Operator: California Public Utilities Commission,
this is the Wildfire Safety Advisory Board meeting
scheduled for this day,
Wednesday, December 9th, 2020.
Marcie Edwards, will convene the meeting shortly.
If you wish to start,
if you wish to speak during the public comment,
please press *1,
unmute your phone and record your name and organization
clearly when prompted.
You will be placed into a queue in that order
that you have identified yourself.
When it comes to time for you to speak
I will announce your name and you open your line.
You will have one and a half minutes to speak.
To withdraw your request, please press *2.
Katherine: Thank you, operator.
Welcome to the final virtual public meeting of 2020
for the Wildfire Safety Advisory Board.
We're going to go spend the next few minutes
going over the technology to be used during this meeting
so that we can all start today's meeting
with the same understanding.
A summary of the interaction method
can be found on today's agenda
which can also be found
on the Wildfire Safety Advisory Board's website,
at cpuc.ca.gov/wsab.
This meeting will be live broadcast
at the normal CPUC live broadcast location.
Adminmonitor, one word, .com/ca/cpuc.
To interact with the board during this meeting,
we have a phone number and an operator on standby
to cue the line.
The call in number is listed on the meeting agenda
which can be found on the website.
The phone number is +1 800-857-1917
and the passcode is 17 67 567.
When you join the call,
you will be in listen only mode.
If you would like to participate during public comment
press *1 on the phone,
and you'll be added to the public comment queue,
and called upon during the meeting by the chair
with the assistance of the operator.
We'll have two public comment periods,
one in the beginning and one at the end.
We will also receive public comment
at the Wildfire Safety Advisory Board on email address.
And that email address
is wildfiresafetyadvisoryboard@cpuc.ca.gov,
comments received here will be read
into the record,
if they can be read in under three minutes.
All comments received will be posted
to the Wildfire Safety Advisory Board website
after the meeting.
In addition, the CPUC public advisor is on standby
if you have additional technical problems.
Please do not hesitate to reach out
to the public advisor either by email or phone.
So email is public.adviser@cpuc.ca.gov,
and the phone is (866)849-8390.
And I will pass it off to Marcie.
Thank you very much.
-: All right. Thank you, Katherine.
Very much.
I'd like to call this meeting to order today
is December 9th.
This is the sixth meeting
of the Wildfire Safety Advisory Board.
The final board meeting of 2020.
And stated my name's Marcie Edwards
and I'll chair the meeting.
Like to begin by Thanking my fellow board members
for being with us today.
It's always exciting to do the virtual board meetings
as opposed to in-person.
And I really appreciate all of your extended efforts
in making sure that you've got on
and within three minutes of our start time.
So I do appreciate that.
I also like to Thank, Robert Joe,
our professionals for all of your assistants.
Alright.
I'd like to turn the meeting over to Katherine Stockton
to lead us in the pledge of allegiance.
If Jamie, if you can mute everyone else
so that we don't have what we had last time
which is really interesting rendition.
We'll be quiet and do it peacefully.
Thank you.
Katherine: Can we get to the flag slide, Robert and Phil?
(indistinct mumbling)
Oh no.
Not that, stanza.
Okay. Here I go.
I pledge allegiance to the flag
of the United States of America
and to the Republic for which it stands
one nation under God,
indivisible, with Liberty and justice for all.
Thank you.
Now I'll turn the meeting over to Jamie Ormond
for a safety moment.
And next slide as well, please.
-: Jamie, we can't hear you.
-: Of course.
Thank you.
This is usually the time in the meeting
when we go over the safety exits
and locations of the bathrooms.
Instead, let's please take a moment to look
around our current locations
and consider our safety options.
We have been doing our best
to make these virtual board meetings
as accessible as possible.
So all of the information about this meeting
can be found on the Wildfire Safety Advisory Board website,
cpuc.ca.gov/wsab.
Links to all the documents
we'll be discussing today can be found there.
And these documents include the minutes
from the September 23rd meeting,
the agenda for today,
the guidance advisory opinion
and the slide deck that is running during this meeting.
Thank you for taking this brief phone with me
please stay safe out there.
I'd like to turn the meeting back to Chair Edwards.
-: Thank you, Jamie.
Let's quickly go over the meeting agenda.
In short order we're going to begin
today's meeting with public comment.
After public comment,
we will be discussing and adopting the minutes
from the September 23rd board meeting.
Following that we have presentations
from Cal OES Wildfire Safety Division and CAL FIRE.
After these presentations,
we'll take a short stretch break.
After the break, we'll continue to discussion
with Municipal and Cooperative Utilities Associations
about the 2021 publicly owned
Utility Wildfire Mitigation Plan filing.
Following that we will discuss the board's
guidance advisory opinion on those plans.
And if appropriate the board may vote today on that.
After that, we will open the phone line
for final round of public comment,
and then hopefully we will be to adjournment
at the appropriate time.
Very quickly I wanna see if any of the board members
have any opening statements
they'd like to make before we begin.
That's an no, no, no.
All right.
Yeah we're gonna open up the telephone lines
move into our first opportunity for public comment.
Starting with public comment.
As stated if you'd like to participate
in today's public comments,
phone number is +1 800-857-1917,
passcode 17 67 567.
Please press *1 on your phone to get in a queue.
Operator is this line open?
Operator: Yes, ma'am the line is open.
Marcie: Thank you.
Then let's get started.
First let's check the Wildfire Safety Advisory Board email.
Katherine, do we have any email communications?
Operator: One moment.
Katherine: Yes, Thanks.
We have one email from Susan Friend.
Thank you for your time.
Please stop doing the PSPS.
Shutting off power does not decrease our chances
of losing our homes by wildfire.
When the power is off, you endanger us more.
One, we have no power for our water, wells and pumps
and therefore no water pressure.
Without water pressure we cannot fight fire.
Two, we have no electricity to keep the lights on,
so firefighters can see our homes and structures.
Lighting is critical in a fire
as the smoke hides structures.
Three, we have no internet or phone
as the carriers on the same grid and they do not work.
Four, we cannot call 911 as we have no phone service.
Five, we cannot stay informed about fires
and or evacuations.
Six, you are stopping school.
We need internet to have students go to school.
Children are missing more school now because of PSPS
than they ever did when they physically went to school.
Seven, we stay at home with stay at home orders
and people working remotely,
you impede our opportunity to work and earn an income.
Thank you, Susan.
And Marcie, I can follow up with Susan and see what utility
she's with and see if we can help her in any way.
Marcie: You could provide her the information
on the determining group on Public Safety Power Shutoff.
That'd be useful.
I'm sure for her.
Sure. Katherine: Yeah.
Marcie: Okay. Okay.
Do you have any more?
Katherine: Nope.
I just one member of Acton Town Council,
I'll send them an email back to get online.
Marcie: All right.
I'd like to check with our phone operator.
Do we have any public comments on the phone line?
Operator: No, ma'am.
I am showing no comments at this time.
Marcie: All right.
Once again, there will be another opportunity
for public comment near the end of the meeting.
I'd like to Thank you for the comments
we have received and close the public comment period.
Operator: Excuse me, Ma'am.
Marcie: Yes.
Operator: We did have two people queue up for comments.
-: All right.
And I am going to rescind the closure of public comments
because it is very critical that we do hear from the public.
And we're going to fall back
and go ahead and initiate the queue operator.
Operator: Thank you all.
Do apologize.
-: No problem.
Operator: Our first comment comes from Marlene Raider.
Your line is open.
Marlene: Good afternoon.
Thank you.
I am a neighbor of Susan Friend.
Our company is Southern California Edison.
And she's addressed a lot of the issues.
However, I would like to also address the fact
of these notifications and the lack of communication
that goes out when they shut us down
or when they're gonna start them up.
Where also some of us in this community
do large animal evacuations,
and without the use of or the ability
to have our cell phones
in Texas capability and internet,
we are unable to assist in evacuations
or get help from the surrounding areas for evacuations.
And that's all I have to say for now.
Thank you.
-: Thank you, Ma'am.
Operator you said you had another one in queue.
Operator: Yes, ma'am.
I have two more.
The next comes from Bill Slocum.
Your line is open.
-: Thank you.
Bill: Hello.
I am Bill Slocum.
I'm the President of the Kagel Canyon Civic Association.
I too am neighbors with Marlene Raider and Susan Friend.
I just wanted to chime in and share.
Our community when power goes down,
internet service goes down,
communications are stopped.
Two years ago or three years ago,
we had a fire in our area.
My home literally was surrounded 360
by fire.
And the only reason I'm here today
is I had water coming from my well,
I stood there with,
for four and a half hours with a garden hose,
just watering down embers, not flames.
I couldn't stop flames,
but the Fire Department could not come in.
And these shut off by Southern California Edison
are deadly to people.
We had 16 homes lost in our area
and the prevention of saving homes by saying,
you've shut off power and you're gonna save homes,
you don't.
You put them in more danger.
Sorry for my emotions.
It just brought back a memory that is very dramatic.
I want people to understand
that I believe they're not doing this out of the benefit
of the people,
that I think that they're doing it out of the benefit
of the shareholders who have stOck in their company
and they are afraid of lawsuits.
If they enhance their equipment
and their lines are put underground
or whatever they can do technologically
to enhance their system
we would all be better off.
We need our services and we need your help
in making sure that these services are provided to us
since the State of California decided to deregulate
and allow these things to go public.
Thank you.
-: Thank you, Mr.Slocum.
Operator, do you have another in queue?
Operator: Yes, Ma'am.
Next we have Eva Andrew.
Your line is open. Eva: Hi.
Yeah.
Can you hear me okay?
Hello?
-: Yes, I can hear you.
Eva: Okay.
Yes.
I've lived in the Canyon for over 40 years.
I'm 73 years old.
In 2002, my house burned down to the ground
(indistinct)
Spadie: Either shutting off the power
or potentially endangering us and either way,
there's a burden that comes along with it.
There are many many people right now
that are getting generators.
It's still a difficult task,
especially in rural communities
to access battery backup systems for solar panels.
And I know that a lot of those funds
from what I'm being told from energy consultants
that I've been having conversations with
who are connected with RCRC,
that a lot of the money that the government
had set aside for battery backup,
went to secondary homes in more affluent areas
rather than the areas where wildfires actually happen.
This is unfortunate.
Because generators can be a dangerous thing.
If people are not actually going
through the right process to connect them
or don't know how to handle them.
And generators are not meant to be running
for 48 hours straight
or longer sometimes depending on what the PSPS is.
I know here in Lake County,
our sewer system or most had a very bad situation
where our pumps almost lost their generators.
And that would have been a very bad situation
to happen to us.
Luckily, that's not the case.
We were able to save that.
On the other side,
we have the cleanest air almost in the entire US
right here in Lake County.
And now it sounds like a helicopter during PSPS
and you can start to see and smell
the fumes from generators as well.
And so we're asking people to go
against what even the State of California
is pushing forward which is cleaner air
and watching our carbon footprint.
And in fact, we're doing the complete opposite
especially during those times the PSPS.
Water pumps.
Water pumps is a huge issue in rural areas.
Power going down in a more suburban area
is a vastly different situation
than in a rural area
where we need a water pump to be able to have water flow
through our households.
This is actually the case in my house.
I have zero water when we have a PSPS
and when a PSPS lasts as long as four or five days
as it did last year,
luckily that's not happening this year.
That becomes a very difficult task,
and water is an essential human rights.
And I think that we need to be aware.
And PG&E and I speak of PG&E
since that's the company I deal with
but the electric company
should be aware of where water pumps are.
And at this moment in time,
it is not factored in their PSPS decisions.
