what we're talking about here is I think a very good effort.

I think that we need to go further because at the end of the day, the investor owned utilities make a profit, but there are people's lives at risk when we're talking about, again, a safety risk, when we're talking about how it affects jails, how it affects hospitals, how it affects nursing homes.

And we have consistently seen across the board that every single time it rains, for some reason our investor owned utilities infrastructure can't handle it. Right. And so I really applaud your effort on this particular Bill, just for notification purposes.

I think it needs to go further, I think the entire Committee needs to go further on making sure that we are taking care of residents and especially whether it's an accident and they or planning it or whether it's a true storm or an incident of some sort that was unplanned. So I appreciate this.

I'll move the Bill whenever you're ready.

Thanks. All right, we got two finals. Senator Strickland and then Senator Mahon.

I just want to follow up the Senator's comments. My understanding I could be wrong. I thought there was laws out there already that nursing homes and hospitals and emergency emergency services have to have backup generators, gas backup generators.

There are.

I do believe that is the case. I believe that's a state law, correct? Yes, there is mandatory backup power generators. So we're not talking about nursing homes, we're not talking about hospitals.

Because the state law already said that communication isn't governed as prescriptively by state law. The backup power piece is. I think I'm getting that right.

I'd also like to mention, so my example for Santa Clara County, yes, there are backup generators and in fact some of them are run on diesel or gasoline. Right.

However, Santa Clara County had an incident where brand new generator had a malfunction in the sense that it had a hole in it that was, you know, even though they tested and so forth, it's these tests are short term tests. Right.

And there was a lack of communication from PG&E with the county that still these generators are limited. Right. So how many hours, how many days can you go without power? They slowly start to shut down certain departments, whether it's, you know, shutting down departments that aren't necessarily vital 247.

But hospitals and jails clearly must be 247. Right. So they have almost half a dozen to a dozen hospitals that they have to manage. And so I think it's problematic when we're talking about just again, planned outages.

But what about when it, when it isn't happening and we're not having the communication, in fact, almost dodging communication to say, hey, in three hours, in six hours, in 12 hours, we're going to take care of this problem.

So I do have significant concerns about the responsibility of these institutions when it comes to something so vital to society like power. Thank you, Senator Limon.

Thank you. And I want to thank the author. We both represent Ventura County. And I think one of the things that's also happened is that since we have allowed for de-energization, we are all learning.

And so I actually see that these bills are going to keep coming forward because every time that there are natural disasters, I think both the IOUS and the local government learn more and more about what is needed.

But it is also true that in that process of learning more, you identify more voids and gaps that need to be filled. And I think that this is one of those pieces. As a representative, Ventura County, certainly, Representative, during the Thomas fire, we have learned a lot. We have worked in partnership a lot with the IOUS.

But there's also times where you recognize, hey, this is a constant theme. We've seen it over the last few years, four years. It's a void and absence absent the ability to fix it in just an agreement. We're going to pursue the legislative path to try to, you know, ensure that that void is met.

And I think it is also true that as we have seen more individuals impacted by Pspss, we now know we know more as a legislative body, but so do they. And they accept, they expect more real time information, more accurate information, more guidance, not just in the form of a website, but certainly in communication.

So I just want to acknowledge that this is a work in progress and I would love to see, you know, to say that this Bill is going to fix it. I don't know that it will.

I think you're going to see other communities say, hey, this continues to be a communication gap between the local government and the iou. And so I think that there's a willingness and appetite from the IOUS to work with us. But also I think I just want to recognize that the need for it is not.

While today we're, you know, Ventura County is sponsoring it, other counties also will identify some of these gaps in the future. So with that, I will be supporting the Bill.

Thank you.

Okay. Seeing no more. Just to clarify a couple on the amendments, there's been some questions and should they. I'll just mention four and short definitions are considered consistent with those adopted by the CPUC within the existing PSPS protocols and those in statute. Provide for more flexibility and discretion regarding the real time information provided to customers.

Delete requirements to provide real time weather conditions, including requirements for hourly Updates and there's some other clarifying amendments. I want to thank you, Senator Stern, and want to thanks for your indulgence on my other question. We figured out quickly who are the Monty Python fans in the audience here.

But I do appreciate, as Senator McNerney said, this had been a big issue in Northern California as well. And, you know, partly through practice, it has improved, but was a big issue with very wide swaths of the population initially.

So I appreciate efforts to make sure customers look local governments and agencies have transparency and sympathetic to customers, literally and figuratively being left in the dark. It is an important balance, as folks have mentioned here today, because it's also, of course, a necessary tool to prevent catastrophic wildfires.

So I appreciate it and appreciate you accepting the Committee amendments. And with that, do you have any closing statements?

I just appreciate the thorough discussion from the Members and I'll certainly take some of these nudges to look at the Bill further and keep working with the Committee. We can look at the PUC role potentially going forward. Overall communications. Happy to keep looking at that.

And I hope that, you know, once you all get this actual text in front of you, I know the chair just described it, but some of those issues that were brought up, for instance, real time, that's been struck now, it's a sort of a reasonableness threshold there. So you've got, you know, a different level of discretion.

But nonetheless, this is statutory. And we do want to know, you know, if when that circuit's scheduled for inspection and if the utility knows, then people should know when their circuit's ready for inspection or schedule for inspection or what their anticipated time of restoration might be, even if it changes.

I just more information and more transparency is going to rebuild more trust. And if we're actually going to have a situation where customers are going to trust their IOUS and it won't just be at war with them all the time. I really do think we're going to have to make progress here.

I'm encouraged by the testimony I've heard today from our utilities, and I do think we can make progress. So I challenge everyone both in the IOU world at the CPUC to to beat us to the punch here in the Legislature. But in the meantime, I do think it's critical that you all advance this legislation.

So with that, I respectfully ask your aye vote.

Okay. We have a motion for Senator Wahab do pass as amended to the Senate Committee on Appropriations Committee system. Please call the roll.

[Roll call]

[Roll Call]

That is 1320. And we will keep it. We will close the roll on that item. We do have the roll open on a few others. Give us one moment here. Thank you. Thank you all.

Okay. Okay, so this is 491.

This is. Go through it now.

Yeah.

Okay. We will now open the roll on a few other bills. We will start with SB 491 from Senator Laird. Please call the roll.

[Roll Call]

16 to 0. We will close the roll, that is out. All right, next up, SB544 by Senator Laird. Please call the roll for absent Members.

[Roll Call]

16 to 0. SB544 is out. Now we will call the roll on SB533. Richardson, please call the roll.

[Roll Call]

Do passes amended to Transportation, current vote 13 0.

16 to 0. That measure is also out. Now we will move on to Senator Blakespear SCR25, please call the roll.

To be adopted as amended, current vote 14 0.

16 to 0. That measure is out.

And so we already closed the roll on.

We already closed the roll. Excellent.

13 to 0 on SB559. Stern. Thank you, everyone. We will...Thanks, everyone, for participating in today's hearing. The Senate Committee on Energy, Utilities, and Communications is now adjourned.