Community resource centers.
Right now, we just had a PSPS.
Luckily we escape this one
but just occurring over the weekend.
It is cold.
And without electricity,
we are asking people to remain in a household
that is very cold.
It's below 30 at night here.
And community resource centers are only open
typically from 8:00 AM to 5:00 PM
or sometimes different hours but never overnight.
And so what are we doing to ensure
that in these circumstances,
in these extreme temperatures,
that we're actually providing some level of comfort
during these times where the decision was made to cut off
the ability to stay warm.
Not everybody has a chimney
and not able able to warm up
through other means than just a heater.
The economy of our rural areas and impact from COVID-19.
I wish that we could have made a decision
that due to COVID-19
we're just not gonna go through PSPS this year.
Yes it might be a risk,
but it just seems that we are only making
our economic environment that much less predictable
and that much more unstable.
And I worry about that especially when we're low economies
are already on a fine line.
And so that makes it that much more difficult.
And here's the difficult part for me
is undergrounding the wires is the best way
to go to help save some of our community growth boundaries
and forest management is the key to reduce them
and mitigate the potential for wildfires.
The process to make those things happen are way too long.
I'm working right now with Euro Land Management
and CAL FIRE to do a controlled burn in an area
just East of the City of Clearlake.
They have been working on their NEPA application
for the past five years.
It can't take that long.
We have to reduce the timeframe
that it takes to be able to get these things approved.
The money, yes, the money needs to be there,
but the process,
the bureaucratic process we have to go through
needs to be removed and minimize as much as possible.
That is what is holding us back more than anything else.
Again, Thank you very much for the time to make my comment.
I appreciate it.
-: Thank you, Mr. Spadie.
Operator, do we have anyone else in queue.
Operator: No, ma'am.
I'm showing no further comments at this time.
-: Thank you, I appreciate that.
I'm gonna use the prerogative of the chair
and take a step backward in terms of accepting statements
from the board.
We're not specifically addressing
any particular public comment,
but I think a few words of clarification are in order.
You will find a very sympathetic audience
within this particular group.
We were created by statute to provide advice
to the Wildfire Safety Division,
as well as direct advice to the publicly owned community
on their wildfire mitigation plans.
It is obviously critical that the investments
being made that the focus
be made in these particular areas to manage
some of the instances
that you've very recently heard about.
So it is certainly in our interest to minimize
and ultimately eliminate Public Safety Power Shutoff.
And while we are not in control of that decision
we are very supportive and understand the implications.
And with that, I wanna offer my colleagues,
if any of them have some brief comments
they'd like to make.
Mr. Mader, I thought I saw your hand go up.
You have something you'd like to say.
-: Yes, Thank you, Chair Edwards.
I was just trying to make sure my mute button was off.
And instead of responding to one particular speaker
I think I would like to respond
to the group of concerns that were raised
because there was a certain theme through these
which was the impact of the public safety power shut downs.
You know, this board of which I'm honored to be a member
has made a number of recommendations
as Chair Edwards points out to advise on the formulation
of the wildfire mitigation plans,
of the investor on utilities.
And now we're talking about the publicly owned utilities.
And our focus really is on two things
which is the avoidance utility initiated wildfires
and trying to advise the utilities
and how to minimize those risks.
But also we have identified that the public,
the PSPS events themselves are undesirable events.
They are not a true solution.
They have their own consequences
of which the speakers very eloquently enumerated
their personal impacts and the impacts to their community.
We recognize those impacts.
And that is why we've made a number of recommendations.
And we'll continue to do that in order
to reduce the impact of PSPS,
if they are necessary to those that are affected
the amount of time or even because of,
from number of recommendations we've made how to avoid them.
We, you know, we earlier made a recommendation,
it's called about the sure,
which is the system hardening utility.
Basically it's a standard to manage hardening
in order to lower the risk to be able to operate the system
when normally when it would be subject to a PSPS.
So we've tried to make a number
of different efforts to address that.
We are an advisory board.
We do not actually operate the utilities.
Those new decisions are made by the utilities themselves
but we are in trying to enable those utilities
to be able to avoid the impact as much as possible.
And I know that all of my colleagues
very, very, you know,
take that charge very seriously
in the work that we're trying to do.
So Thank you for your sharing the impact
of yourself and to your communities.
And we will continue to work on these issues.
Thank you.
-: Thank you, board member Mayer.
Chair recognizes board member Block.
Block: Hi. Can you hear me?
-: Yes.
Block: Okay.
I was actually glad to be coming right
after board member Mader,
to just follow up and support what he was just saying.
I wanted to say that we hear you.
We really appreciate you coming on
and sharing your story and your struggles.
And it's a tap on this in a sort of remote environment
for us not to see your faces
and for us not to be face to face,
to recognize your concern in person.
I just wanted to let you know that we hear you
and we appreciate your comment.
And to further support what board member Mader said.
Or we're working on ways to provide recommendations
on data-driven solutions
so that there are the cost benefit analysis
is done in more sophisticated ways through the future.
So we're keeping all of this in mind
and doing our best to put our heads together
to find solutions.
Thank you.
-: Thank you, board member Block.
I'm seeing no other requests from the board.
That's gonna conclude the portion
where the board has an opportunity to comment
at this time.
We're also gonna close the public comment period,
and we are going to open the topic
of the September 23rd meeting minutes.
Let's see.
Let me see.
The draft minutes can be found
on the Wildfire safety Advisory Board website.
I'm sure that the members of the board
have had an opportunity to read them.
Are there any edits or additions
that you'd like to make to the meeting minutes?
-: No.
-: All right.
Hearing none.
I'll entertain a vote to approve the minutes.
Block: I'm move for adoption.
Vice Chair Fellman.
-: Board member for the second. -: Thank you.
And a second by board member Porter.
All those in favor, Aye.
-: Aye. -: Aye.
-: Any opposed? Block: Aye.
-: Motion carries.
Thank you for that vote.
Next, we are very grateful to the next run of presenters.
We're honored.
We're joined by Cal OES Wildfire Safety Division
and CAL FIRE to discuss the lay of the land
not only this past year
but perhaps get a glimpse looking forward.
First, I'd like to introduce as well,
Thank Michael Massone.
The Assistant Director for Response Operations
at Cal OES to speak with us.
Welcome, Michael.
Is your mic working?
Michael: Yes, ma'am I'm here.
Can you hear me?
-: Excellent.
Please, go ahead.
-: Hi, good afternoon.
My name is Mike Massone,
I'm Assistant Director for Cal OES.
Wanna say Thank you to madam chair
and the honorable board for having me today.
It's an honor and a privilege to be here.
I've put together a slide deck
that we can go over and discuss
kind of a small snippet perspective
of our 2020 wildfire season to date.
As we all know, it's been a challenging season
with just wildfire alone
it would have been incredibly difficult season
compound that by obviously with COVID
but then throughout the season,
we had some civil unrest.
We had elections.
We've had many number of other events
that we've been managing here at the State Operation Center.
But as it relates to wildfire,
I do have my slide deck up just a quick shot
of our fire apparatus that we maintain.
And an overview of those apparatuses
are staffed by the men and women across the state,
on resources that are provided by Cal OES as Fire and Rescue
and then staffed by individual cities and counties.
So with that, I'll start my presentation on wildfire.
So next slide.
As it relates to the State Operations Center
working with our state agencies and partners
including CAL FIRE Department Social Services,
the Red Cross and others,
we are the clearing house for all things emergency
in the state.
So our State Operations Center is responsible
for the wildfires as well.
Or at least assistance in managing those.
And we're gonna hear from CAL FIRE
in a minute to give their perspective from CAL FIRE side.
But Cal OES this year in the State Operations Center
we're looking at 4.177,856 estimated acres burn to date.
We still have a few active fires
albeit somewhat contained in our Southern part of the state
that's what we're tracking this year.
And I mean, that's just an astronomical number.
And I'm sure CAL FIRE is gonna reflect
in more detail on that
but just 4 million acres in a single year.
We don't even call it a season anymore.
But a single year it's just an astronomical number.
Of those the State Operation Center was assisting
in managing 30 of those 30 incidents.
And those are just the highlights.
Those are the ones in of themselves.
Each one would have been a major emergency
or a major conflagration or fire in the state.
And this year we had 30 of those,
and I'm sure CAL FIRE will reflect on those as well.
But at one point we had, you know,
28 wildfires burning
across the state that were in of themselves
each one would have been of such enormous magnitude
that they were overwhelming.
However, we manage those efficiently
and with great success obviously,
with our state partners, our federal partners,
and we actually had firefighters come from Israel this year
to help us out and multiple firefighters
from every almost every state as well,
providing assistance to us.
Sadly this year with our law enforcement branch.
And we sustained 31 fatalities that were reported to us
through our law enforcement branch on those fires.
And again, sadly one is too many, 31 is just unconscionable.
This year structures damaged and destroyed
we track them by damaged and destroyed.
There are other metrics out there but 11,005 structures
damaged and destroyed from these incidents
across the state costing just over $2.05 billion in costs.
I'll talk a little bit about costs in a minute
but just to let that sink in,
just again another incredible number,
and this is just wildfires,
this isn't the other incidents that we've assisted
or managed across the state including COVID.
On our next slide,
our fire management assistant grants or FMAG's,
19 FMAG'S.
I didn't check to see whether that's a record,
but can assure you that that's out there.
And these management assistant grants
are the ones that are put in from our operational areas
or counties for assistance,
federal assistance on these fires.
Thanks to our FEMA cooperators and partners
we were granted those grants relatively quickly and easily.
When those are sent to us,
we get on them right away,
sometimes in the middle of the night
we hold meetings to discuss them
to see whether we put them forward.
And then we get them to our FEMA partners as fast
as possible to get those back to us.
And out of those 19 FMAG's
we assisted 25 counties with those.
So 25 of our 58 counties are currently receiving
FMAG assistance.
Now that everything from direct assistance
directly to individuals, housing cleanup,
everywhere in between us and also for the fires.
We have two major declarations.
Presidential Declarations of Disasters.
Again, one is typically a heavy lift and a huge challenge.
We are actually supporting two right now
through our joint field office that we've established
with FEMA and Cal OES.
And out of that,
those two declarations we've got 28 counties
that are receiving direct benefit from that and one tribe.
So again, it's just it can't be underscored,
what challenge 2020 has been in terms of wildfires
and what we've seen to date.
And again, our declarations are still ongoing
each and every day, we're coordinating amongst
all of our cooperators state agencies and partners
to make sure that ultimately the citizens
in the counties are receiving
that to the max extent possible aid and assistance.
Next side is our State Operations Center.
As I mentioned earlier we kind of consolidate
and coordinate all emergencies
throughout the state this year to date
we're tracking 80 significant events
that are kind of relative to this body.
30 of those being those major Disasters fires
and then 50 of the Public Safety Power Shutoff.
And I wanna Thank not only this board
but the CPUC and the Wildfire Safety Division on,
our cooperation coordination
amongst these Power Safety Shutoffs
and to the board and to the public,
please know that we take this very seriously.
The Governor, our director,
as well as all of Cal OES is intimately involved in.
And we hear and understand the issues
that are surrounding the Public Safety Power Shutoff.
And we echo the comments earlier from the Board member
that we too would like to see these end.
As it relates to our State Operations Center
currently we have 800 staff that are currently activated
in support of our State Operations Center.
And that's statewide.
That's everywhere from our federal medical facilities,
our acute care facilities
that we're managing the COVID incident with,
to our joint field office all the way down to,
you know, folks in the field,
actually doing inspections to make sure
that actions are being completed
in terms of wildfire recovery,
and making sure that the needs are being met.
Kind of a unique numbers,
the next one, that each day I come in
it still resonates.
There's 284 days of solid activation
meaning the State Operation Center
that's just out to my right here
has been activated with people in it for 284 days,
which I'll just let that one sink in as well.
But which equates to 78% of this year to date
with knowing insight of us deactivating
or shutting down the SOC,
we're just ramped up really heavy for COVID
and the surge that's ongoing right now.
But again, we set a record in 2017
and we've surpassed that by 167 days to date.
And like I said, we're probably gonna continue on into 2021
with that as well.
Next is our OES Urban Search and Rescue CAL FIRE,
I'm sorry, Cal OES Fire and Rescue
also manages our OES Urban Search and Rescue Program.
And one of our unique deployments this year
was we deployed four task forces over 10 days
to the North complex of Butte
to do remains recovery and search
of over 2,500 burned structures in that area.
That was basically an incident within an incident.
We operated under the incident command system of that fire.
And we built out a urban search
and rescue component within that,
where we tasked four task forces
from four different locations within the state.
We brought them all to Butte for that 10 day operations.
So again, just to get more outside the box thinking
and really throwing every resource
that we have at these.
And at the end of the day our ultimate goal was
to provide some closure for families
make sure that we accounted for all of the missing
and that we can ensure that the structures were searched
and that there were no more lost or missing.
So again, just another resource that we provided
on some of the fires.
We also do a what's called pre-positioning.
We've done that with our fire apparatus.
When we've moved for wind events
we have strategically located
and stood up or staffed fire apparatus throughout the state
during these PSPS and the wind and the red flag warnings
both in the North and the South.
This year because of the large areas of burn scars
and the potential for debris flow,
and if you remember Montecito
that's what we were guarding against.
And pre-positioning our urban search and rescue teams
in those areas.
Thankfully, luckily we did not see that
and we were able to pull back our resources,
but again we stand on the ready
as we move into the rainy season.
Should that ever come.
I know that we're still in red flag
and no immediate relief for our rainfall
but we're certainly hoping as are the rest of you I'm sure.
Lastly, I'll just close with our law branch.
This is just kind of a broad picture of them.
We also coordinate law enforcement mutual aid
and with our law enforcement mutual aid system
we manage all of our evacuation
and coordinate evacuations of all of the various individuals
throughout and coordinate them into our shelters.
Which we partnered with CDSS and American Red Cross.
This year our sheltering program
was a little bit different due to COVID.
We weren't able to put them
in the typical congregate shelters
or the large arenas, gymnasium,
and those sorts of things where we typically
set out tents and cots and direct them all to one area.
What we did this year was we provided hotel rooms
and hotel vouchers to all of the evacuees.
And again, just managing that
and keeping track of the evacuees
making sure that their needs are met
and making sure that we know where they are
within a defined area was a challenge as well.
And then obviously you saw a lot of the air rescues
through our national guard folks that flew
some credible air missions this year
pulling out, you know,
people out of these these fires zones,
just incredibly heroic.
Our law enforcement branch coordinated
those with our partners at California Military Department
and California National Guard.
With that, I'm going to end.
I'm available for questions either now
or I'll remain on the line and available for questions so.
Thank you all for having me.
It's been a pleasure.
-: Thank you, Mr.Massone.
I know I speak for all of us when I share with you
how proud we are of the work at Cal OES is doing.
At this point, I'd like to see if any of my colleagues
have questions.
Vice Chair Philman.
-: Thank you.
And Thank you, Mr.Massone for your presentation
and your support for the state.
The question I have goes to the one that was raised
in the public comments.
At our meeting today we're addressing the publicly
owned utilities and electric cooperatives.
And with respect to coordinating with communities,
is your general line of communication
to the jurisdictional entities like the cities and counties
or do you have a separate line
of communication to the publicly owned utilities?
Cause I imagine you're already dealing directly
with the IOU's, so this focuses on the POU's.
-: Yes.
The answer to both is yes.
We have a communication with the POU's.
And then as it relates to the communities
and the counties,
we use our geographic mutual aid regions
to coordinate between the counties and Cal OES.
So each geographic mutual aid region
has emergency service coordinators assigned to each county,
and they work with the counties,
and the agencies to make sure that the needs are being met.
And that any of the information
that is sent back to either
the State Operation Center, Cal OES,
or questions are answered from the communities
and the counties.
-: And this is a follow-up,
is there any pre-fire season outreach
or is it mostly in real time?
-: In terms of PSPS?
-: In terms of it.
Well not in terms of PSPS,
but do you establish communication
and have information forums prior to the fire season?
Or is it merely during,
is it totally during the fire season and in real time?
-: Yeah, again, the answer is both.
But no, we do have ongoing we're in constant contact
with our counties.
Our County Office of Emergency Services
and all of our community-based organizations
that are within those operational areas or counties
to make sure that that needs are be met and,
you know, it's the pre-events.
And then we do have in real time,
you know, communications either
through emergency operations centers
that then communicate back to our State Operation Center
or just directly in the field.
-: Thank you.
-: Of course.
-: Thank you.
I'm seeing no other questions from the board members
at this time.
I'd again like to Thank you, Mr.Massone
for being here with us today.
With that we're gonna move to the Wildfire Safety Division.
Director Thomas Jacobs is with us.
It's been quite a wild year for her.
No doubt.
We appreciate you joining us today and with that Director.
-: Great.
Thank you, Chair Edwards.
And good afternoon board members.
Thank you for the opportunity to brief you
on the Wildfire Safety Divisions progress
we've made in 2020.
Before I get into my official remarks.
Just wanna take a moment to offer
my personal Thanks to Mike Massone,
who just was presenting for all the work
that he's been doing and leading at the Cal OES.
Just given my background there myself
I have a deep understanding of the enormity
and the complexity of what this year
has been for the state's response
so deep appreciation for all the time
and energy you've put into that Mike,
so Thank you very much.
So when I first briefed this body
back in the beginning of the year,
I laid out objectives for the division in 2020.
As a new division established in just this January.
Build our division,
meet our statutory responsibilities
and prepare for our transition
into the office of Energy Infrastructure Safety
by July, 2021.
We've executed on all three.
A quick recap of building out the division,
and then I'll provide more detail
on our core responsibilities.
So today we've hired the vast majority of our team.
We have a few remaining positions
that we're expecting to fill soon.
Throughout the year we've executed
on our various responsibilities.
While we've executed on our various responsibilities,
we've built out our internal procedures and protocols.
We've equipped our teams
and we've developed a training program
to ensure that as we quickly onboard staff
they can hit the ground running.
So while we've built the proverbial plane around us,
we have been running full steam ahead
tackling our specific statutory responsibilities.
Key among them this year,
first, evaluating our 2020 Wildfire Mitigation Plans
which was the first iteration of the plan
that covers a three-year period
for the new AB-054 requirements.
We completed a comprehensive review
of the eight submissions back in May,
and are in the process of finalizing
our review of Bear Valley Electrics refiled WMP this fall.
And the majority of utilities received
conditional approvals of their plans
requiring them to submit remedial compliance plans in July
to address class A with the most substantial deficiencies
and submit a quarterly report in September
to address the class B deficiencies
or the moderate deficiencies.
We're in the process of finalizing our assessments
of those submissions.
And we'll be issuing our findings shortly.
Throughout the year,
we've been reviewing issuance,
for issuing subsequent safety certifications.
We issued a reissuance
of Bear Valley's electric safety certification
after a corporate restructure back in August.
And then we issued subsequent certifications
for Southern California Edison
and San Diego Gas and Electric in September.
We currently have before us under consideration,
PG Need Safety Certification.
We initiated development of our overall
Wildfire Safety Compliance Program.
And to date, our inspectors have completed
over 2,700 inspection activities identifying 160 defects.
And we are actively working with utilities
to ensure that they resolve them in a timely manner.
And in October we submitted our inaugural recommendations
to the Commission on the four required elements
per public utilities code 8389D specifically
the wildfire mitigation plan,
updated welfare mitigation plan requirements,
updated performance metrics,
an inaugural annual safety culture assessment
and the inaugural compliance process.
I'll provide some details on those recommendations
in a moment.
But as you all are, of course aware,
we built our recommendations off of the recommendation
provided by this board.
So I'd like to provide a bit more detail
in those recommendations.
We submitted our recommendations to the Commission
via two resolutions.
WSD-011 and WSD-012.
Both were informed by the recommendations
that we received from the board in June.
The division considered the boards 23 recommendations
and prioritize 16 for incorporation
into the resolutions and its attachments.
The 16 incorporated broadly focused on the following areas.
First, further clarifying and standardizing metrics
such as clearly defining all risk events
that could cause an ignition.
Second, requiring additional reporting requirements
in the wildfire mitigation plan.
Such as worker qualifications and providing a risk analysis
on each initiative.
And third, reshaping the wildfire mitigation plan,
process and timeline to enable more complete plans
and time for evaluation.
There were seven recommendations
that while we appreciated the thoughtful analysis
and recommendation from the board
we did not incorporate at this time.
Most of these were were not incorporated
because they either were outside the scope
of the division specific authorities and responsibility,
and that's handled in other parts of the Commission
or prioritize as part of a longer term effort
following the 2021 wildfire mitigation plan cycle.
For example, sobbing utilities resource constraints
which is a longer-term issue that the division supports
but is outside of our direct scope.
And then adopting a comprehensive risk metrics.
That board member Mader mentioned earlier.
Which is best addressed within the context
of the Commission's ongoing risks focus proceedings
such as the RAMP proceedings.
Our full analysis of the board's recommendations
can be found in attachment one
to resolution WSD-011 which can be found on our website.
Our changes to the wildfire mitigation guidelines
were relatively light
and therefore in short compatibility
over the prior year submissions.
The changes focus on clarifying definitions,
the maturity model capabilities and metrics.
While keeping requirements consistent
with the 2020 guidelines to allow
year-over-year progress tracking.
Standardizing quantitative data
and adding structure to narrative responses
and reorganizing the requirements to streamline
both the utility submissions and the division,
the review process.
For example, creating a new section
where all information related to Public Safety Power Shutoff
will be housed as opposed to that information
being throughout the utilities WMP
as was the case in 2020.
Our changes to the wildfire mitigation plan process
are also relatively light and focus on making
the wildfire mitigation plan review schedule more efficient
and feasible for everyone involved going forward.
The adopted process includes the following core elements.
First, we offset the small
and multi-jurisdictional utilities
and independent transmission owner submissions
to 30 days after the February 5th
large utility submission date.
This gives the WSD, the division,
a dedicated month to focus on reviewing the large IOU plan
and provides additional time
for smaller utilities to prepare their plans.
Second, we move quantitative WMP requirements
into an into new quarterly reports.
This will enable the division
to receive the data more frequently
and conduct analysis and assess progress year-round.
Regarding the Safety Culture Assessment or CSA,
there are a few things I'd like to highlight
about the process.
First, the Division Safety Culture Assessment
will be distinct from the Commission's
broader Safety Culture Assessment In two ways.
One, the Division Safety Culture Assessment
must be conducted annually.
In contrast to the Commission's assessment
which must be conducted at least every five years.
Second, the Division Safety Culture Assessment
will be focused primarily on wildfire safety.
While of course still incorporating
covering some of the elements of broader safety culture
which are essential to wildfire safety outcomes.
Second, the division safety culture assessment
by nature of being conducted annually
aims to measure improvement of safety culture over time,
in a consistent fashion,
and accordingly drive accountability.
Key to this is having a standard assessment tools
which can be applied across electrical corporations
year over year.
Third, the division will base its assessment
on five forms of data;
survey, self-assessments, interviews, observations,
and supporting documentation.
We might phase these in over initial years
and will likely streamline the process
for smaller electrical corporations.
With the Commission's adoption of WSD-011,
at their November 19th voting meeting,
the WSD is moving forward to implement
all of these recommendations.
We have recently released detailed CSA requirements
for stakeholder feedback and plan
to conduct our first safety culture assessments next year.
As per resolution WSD-012 our new annual compliance process,
it articulates a two-part compliance process.
Ongoing an annual compliance assessments
in which the WSD determines each utility compliance
throughout a compliance period
and then conducts an annual review
at the end of each compliance period
in consequences of compliance assessments.
In which the WSD will work with utilities
to minimize and or resolve wildfire safety issues
and noncompliance with the WMP initiatives.
The ongoing compliance assessments through field inspections
and regular audits of electrical corporation compliance
with initiatives is a core part of our strategy.
The field inspections provide new real-time notification
and expedited resolution of electrical corporation defects
and provide transparency into the progress
towards risk reduction goals.
Regular audits allow the WSD staff
to expeditiously address WSD compliance concerns
not easily addressed through the field inspections.
A key element of the new process
is expedited timeline to resolve defects.
All WMP defects will be categorized
by severity using the same definitions
and thresholds as a GO 95 rule 18,
but we'll have shortened timelines
to ensure expeditious remediation.
The new timelines are as follows.
Severe defects will remain immediate
or need to be temporarily repaired to lower risk level.
Moderate defects within tier three,
high fire threat districts,
their resolution timeline will shorten from six months
to one to two months.
Moderate defects in tier two areas,
will shorten from 12 months to three to six months
and moderate worker safety defects
will shorten from 12 months to six months.
Other moderate defects will shorten
from 36 months to 12 months.
And then minor defects,
will shorten from 60 months down to 12 months.
With the Commission's adoption of WSD-012
at the November 19th meeting,
the WSD is moving forward to develop
operational compliance protocols.
These draft protocols will be circulated
for stakeholder comments soon.
Lastly, let me address our plan transition next year
into the office of energy infrastructure safety.
Everything we have developed
as a division has been developed with an eye
towards how we would transfer it to OEIS.
Where we can, we simply will move the capability with us.
For example, all WSD staff will transfer it to OEIS.
We will bring our computers, our phones, our procedures,
where we can't take it with us,
we are actively working with CNRA
to identify replacement capabilities to meet our needs.
For example, we will be creating new
OEIS IT systems and accounts.
All staff will get new OEIS emails.
We will have a new OIS website under the CNRA.
And lastly, there are some processes and tools
that WSD is using that are distinct to the TUC.
Where we use something that doesn't have an equivalent
over at CNRA,
we will innovate and create new capabilities
designed to meet OEIS specific needs and missions.
For example, we are working
with the Office of Administrative Law
to identify any necessary OEIS rules
that need to be worked through that rule making process.
There's an unbelievable amount of detail
behind each of these transition tasks,
but I won't bore you with here.
But suffice it to say we are on track
to successfully transition by July one of next year.
So with that, I Thank you again for the opportunity
to brief you and welcome any questions you may have.
-: Thank you, Director.
We appreciate your presentation
and the time you took to be here today.
I do have one question and it may be overly simplistic
but how do you relate the activities
that you undertake in the wildfire safety division,
do you have any way of correlating its impact
on Public Safety Power Shutoff?
I mean, I know the overall goal for all of this
is to reduce it.
But is there any quantification we can use?
Thank you.
-: Yeah.
So that goes to the performance metrics.
So last year was the first year that we sort
of introduced a number of performance metrics
that we required the utilities to submit.
To give us both historical data.
For example, how many emissions they've had?
How many PSPS events have they had?
And then they have to articulate
how the different wildfire mitigation plans or initiatives
are driving a reduction
in those performance metrics over time.
So what we've done is in the submission for 2021
is we've continued to refine those performance metrics
and with a goal towards showing how the activities
that they're doing,
there a lot of mitigation activities they're doing.
Which PSPS is one of those mitigation activities.
But as is clearly stated by the Commission
and reiterated a number of times,
should only be used as a mitigation of last resort, right?
It should only be the last very last thing
they decided to use.
But how all of those different mitigation initiatives
are actually driving a reduction in the risk of wildfire
and or the consequences of wildfire risk.
-: That's good to know.
We'll have any questions from the balance of the board.
Thank you, Director.
Again we very much appreciate it.
-: Thank you.
-: All right, then.
Moving to CAL FIRE.
I'm pleased to introduce Erick Puckett
the CAL FIRE Division Chief in Charge of Utilities
Fire Mitigation,
and Thank you to Erick for taking the time out of your day.
Please go ahead.
-: Thank you, Chair Edwards.
It's a pleasure to be here and it's nice actually
getting to hear some of the public comments that came in.
So my name is Erick Puckett,
I am an Assistant Chief in the Utility Fire Mitigation.
I work closely with the WSD and Caroline's team.
So I can, I do have a very good understanding
of the PSPS comments that have been made.
I can assure you we're collaboratively
working on resolutions.
So I hope to provide you a little bit of insight
into what I look at season fire in 2020.
There are a few important components
if we could get, next slide, please.
One more.
Thank you.
Okay.
So just a few things, weather outlooks.
We're gonna see how the season started
and where we think it's gonna go.
Based on fuel and forecast.
Can talk about the efforts of CAL FIRE's fuel reductions.
You're gonna see the impact of COVID 19.
To talk about some growth we had even during this climate,
this fiscal climate that were dealing with.
Some stats that will be in line with Chief Massone's records
and then our new CAL FIRE Hawk platform.
So next slide please.
Excuse me.
So we're just gonna kinda start here
significant fire potential.
So essentially there's three slides
and our forecasters monthly do a four month outlook.
And so this is we're gonna go back to June.
So this was posted in June.
So the first slide is essentially, June.
And what you see as a map of,
I just displayed in Northern California.
And anything that's red is significant fire potential.
So in month of June they identified
that we had significant fire potential.
And we actually did have a large incident in Santa Clara
that was tied into essentially this timeline.
And we get into July and August
and it kinda moves around a little bit.
And that's September where the entire North State
is essentially in a red
which indicates a significant fire potential.
So a couple of key things going into this season.
Most areas were 25 to 70% below average rainfall.
And this snowpack almost completely melted off
weeks ahead of the usual.
So on top of that,
we had they anticipated North-Northeast offshore winds
will pose a bigger threat of large fires in June, September.
So their forecast was almost spot on.
We started to get a significant lightning storm
and as predicted the trend.
So we're gonna get to the fire siege here in just a bit.
So going into from this point forward,
our focus right now as far as weather patterns
is we're looking at, the next slide, please.
I'm sorry.
I'll let you know (indistinct).
We're looking at South OPS
four months significant fire potential.
So the left side is December,
you can kinda see right down there along
the coastlines is red,
and then the picture to the right is three months,
January, February, March.
Still very normal.
So what we'd like to see is below normal
that indicates that there's some more sheer
that the fuels are reacting.
So what's key here is that the forecast
is above normal offshore wind events in December,
then near normal offshore wind events
from January through March.
So we are seeing that currently.
So we've had a series of offshore events stack up
and continue to hit Southern California.
And we're currently in the tail end of an offshore event.
And it's very likely this weekend,
we may see an onshore event
that could be as or near significant as the events
that we've seen.
Next slide, please.
So this is just a little bit of supporting evidence
the top left there,
your looking at the state of drought index.
So you can see almost the entire state
is in some form of a drought
other than that Southwest corner, maybe San Diego.
Percentage of average preset way below normal.
So we're looking at August 1st through November 30th.
And most of that much of the state is in red
which is indicating they were way below average.
Now we're gonna look at more of the potential tier.
So bottom left December,
it's sure looking like the temperatures
are gonna be above normal and below normal precipitation.
January very similar,
February kinda migrates a little bit but half the state
is looking warmer than normal.
And then it's still pretty dry in the Southern region.
March, it looks like maybe a little bit of trend of moisture
in the North region.
And in the South, not so much.
So this is just an indication December 20th
through March 21st,
that in the North this is just essentially a normal,
significant large growth prediction.
Next slide please.
So CAL FIRE has made tremendous efforts
and we have very,
specific goal directed by the Chief Porter.
So this is statewide.
So within a fiscal year our goal is to burn.
Broadcast burn 30,000 acres.
that complete 20,000 acres of fuel treatment
and complete 250,000 of defensible space inspection.
Next slide.
So I think the takeaway here guys
is that the real number is when you look at what we've done
compared to our goals our broadcast goals were 30,000.
We've completed just under 3000.
So we're looking at 10%.
Our combined fuel treated acres, 2,900.
So 14%.
So the takeaway is that this has been an extremely
busy fire season.
All of our staff have been fully engaged
and we typically gain the most numbers
on our fuel reduction in late fall and in early spring.
So these aren't alarming numbers
because we still have a lot of time to meet those goals.
Next slide.
So this one really just focuses
on our efforts for defensible space inspections.
And so each inspection really includes
a habitable residence.
So what our department does essentially
is updates as they go along inspecting
and you can see what units are producing the numbers.
Total our goal is 250,000
and we are sitting at 104,000 so 41%.
So again, not alarming,
but just a good stat to understand our efforts.
Next slide.
So COVID.
So COVID when we first got impacted by it.
It was in March.
Our department developed an incident action plan
and the whole goal was to really,
to reduce exposures to keep the workforce working.
So there was a lot of work put together
by this incident action plan,
strict guidance, strict reporting requirements.
I think overall our department did very well
with reducing the impact on our personnel.
So if you go down this list May and June a few cases,
July spiked a little bit,
then August and September really .
The takeaway here is that the August, September,
so the lightning siege came in August 16th
and lasts at approximately six weeks.
Though those were the two busiest months.
They're very, the cases are very low.
So the mitigation efforts that our incident management teams
and the units were actually processing work.
Next slide please.
So this is just an indication of,
you know, the term fire seasons is used widely
but we use winter and summer preparedness.
And when we're talking summer preparedness
we talk peak and off-peak.
So this is a representation of peak summer preparedness
when we have all of our resources staffed on a daily basis.
So we're going into peak preparedness
with 356 fire engines, 196 hand crews,
58 bulldozers, 23 air tankers, 12 helicopters,
at 12 air attacks and six incident management teams.
So these incident management teams
are all risk and they respond within California
to essentially any type of emergency.
So a good example of that is IMT4 was activated for COVID.
I think it was March or maybe February or March.
Next slide please.
So again, those IMT's are not just for wilden fire.
So what's been going on really
it's been happening since 2012,
is we have a declining number of low risk offenders
in our camp and correctional facilities.
So over the last three or four years
we've essentially declined our Type 1 fire crews.
So in October and December at CAL FIRE
and California Department of Corrections and Rehabilitation
announced that we would be closing eight conservation camps.
And those camps are located,
they will increase in Mendocino County,
Devil's garden in Modoc County,
Iraq Conservation Camp in Humboldt
and Valley View Conservation Camp in Glenn.
In the Southern region you got baseline Camp in Tuolumne,
McCain Valley, San Diego,
Pilot Rock, San Bernardino,
and Rainbow Conservation Camp in San Diego.
So I highlighted that 196 number
so now we're officially down to 152
with those camp closures.
In addition to that while COVID-19 pandemic
led to an increase of low risk,
potential inmate firefighters being released
it does not alone account for the dramatic drop.
So we've had to come up with mitigation
for the low crew counts.
Next slide please.
So some of the things we used,
so the California National Guard Crews were engaged.
They were engaged in both of our fuels projects
and those were the Governor's 35 fuels projects.
And then they were engaged in fire suppression.
We increased our dozer staffing in the unit.
So bulldozers staff, 24 hours, seven days a week.
We engage our CAL FIRE fuel reduction crews
but typically their purpose is focusing on fuel reduction.
They were engaged with fire line assignments,
increased in CCC crews.
We had to hire private Type 2 IA crews.
And then this is a big one down here.
So firefighter 1 hand crews,
this is the first year that we've actually put together
firefighter 1 hand crews.
So each unit was funded to put together one crew.
We thought we use the tools that we already had in our unit.
So we use our existing fire captains.
We used our existing crew carrying vehicles,
in some units we did have to rent some facilities.
But the takeaway at the end of the fire season
was that they had experienced leadership,
they were very motivated and they're supported by labor.
So it was a successful model.
The next slide please.
So I talking about growth a little bit.
So this came right at the end of the fiscal year.
So this is basically a relief and augmentation funding.
So just kinda look at that first line.
354 seasonal firefighters.
Those firefighters were put on hand crews
and were additional engine staffing.
Next slide please.
Okay.
So we did put into service three
S-70I Blackhawk helicopters.
So the department has been working
for quite some time with this.
So nine are still to be delivered.
Expected to be delivered by 2022.
The first three,
the first one was a training spare relief platform
which is out of Sacramento.
Vina Helitack out of to Tehema,
and then 404 out of Columbia.
So this was interesting to see these copters at work.
They increased the tank capacity from 324 gallons
to a thousand gallons.
And they have much faster travel times.
So I think this first season was a good exposure
to the capabilities of the S-70I Blackhawk.
One of the big things that is coming
it hasn't been developed.
They're working aggressively on that
is they will have night flying capabilities.
I don't think we're gonna get there this year
but hopefully around the corner we'll be successful.
Next slide.
So this is where it all began.
August 16th, early morning,
rare lightning siege comes through
approximately 12,000 strikes in a week.
And of those 12,000 strikes, 650 confirmed fires.
Next slide.
So the situation essentially abundant ignitions,
record low fuel moistures,
significant drying post lightning.
We have continuous red flag warnings,
extreme drawdown due to the number of incidents.
And then our federal partners are also burning.
So this isn't on state lands.
This is on state and federal and local lands.
Next slide.
So CAL FIRE has a goal of containing 95% of its fires
for 10 acres or less.
So we can achieve this goal
when we keep our initial attack, resources plentiful.
So during these events, the lightning siege,
almost all of our resources were committed.
Chief Massone was talking about his resource
local government that supported that.
But the one interesting thing that we see here
is that during that event,
we had a lull in new starts.
I don't have the exact numbers for you,
but we just started seeing a little bit of a slowdown
in initial attack.
So during that time,
we were digging as deep as we could to get
as many resources on the incidents
as well as preparing for due incidents.
So we use a term called assistance by higher.
Using local government resources for station coverage.
And in my career,
I've never seen an entire unit covered by volunteers.
So those volunteer firefighters for up to two weeks
staffed our state stations responding
to all of our incidents and did a really good job.
So during that time,
all six of our CAL FIRE All Risk IMT's were activated
and those were multi-jurisdictional multi-agency.
In some cases we would have two State Teams
and one or two Fed Teams on the same incident.
Next slide.
So we're gonna go over some stats here.
So we've been keeping records,
good record since the thirties.
So we're looking at the top 20 largest California fires.
And so everything you see highlighted is this fire season.
So we're just gonna go over a couple of those.
The August Complex came from the lightning siege on the 16th
and they encompass seven counties,
1,320,000 acres, 935 structures.
And we bumped down to the SCU Complex,
same lightning event covers I think six counties
almost 400,000 acres.
And then it goes on.
So out of the top 20 we now have six
of the largest California wildfires
happen in the same season.
Next slide.
So this is a comparison on the left hand side
you have a campfire, which 2018 in Butte County,
then you have the North Complex
which was this year in Butte County.
So I just wanted to illustrate was really the footprint
of those two fires.
These fires are effecting
the communities almost back to back.
So you have a campfire
which is still rated as the most devastating structures.
Losing 18,804 structures.
And right next to that the North Complex
now rates as the fifth largest at 2,352.
So we're right in this picture.
You're looking at almost 21,000 structures damaged
within two years.
So we go to the right, this is effect Napa.
We're looking at the Tubbs incident, 2017,
and the Glass incidents.
And both of these ranked as well.
So the Tubbs is the number two most destructive fire,
destroying 5,636 incidents, excuse me, structures.
And then the Glass, which is right next door happened
this season just a bit ago was 1,520 structures.
So go ahead and next slide please.
So the two these is the ones
I was just talking about North and Glass.
You can see that the communities are being affected
back to back with large devastating fires.
Next slide.
So we're gonna just look at the deadliest fire.
So this season number five,
the North Complex 15 reported deaths and number 16
the LNU Lightning Complex, six reported.
Next slide.
So here's a totality of what fires
should look like as far as numbers.
Still CAL FIRE, acres 1,049,987,
and that was from 7,921 fires.
CAL FIRE and other partner agencies.
Cause we put up their logos up there,
all these agencies cooperatively work together.
So in the State of California this fire season
for this calendar year 4,177,000 acres,
9,639 fires, 31 fatalities,
and 10,488 structures damaged or destroyed.
So in comparison walk to the left,
last year the same interval,
we have 5,600 fires for 137,000 acres.
But last year it was a good indication
we did have a wet winter,
snowpack, we had good fuel moistures
and we didn't have the events that we had this summer.
So this year's acres are,
just for CAL FIRE is almost five times.
So our five-year average is roughly 5,600 fires per year
and 446,000 acres.
Next slide please.
Okay so.
I really appreciate the opportunity
to show some insight of our agency
and I'm open to any questions if you may have some.
-: Thank you, chief.
-: I am curious what other differentiators
that you see are impacting the severity of this last season.
I get the reductions in defensible space
and I get lightning sieges
and the fuel load and the weather.
Are there any other major contributors?
-: No, I think the important thing
is there's bits and pieces of,
and it's really it's a combination
of all those coming together.
So a reduction in available resources
due to significant drawdown, that lightning siege,
I can't off the top of my head
really tell you that there were other significant factors.
It really, everything came together
and we were spread really thin, really fast.
And given the circumstances of weather events
that stacked up behind those ignitions
it just was kind of a,
you know, a natural flow.
So chair, I don't have a good answer for you.
-: See if I could also,
you mentioned that there were a significant
amount of volunteers.
In fact, we were staffing two facilities
with volunteers for some longer-term period.
Have we been utilizing,
and you also mentioned that conservation camps,
that there had been some shutdowns.
Are we still using any any prison facilities
or individuals to help fight fires?
-: Yes, absolutely.
So we the California Department Corrections
still provides firefighter training and physical training
for inmates that meet the criteria
to be on our Type 1 hand crews.
So that is still existing and they are still processing
and training and delivering folks
into our conservation camps.
-: Okay.
And my last question, and this is really connected
to the question immediately prior.
I had heard purely anecdotally,
that even when some of these inmates had done their time
and been restored to society,
that their past history despite all this fire training
was not allowing them
then to join the various fire services.
Do you have any comment on that?
Or is that anecdotal information accurate?
-: Well, I think I can speak for our agency.
I have also heard the same.
I can tell you that that CAL FIRE
or the State of California HR,
we go through an application process annually
for firefighter 1, that opens up in November
and essentially it's a scoring process.
And so those incarcerated inmates that have been released
do meet certain criteria
to get ranked and hireable on our firefighter 1 hiring list.
So they have an opportunity to come into CAL FIRE.
And actually there were several folks
that I know that are within our agency
that have had a incarcerated background
and are now doing very successful in our agency.
-: Oh, that's excellent, chief.
Thank you for sharing.
I believe a board member Block has a question.
Block: Hi, Thank you for your presentation.
Really appreciated it.
And this has been an immense year,
I wanna Thank you and CAL FIRE for all you were able to do.
Can you tell us a little bit about CAL FIRE's role
in fuel management and the long-term into the future
in particular with the conifer forest part of the State
in Northern California?
-: You know, that was one of the topics
I was talking to Jamie.
Excuse me, Jamie about was my focus works
in the utility fire mitigation.
So unfortunately I'm not the guy
that has all the answers. Block: Right.
Erick: We do play a significant role
in the state's efforts on private lands
for fuel reduction.
I can't speak on behalf of this specific forest
that you're mentioning, but we do, you know,
I shared with you some of those fuel reduction goals
and we are gearing up the last couple of years
and we have a lot of momentum.
We are streamlining our project processes.
I heard a complaint that it does take some time
to get through NEPA and CEQA.
Our agency is working closely
with all the other agencies
that are involved with fuels projects.
And we're becoming successful with reducing the timeline
and the lag that that we're all kind of in tune with.
So our department has made drastic improvements
and have met some of our recent,
have met our previous year goals
and will continue to be a focus of our agency's efforts.
Block: Great.
Thank you.
I thought that might be your answer.
(Erick chuckles)
I have a assumption that many of my fellow board members
who aren't totally educated on how fuels are managed
throughout the state and what we can learn more.
So I may reach out for resources or contacts
from you later offline.
Thank you.
Erick: Yeah, I'll certainly help get you
in contact with the right person.
Block: Great.
Thanks.
Thanks for your time.
Erick: You're welcome.
-: Thank you, board member Block.
And I think your fellow board members
would actually be very appreciative
if you would share some of that information.
It is certainly not as strong suit of mine
and I'd be very Thankful for that.
And Thank you, chief.
I don't see any more questions at this time.
So with that, I'm going to turn it over to Jamie Ormond.
-: Thank you.
Can you hear me.
I'm off mute.
Okay.
Now is the time for the stretch break.
If you could go to the next slide, please.
We are gonna take a stretch break.
15 minutes.
We'll come back at 2:45,
if that works for the chair.
Chair, does that meet
your timing preference? -: It's fine.
-: Perfect.
So we're gonna reconvene at 2:45.
Could we please stand up, stretch it out.
Turn off your video, mute your phone,
get the blood flowing, get some more water.
You'll return at 2:45 for the next part of the meeting.
Thank you very much.
Enjoy the stretch break.
Thank you very much to our presenters.
We'll see you back here at 2:45.
2:45.
We'll see you then.
Mute your phone.
Turn off your video.
We'll see you at 2:45.
-: Thank you (indistinct).
Operator: We'll begin momentarily.
Thank you for your patience.
-: I hope you all made very good use of it.
And as somewhat of a coda to the discussion we had
with the municipal and the co-op community on November 19th
I'd like to welcome back the speakers,
Jessica Nelson, the General Manager
of Golden State Power Co-op.
Barry Moline, Executive Director
of California Municipal Utilities Association.
Scott Tomashefsky, Northern California Power Agency.
And Mario DeBernardo,
Southern California Public Power Authority.
See we do appreciate your continued participation.
A few introductory remarks.
If you bear with me.
We received public comments from the Joint Associations
from the organization, CMU, NCPA, SCPPA and GSPC.
We also receive public comment
from SMUD, DWP, Grid Subject Matter Experts.
Comments were quite useful in understanding
the challenges that POUs face,
the difficulty they also face
with any due reporting process.
I think what I gleaned from comments is that the POUs
at the end of the day wanna protect their resources,
not affect customer rates,
at the same time they're also very concerned
with focusing their efforts on the work
of wildfire mitigation and not on anything
that they to them appear to be extraneous to that effort.
So I mentioned they're concerned
about protecting their customers
from any of the catastrophic consequences of wildfire
particularly utility ignited wildfires.
And from our standpoint,
that's a good thing because that's the same mission
that this advisory board has been given.
And because of our unique relationship
with the publicly owned utilities and co-ops
and that being that we play an advisory role to them
we thought it was important to respond to their comments,
and those responses were included in attachment two.
We do in fact, hope that they were helpful.
The legislature, excuse me,
created this board to ensure a broad expertise is available
to help develop best practices
for wildfire reduction.
The board is just beginning a process
of developing recommendations on best practices.
There are some here in our guidance advisory opinion.
We were tasked with reviewing all of the plans submitted
by the POUs and co-ops in commenting on the quote,
content and sufficiency
of the wildfire mitigation plans then quote.
The board is required to provide comments
as well as our advisory opinions.
The legislation details
which should be included in the plan
and the board focused interview in these areas.
These requirements are included in attachment one.
Because this is the board's first round
of publicly owned utility wildfire mitigation plan
we thought it important to provide information
about how we believe each POU
can best meet these statutory requirements.
This is why the advice in this advisory opinion
mostly lays out the type of information
that we believe are needed to meet the statute.
It's frankly, it's more than that though.
The WMP tell a story
about the POU's wildfire mitigation efforts.
And in this guidance advisory opinion
we explain the ways that this story
could be communicated better in certain areas
such that a broader audience
could in fact better understand.
Again this is a guidance document
and we understand that it explained the information we want,
doesn't necessarily show it.
What we're hoping to do is that we can work
with your organizations to create more detailed guidelines
that utilities can use to consider
when updating their WMP for the 2021 filing submission.
All right.
So I'm opening up the discussion now
to the muni and co-op representatives a few questions.
You don't need to answer them in order
or if they're contained in your comments, that's fine.
Do you think the guidance document,
at least, this initial one starts to pay
the clear path forward?
What do you see your next steps
in creating more detailed guidelines
and what else would you like the board to consider?
I think with that, I'll start with Barry Moline,
Executive Director of CMUA.
Fair?
-: Oh, well Thank you, Chair Edwards.
The answer is yes, it does.
The answer to that question directly,
it does provide, you know,
a good, some great feedback
on where the board is clearly and,
you know, the general direction
of what you'd like to see going forward.
And I think it opens a dialogue in terms
of the kinds of things that you're seeking
and the kind of things that that would make sense
in our communities.
So we see this as an iterative process.
We're gonna be doing this for,
I don't know if I'd say forever,
but this is something that we believe
that is gonna go on for quite a long time.
So, you know, this is the first stage
of this iterative process.
You asked the question what we would like to see
changed in particular?
Correct?
-: Mm hm. -: And I can identify
two items specifically,
and not to garner the attention
from my fellow panelists,
but what we have communicated
and this is something that we all agree on.
So the first item is we ask that the guidance reflect
the fact that per the statute
and this is of course, as you know,
in the finalization of the guidance recommendation.
That as the guidance reflects the statute
that the comprehensive wildfire management plans
that the updates be prepared at least every three years.
So that would correlate with statute.
And we also ask that there be some recognition
that the independent evaluation
also be done in instances
where there's a comprehensive change
to the wildfire management plan,
not so much as just an annual update with minor changes,
but when there's a comprehensive change
and we know that has to take place every three years.
So we would like this clarification be included
in the guidances if possible.
You know, we see that kind of potentially
being included in somewhere and page,
I don't know, II or III.
You know, upfront in the introductory materials
before the recommendation.
And then the second item is regarding
recommendation number two, which is on page three.
And that is just a minor modification to the nomenclature.
Just the words that are used there.
The words talk about the concerns
about the budget mechanism.
And we would prefer to focus on funding
for the wildfire management plan
and wildfire management activities rather than budget.
And the reason why is that the plans and the activities
are part of a much larger budget for the utility,
not just and wildfire activities are just a segment of that.
I mean, we're talking things like power supply
and delivery of power and so on.
So granted wildfire issues do cross cut a variety of those,
nevertheless we would like the wording
to focus on funding rather than budget.
And we have some suggested language
that we can give to you,
you know, after this meeting
so that and it's just relatively simple.
So those are basically our two recommendations
for the changes to the guidance.
-: Okay.
And certainly as we go through some of the commentary
from all of the agencies, I encourage the board,
if you have follow-up questions or inquiries,
I have a couple on what you just said Barry.
With respect to the statute in the every three years,
I think everyone agreed.
I think this meeting also is part of the public record.
So I think the interest in looking at 2021
was to arrive more rapidly at a structure or template
that the muni and co-op community,
as well as the board agreed,
provided the necessary information
such that then we can translate to doing incremental reviews
of each of the agencies.
Which we did not do this time.
In which was surfaced.
But I think without a clear agreement
on the the communication path forward,
the meaning of certain things,
I think it would have been problematic.
So I think that's what the focus was on 2021,
is just starting to narrow down
so that when we go to a three-year iteration,
it's more sensical to both sides.
Secondly, with regard to your comment on the IEs,
am not one to create the permanent employee,
you know, Permanent Employment Act for IEs.
I'm not interested in them rubber stamping a report
every year and changing two words in it.
So what I do wanna ensure
though is our view from initially from the IEs,
and board members, again,
interrupt me if you do not concur
or have additional questions.
My interpretation was that the IEs were to be additive.
They were intended to bring best practices
from sometimes their broader view
of the landscape with municipal and co-op
such that they would then be advantageous to the agency
who they were writing their analysis for.
And my concern is there might be something that comes up
that's very cool that the utility will never
become aware of without potentially
doing the IE evaluations.
Somewhat more frequently.
So we can caveat that too to include
maybe just a partial review of some of the new
and upcoming best practices
and maybe answer it in a more narrow fashion.
So we don't launch this broad multiple iterations of review.
The last thing you brought up was funding.
I understand that no one,
even though much of the information is public
because it's transferred between the city agencies
and the utilities themselves which respect to budget.
I don't think we were looking for some holistic evaluation
necessarily the budget as a whole,
because it's difficult enough for people to understand
let alone for people who are three or four clicks back.
I think the question we were attempting to answer
and again, board members,
I think the question we were attempting to answer
is what in fact was the funding?
To use your term.
And how were people in the hierarchy
then made aware at the conclusion of that funding year,
did that work get done?
Or were those dollars appropriated and moved somewhere else?
Which happens in any and all budgets.
But I think the concern we had is if you commit
to do X amount of miles of fire resistant conductor
or change out certain equipment on transmission lines
and you set that goal,
what's the methodology to ensure
that goal is being accomplished?
Or just so that your own decision makers are aware
that it wasn't accomplished and the money was reallocated.
I think that was really the interest
not in boring into the individual budgets.
I wanna stop right now and make sure
I check the temperature of the board
in that no one has any strong disagreements
with anything I said or needs to add to it at all.
Okay.
At the very end of hearing from all of the participants
where I haven't gotten feedback from the board,
I'm gonna surface some which to me
are largely ministerial adjustments
and we can take the temperature of the board
in that fashion.
Barry, do you have any other comments
or can I move on?
-: Well, very briefly.
One is I didn't get a chance to say
how much we appreciate the board's engagement
in this process.
We know that it was a major undertaking
and looking at about 50 agencies plans.
So we definitely appreciate everyone's time,
attention and expertise in pulling together the guidance.
I mean, that was, so Thank you all for that.
-: We appreciate that.
Believe me, after reading three IOUs
and then being faced with over 50 municipal and co-op plans,
it was something that kept us up for a number of evenings
but I appreciate that.
-: Good. -: Thought I'd like
to hear from-- Oh, excuse me, Barry.
I stepped-- -: And I was just gonna say,
there were several changes that in our comments
you did adopt and in preparing
this next round of the guidance
and we appreciate you taking up those.
So, you know, one thing that you mentioned
about best practices is something
that we want to engage or we will be engaging
with all of our members in identifying
what those best practices are and sharing
-: In the association. -: Of those next part
of what we do.
Yeah as an association. -: Okay.
-: So we will be doing that.
And even things like the templates that you talked about.
That are in the guidance,
we wanna continue to work with the board
and staff on developing the right kind of templates
that make your review easier for the next round.
-: Easier and more meaningful.
This is a very unusual board.
You don't see a group of industry experts assembled.
We are not regulators.
There are people on this board who have a depth of field
in their area that I can't even touch.
And so I think it's very important
to be able to solicit their feedback.
The vice chair has a quick question for you, Barry.
Vice Chair Fellman.
-: Yes.
Thanks Barry for and everyone for your cooperation.
And I just wanted to tee off the last remarks
and actually where you started,
which is we see this as the opening of the dialogue.
So I guess maybe it's going to end up
being more of a statement than a question,
but and I particularly appreciate you acknowledging here
you know, the efforts we went to in revising the draft
based on the joint association comments.
We do see this as an iterative process.
And just in general, I wanted to note that,
you know, our first meeting was in January of 2020
and we had to go through,
I mean, I think I bring this up every time,
but we went through the IOUs 2020 WPS
then we did the IOU 2021 WMP guidelines.
And now we're looking at the POUs and the cooperatives.
And I think it's just exciting to me in some ways,
because we're in a co-creation process.
A collaborative process here.
So, and just keeping in mind when you,
when any of you make recommendations
about where we go next,
we're reading it based on our expertise
as Marcie just said, it's an our chair, excuse me.
Chair Edwards just said it was an amazing board.
And I've learned so much from my colleagues
but also we're reading it from the perspective
of someone who's picking up the document and looking at it.
And so there's some things that will be across the board
for all of the utilities,
but some things we felt would just make the material
that was already there more digestible
and with respect to things that might,
that we want to address
it doesn't mean we want a solution for it.
It may be something that you say,
"Hey we are looking at this,
"we've looked at this and we don't have an answer,
"or it's not relevant."
We just wanna make sure that all the boxes
are checked based on the statutory requirement.
So Thank you.
-: Thank you, vice chair.
Board member Porter.
-: Yeah, again,
I do wanna make sure that,
you know, that we Thank you for your participation.
This has been collaborative
and we want it to continue to be collaborative.
You know, we saw that,
we believe the platform was under utilized and information.
We truly do understand that each POU is unique
and it would have been egregious of us
not to ask for more information
to really give us context to the challenges.
Even addressing best practices.
We understand that not putting,
not, you know, creating concrete,
our intention isn't to create concrete best practices
cause they might not be able to be carried out
by certain unique and particular appeal use
but where there are commonalities across the board
and they are deliverable that's something
we would like to identify.
And more information is something
that will allow us to do that.
And again, I'm gonna reiterate,
it is amazing the seven particular expertise on this board,
you know, we're gonna need each POU to pull back the husk
so that we can activate those expertise.
Or for the betterment.
And again, we do enjoy the fact
that you are open to the collaborative process.
So Chair Edwards.
-: Thank you, Sir.
All right.
If there are no other inquiries from the board at this time.
I'd like to move to NCPA Scott Tomashefsky.
-: Thank you, Chair Edwards.
And good afternoon, everyone.
I think the point in terms of iteration
is really important here.
We all have the same mission here.
This is all about reducing risk of catastrophic wildfire.
And so the idea of sharing best practices
and having a process that allows us to continue to revisit
what we do is really important.
And so the recommendations are not a reflection
that things are wrong.
Recommendations are reflection of things
that we should give consideration to.
And so the subtle changes that you've made in the document
that address flexibility,
the use of the term as appropriate,
the movement towards guidance and guidelines
and how the templates are used.
I mean, we look at the template
as the POU review template that we started with
to help a lot of our member utilities
develop their first document.
And as they go to the second one they'll enhance that.
There'll be improvements each time.
We only get better in this.
And as we have these conversations
we will all collectively get smarter
in terms of the things that we do.
So that's really important in all of this.
And even when we talk about the funding,
the funding issue,
the whole notion of the approval process,
I think that's an improvement
in terms of what was being asked originally.
It's really, how do we deal with the approval process,
recognizing that when we authorize something
we're gonna do with respect to wildfire mitigation,
we're going to fund it.
That's just sort of the nature of what we do
when we deal with budget accounting.
It's very different than IOU accounting,
and for a lot of good reasons,
there's city considerations and district considerations
that's involved in that.
So that's important to incorporate.
The other thing that becomes really important
with these types of documents
is the the context around what's there.
I think we start to understand the things that are important
to us collectively,
but then there's occasionally that a policy maker,
industry expert or someone that picks the document up
and really has no context for what's happened before.
So when we talk about discussing the role
of the independent evaluator,
how that fits into the equation,
and what were the statutory requirements
or what we're trying to do,
it's helpful to have that in the document.
So someone can actually get a full scope
and realize that we're all still
trying to move forward productively,
even though there might be different models
that are in this entire equation
that might treat it differently.
So Barry made a couple of the points
that we've talked about in terms
of addressing specific changes.
But I do think that this document goes a long way
towards moving a collaboration and on this.
And so I would think that from an NCPA perspective,
we're certainly committed to sharing best practices,
hearing best practices,
considering recommendations that you have,
with the understanding that there are instances
where it may just not apply.
But that's not a suggestion -: Sure.
-: That we don't think it's important.
It just wouldn't be applicable
for that particular utility or district.
And so I think, you know,
as we move forward with this,
I know we look forward to continuing this conversation
and we love to talk about the good things we do
and we love to learn about the good things
that others are doing.
So really appreciate the opportunity
to be part of this again.
And I'll turn it back to your Chair Edwards.
-: Thank you, Scott.
One of the things I would ask is,
when things are found to be not applicable
having an understanding as to why would be very beneficial
for this board.
Because they just,
they're not as familiar with the structure
and with some of the challenges faced.
And so knowing the why,
in particular imagine if we find the same,
well, here's why and yet the problem potentially
could be solved on aggregate.
I worry about the resources.
You know, trying to get people with the right skillsets
in the right places, doing the right thing.
That's a challenge for IOUs and and co-ops alike.
So any more information we get as to the whys
is always very helpful.
Any, okay.
At this point, I'd like to move to Mr. DeBernado.
I've lost my list of names.
So I hope I didn't slaughter yours.
And you're with -: No.
-: The Southern California Public Power Authority.
-: Yes, you got it perfect so.
Yes, Mario DeBernardo with SCAPPA.
Good afternoon, Ms. Chair and board members.
So I wanna align ourselves with the comments
made by Barry with CMUA and Scott with NCPA.
Wanna Thank the board members for dedicating your time
and expertise for the benefit of the State of California.
We recognize that wildfire mitigation planning
is crucial for the public health,
safety and welfare of California.
And so we take compliance with AB 1054 very seriously.
The thing I just, I wanna emphasize is that,
well clearly the wildfire issue is not going away.
And so we're going to have a long-term working relationship
with the board.
And so we look forward to continuing
our working relationship with the board
and working collaboratively,
including discussions with the board
and the of board staff in the next few months
as we work together on issues
like those discussing recommendations four
of the guidance advisory opinion,
where the document itself is is suggesting
that we all work cooperatively with each other
collaborate on the groupings and template issue.
I think it would be beneficial to all of us
and to the public power community especially.
In those discussions we got a better understanding
of the context of some of the things
you guys are looking for, some of the background.
Some of the things that are happening right now,
this meeting where, you know,
clarification on things like the best practices,
(indistinct)
tabulations, concrete practices,
but be able to find commonalities and identify those.
So those types of things will be helpful for us to know
as we work with you and collaborate.
And I think we could really be a resource
to provide ideas and how to make these plans
structured in a way where you're getting the information,
where streamlining your review process
like in the structure and also making it efficient
and effective for a publicly owned utility
to complete and share the information
with both board and the public.
So I want to Thank you for the opportunity
to participate in this.
Thank you for in the revised version of the document.
The items that you had changed
in light of the comments we had submitted.
So really, again,
just wanna emphasize that we recognize
this is a long-term relationship
and we look forward to working with all you on it.
-: I certainly appreciate that.
What a lot of people forget
is that the stance of publicly owned utilities
is from a customer oriented motive
it is not for our profit motive.
There are no stockholders,
there's no dividend maintained.
And so they act as a very effective bellwether
and their adult supervision is typically
within half a mile of the utility.
It's not remote oversight by any way, shape or form
and I personally can testify to that.
Ms. Nelson, my apologies for leaving you till the end.
I just wanted to kinda group the publics.
Could we hear from you please?
-: Yeah, absolutely.
Can you hear me okay?
-: Ma'am.
-: Thank you, Chair Edward.
You know, I just really wanna emphasize,
how, you know, we as the joint association
have been working together.
We provided comments to you
and we really appreciate all the thoughtful,
you know, time and input you have put
into these recommendations.
We want to use all the expertise that we can.
And so we know the board has a lot to offer us
and you have quite a few recommendations
that we can all incorporate and evaluate
if they're applicable,
and go forward with continually
improving our wildfire mitigation plan.
Like you said, Chair Edwards,
you know, we're doing this for our communities.
We want to prevent wildfires in any way possible.
And so, you know, we will take any advice.
And in fact, the joint associations have been talking
about ways that we can convene some best practices
so that internally we can share
as much information as possible.
I think your last meeting was very helpful.
So we could kinda kick that off
and see how different utilities are doing things
and highlight some of those best practices.
But I think the joint utilities
are also going to take that upon ourselves as well,
and really try to share information as much as possible
and work together to implement as much as we can.
I do wanna come back to the point though
that this is an iterative process
and a lot of these utilities that the co-ops
that I work with are very small.
-: Yeah.
-: So to completely revise their wildfire mitigation plans
by July will be quite an undertaking
more short on time already.
And so we, you know,
want to work with you to try to make sure that,
you know, we will absolutely do comprehensive updates
within three years.
And in the interim we hope to make meaningful improvements
as we go.
And, you know, board member Porter mentioned,
you know, it would be really useful to provide some context.
And we understand that as well.
And so there could be some improvements in the interim
before we get to a comprehensive overhaul
of our plans that we can provide more context
and we can really maximize the accessibility of information
so that you don't have to waste your time
trying to find to make sure
that we are meeting all the requirements.
And so we really, you know,
we appreciate that you have already put a lot of time
into this and we don't wanna waste your time
to have you flipping around
trying to find all the information.
So we wanna work with you on that.
Absolutely.
And just, you know, continually get better at this process.
And this is just the first year.
And so we're really looking forward to each year
improving upon our plans incrementally.
So Thank you very much.
-: I appreciate that.
It is true.
Benefit of the group cause I always offer explanations.
I'm gonna step out for a moment,
my husband's been hospitalized
and they're delivering him by ambulance.
And of course the entire neighborhood
is turning out to watch this event.
So I'm gonna step out for a moment.
Diane if you would consider
some potential language changes on,
as example, the July 21st date.
Maybe it's iteration.
Maybe it's just answers some of the significant questions
without the municipals
having to go through a massive approval process,
which may not really prove beneficial
and maybe a real time expender for them.
The other one, if you would take a look to see
if the utilization of the word funding
and underscore our interests.
That with funding we're interested in knowing
did the work get done.
And thirdly, as I mentioned I'd like to avoid
the Long-term Employment Act to the IEs
and maybe there is a trigger language
that we can use that says any significant
or comprehensive change.
If the board could adjust those,
if you are in agreement we can direct staff
to just adjust the language,
and it should not preclude us from voting on it today
with an understanding that staff could in fact make
some of those adjustments and they're wheeling him in.
If you will all excuse me for just a moment.
My apologies.
-: Thank you, Chair Edwards.
And I'm prepared to take over.
So we can discuss if the chair does not return
prior to our board discussion,
if our advisors have taken note of those three items
we can take it up at that time.
So Ms. Nelson, did you have anything else
that you wanted to add?
-: No, Thank you very much.
-: All right.
I think we have covered,
let me refer to our schedule here.
We have covered the comment and the filing
and I think we are now ready to go to the discussion
but first do any board members,
and if you could send them to me now your requests.
Do any board members have questions for the panelists?
Any of the panelists before we go into public discussion,
just raise your hand.
If you would like to ask a question
or make a statement.
Board member Mader.
-: Thank you, Co-chair Fellman.
You know, I am listening to the points made
by all of the associations here,
there was a lot of talk about best practices and,
you know, I'm very sensitive.
And I think the board is very sensitive
to the resources that are available and the need
for these wildfire mitigation plans
to be comprehensive but not excessive.
But there are things
that I think maybe made these points
that it would make it easier to review these plans.
If there were certain kinds of checklists
from like for instance,
a technical perspective on overhead
in the high fire threat district area.
You know, I'd like to,
you know, when I look at that as an engineer,
I'm looking for the did we think about eliminating
equipment that causes sparks in normal operation.
Like kinda using expulsion fuses,
using the right type of lightning arresters,
fault duties that are appropriate
for fault interrupting equipment.
And, you know, I'm sure,
you know, because of the professionalism
I saw in these plans that that was done.
But if we could just be mentioned
that each one of these was analyzed,
I'm not, you know, not necessarily like towing,
we want to tell the POU how to do it
but that they've mentioned like X, Y, and Z was analyzed.
That would be very helpful when we're discussing,
like when you were discussing amongst each other
the kind of things that should be included in these plans.
That would help us greatly.
-: Thank you.
Are there any other, yes.
Board member Block.
Block: Just to riff off of what the rest
of my fellow board members have said.
Understanding the uniqueness of the POUs and their contexts
will be helpful.
I'm making reference to recommendation number 11
on risk assessment,
sort of situational awareness and data sharing.
Coming from as an environmental scientist,
I think it's super helpful to have broad characterizations
of what kind of trees are in your service territory
and what kind of weather patterns
you tend to get seasonally.
And just having those broad contexts
will be really helpful for understanding,
like on a broader scale
when we evaluate these plans.
What the kind of risks are that you face
in your environmental context?
And knowing that there's already now a lot of data
and technology available publicly from the IOUs
you may or may not be partnering with them directly
but possible that you could be using their weather stations
or some of their weather forecasts
and think there are many ways to leverage all of that
available technology without having
to do much investment yourself.
I'm curious to know about those
and would love to have discussions about them.
If there are questions about it,
I'm really jazzed about that part of the plan.
So that's all I have to say.
Thanks.
-: And I will say now that we have heard,
are there any other board members
who would like to make a comment at this time?
So Thank you.
Now that the associations have heard from the board,
do any of the presenters want to make any closing remarks
before we end this part of our meeting
and move into the board discussion on the advisory opinion?
Seeing no responses,
Mr. Moline would you like to make a comment?
-: Sure.
Only that, were eager to work closely
with y'all to finalize the document
and incorporate these modifications,
and again, as everyone has said
we appreciate the opportunity to work closely with you.
-: Now in this time of COVID,
it's really nice to have community
of reviewers and associations,
and, you know, deliverers of services to come together
and work cooperatively.
I think we need bright spots wherever we can get them.
So Thank you for that.
And that leads us into my next comment
which is that I will ask our staff
and I will say I think I'll take the moment
to say that this is Ms. Ormond's last meeting with us.
She's going to go on
to another role at the Public Utilities Commission.
Yes, Katherine is very sad.
We are all very sad to lose her.
So Katherine will be your main contact going forward.
And I guess both of them are,
Jamie, you were going to be here
until the end of the year, is that correct?
But so you can contact both of them
but Katherine will be taking the lead for us.
And why don't we right after this meeting
and before we get swept away in the holiday madness
to schedule our next conversation
and set the agenda for that.
So I just wanna put that out as a to do item
for our advisors and ask the associations
to just think about,
I don't think we have to meet before the end of the year
but I would like to see us schedule our next meeting
in this time period.
All right.
So I don't know if we want to keep,
I guess we can have the panelists now,
the I don't wanna use the word downgrade
but put in the status, change status.
I guess they're going to go into the economy
part of the screen, Katherine?
-: Hi, so we are talking
about potentially making changes to the document.
Is that correct?
-: Yeah.
-: And if that's the case,
I would like a little bit more from Barry on exactly,
-: All right.
-: What he recommends being changed?
-: Chair Edwards laid out three different modifications
so that's a good suggestion.
Why don't we in real time take input from the associations
on what those changes would be,
and then as we can incorporate
those into the board discussion.
So-- -: Okay.
So Barry can remain on the line on the phone.
-: Yeah and I think everyone can.
Jessica and Mario and Scott still there.
So I think all four of you can stay on while we have,
and I'm going to turn it over to Katherine
to just go through what you would like,
Katherine what you heard and what,
how you would like to see the language evolve
for these changes.
Now and before we do that,
I wanna level set what we are trying to do here.
Again, we see this as our general.
I think we called,
in fact we called it that the general guidance,
the guidance advisory opinions
for all of the plans,
and so these would be changes in my view,
these would be changes that would reflect
the launch pad for the next discussion.
Rather than resolving certain issues right now.
And I think with that caveat
I think we can get there quite easily.
So I'll turn it over to Katherine now
to lead that conversation.
-: So, right.
So I think I understood the change about the funding
and that request was to just change
the word budget to funding in most places in that section.
But the other two-- <v ->We also have a...
I didn't say the words but,
cause I suggested that I just email too.
But we have a suggested sentence that that would help.
Or should I read that to you?
-: Sure.
So, and I'd like to have Jason,
Jason can you speak a little bit,
I'd like a little bit of direction from Jason about how to,
if we need to make the changes on the dais,
if we need to pull it up on the screen
or if we need to,
you know, if there's changes that can be made later
if we kind of have a general agreement
or do you think it needs to be quite
as detailed as line item edits?
Jason: Hi, this is Jason Reiger.
I'm happy to help out.
First.
Can you guys hear me?
-: Yeah.
Jason, please introduce yourself
because not everyone may know who you are.
-: Yes, this is Jason Reiger,
I'm an attorney
with the California Public utilities Commission.
And my role here today is to help be a legal liaison
to the board for matters of process like this.
And it is completely within the board's discretion
to make changes from the dais.
That is perfectly fine.
If the board wants to,
they have a couple options let me say.
You can make changes from the dais.
Staff can incorporate those changes.
We can come back next time
and vote on it again to ratify those changes.
That is probably the simplest way
from a staffing and legal angle.
But if for time reasons you wanna vote on this today
and not have it ratified later,
we can wordsmith it from the dais,
which can be time consuming,
but it's very clear and very public
and everybody can see the changes being made
and everybody knows exactly what they're voting on.
There are also, you can vote the document out
with some pretty specific changes to be made by staff.
Sort of changing words budgets to funding
or if Barry could read the sentence out he has
so that there is a public record of that.
And everybody knows that sentence is the change
the board is adopting to what is currently on our agenda.
That would be great.
I will say, what you all want to avoid
is voting this document out with directions to staff
that are a little unclear so that staff
doesn't know what exactly how to capture your thoughts
and your votes in the proper final document.
So to the extent we can be as most specific as possible
that would be best.
Thank you.
-: So let me take the conversation in this direction.
First of all, we are an advisory board
making an advisory opinion.
So the document and we appreciate that you're taking,
you know, you're taking it as seriously as it deserves
to be taken.
And having said that,
as I mentioned just a few minutes ago,
this is going to be issued as the 2020 output,
you know, of the board for 2021 document.
We did put it out in draft and we had comments
we're looking at it now,
to not delay.
I mean, my preference would be to not delay voting
on this today so we could get into the work.
And I would say unless there is something
that is so egregious or would have,
you know, unintended adverse consequences
with the publicly owned utilities and cooperative
that we keep those any changes today
in this document to a minimum.
So let me just put that out there
and then ask for board comment, Mr. Mader.
You're on mute.
-: Is there a compelling reason
why we couldn't take the input
that was provided by speakers and have staff work
perhaps a new document for us to approve next time?
It does seem as a deliberative process
that I myself would prefer that unless
there is some compelling operational reason
like to progression of these WMTS that we couldn't do that.
-: Any other board comments?
I guess I'm suggesting in response to that,
my suggestion is that we again keep the changes
to a minimum.
And I understand that,
and I think the most important one
is the budget to funding one.
And that the others will be part
of the next wave of our discussions and process.
So that's where I am because I don't,
and Jason you can help me with this.
I mean, we would make changes
that those wouldn't necessarily go out to public comment
and then or I don't know exactly
when we're gonna meet next quarter.
So I would, my preference and recommendation to the board
would be that we try to wrangle this today.
Board member Porter,
do you have a statement you wanna make?
-: Yeah, I do, right.
I think that we should at least hear the three changes
and we can have that discussion,
even if we don't do anything today.
I don't believe that the suggestions,
while I was listening to Mr. Moline isn't substantial.
It's just a more, it's a better clarification
I assume for the members that he represents.
But it would be good for us as a board
a collective in this arena to hear the possible changes.
-: Are there any objections to going forward with that?
All right.
So Mr. Moline if you want to proceed.
-: Yes, Mr. Mader. (indistinct)
-: Suggested change, right?
-: Correct.
Correct.
These are going to be suggested changes
then we'll discuss whether or not we feel comfortable.
And Jason, I will turn to you
if whether we can feel comfortable
walking through the editing process in real time
either accepting or rejecting those.
And Mr. Moline I will then also repeat
that in offering these changes,
if they can be as surgical as POS,
and only those that are deemed absolutely necessary.
So we can put the dial on the table and have a discussion
about it as soon as you're done giving us any information.
-: Okay.
Well, the doing that in real time,
in looking at on page three,
recommendation number two.
And Scott Tomashefsky,
I want to make sure that you're also focused
on this particular one.
-: Excuse me, excuse me.
I think it would be helpful.
Is it possible to have one of our advisors share her screen
so we can see the language in front of us?
-: Yes, I'll do that right now.
-: Okay, sorry for interrupting, Mr. Moline.
-: All good.
Scott we had talked about deleting paragraph three,
I believe, right?
I mean, I'm sorry, I'm just saying this to cue Scott,
and but there is language in paragraph three
that does talk about validating
the plan versus actual that I'm not sure
that the board wants to lose.
Scott: Yeah, just adding to that,
really the notion that we're trying to incorporate here
is that the approval process basically incorporates funding
that's needed to complete any work
that's included in a wildfire mitigation plan.
So it gets away from the question of how do we do this
as opposed to it's all part of our approval process.
And that becomes something that's a little bit easier
for us to describe, as opposed to saying,
how are you gonna fund this?
A funding mechanism is a subset
of city or district budgeting.
And so that becomes first and foremost.
And when we deal with the activities that are authorized
to be done in a community,
they have to be funded.
It's not as if we,
you know, we can create some additional funds
that actually make that happen.
And so it's intended to sort of thread this needle
in terms of the budgeting element is really tied
to how we fund certain activities
which is part of a broader discussion
that we have within the community budgeting process
that we we undertake this part is.
-: So Scott that sentence that we're suggesting,
the approval process incorporates funding,
which I'll read entirely,
where should we suggest that that sentence be added?
Scott: It would really be part of that first paragraph
with the approval process.
-: That that would be at the end of the first paragraph?
Scott: Yeah, but you'd have to drop
only a small paragraph as proposed to here
and move that to the end
of the paragraph. -: Okay, so.
Scott: Well, that would be the best way to do it.
If it required a little bit of additional wordsmithing
to that paragraph, that's fine.
But it brings the focus on the fact
that the community budgeting is going to fund this project.
If it's actually authorized as something the city would do.
-: So the sentence that we have is the,
which we're just debating where to put it,
but, you know, we'll at least say the sentence.
The approval process incorporates funding
that is needed to complete any work
that is included in any WMP.
And I'll repeat that.
The approval process incorporates funding
that is needed to complete any work
that is included in any WMP.
And we see putting that in the first paragraph
probably the second to the last sentence
before only a small paragraph is required here.
Or requested here.
Scott: And you needed to complete The thought
from a board perspective,
you could put a couple of words
in front of that approval process sentence
and basically says the board recognizes
that the approval process incorporates funding
that's needed to do this.
Cause in some respect,
this is sort of a guidance and directives
for us to consider.
And this is more of a statement of what we actually do.
So I think it's important to recognize that.
That nuance.
-: So Scott are you saying the approval process
should incorporate funding
or does incorporate funding that is needed?
-: Just incorporates funding.
The approval process incorporates funding
that is needed. -: All right.
So I think we're good with that.
I mean, I'm not speaking for the whole board.
I mean, I'm just good with how, Scott: Sure.
-: You've characterized it and given us that language.
I don't think we,
we try not to add a lot of explanation.
So this seems clear to me.
So if the associations are satisfied
we can move to the next topic.
Scott: Appreciate that.
-: Well, the next one we and Jessica,
I and Mario, I asked you to put your antenna up on this one,
this is regarding,
we were thinking about this being in the introduction
on page II.
And but we recognize that it could be in the introduction,
or it could be on the subsequent page, III.
near the bottom of that.
And that is we were asking for clarification
and I think this is what Chair Edwards was talking about
or she reiterated.
Clarification that the comprehensive
wildfire management plan updates
be prepared at least every three years.
That was one element.
And then the second element
that the independent evaluation be required
in instances where there's a comprehensive change
to the wildfire management plan.
-: And you feel that's appropriate under the statute.
-: Yes.
Yeah. I have this--
Mario: The statute is silent on.
I just wanted to say that statute is silent
on when the independent evaluator do the work.
So.
-: That's true.
Mario: And I think the way that,
well I think the (indistinct)
based on what we say on the comments
is that independent evaluator would be doing the work
that would be appropriate
for forming the comprehensive review.
By looking at industries (indistinct)
and comparing with that doing that sort of (indistinct).
-: So yeah, the independent evaluation
or evaluator language doesn't say when it,
you know, I think is Chair Edwards,
you know, I mentioned before,
you know, when there's a minor change
or a modest change, it's not the intent to,
I forget exactly what she said,
but you know the full employment
for Independent Evaluators Act.
And I'm sorry, I don't mean that to sarcastically,
but we do want to seek the independent evaluation
when there is a substantial change.
And clearly that would be every three years
if there is a substantial change before then,
then that might be appropriate as well.
But nevertheless, we're looking for guidance
on when the independent evaluation would be done
and that is when there's a substantial change.
So that's what we would like to see in language.
And I know for staff's perspective
we're not being perfect in our edits here
but that's the spirit of what we're talking about.
-: Got it.
Do you have any suggested language?
Let's do this--
Jessica: The (indistinct) Katherine
Go ahead Jessica.
Jessica: I can take a shot at it if that's helpful.
We could put there,
or wherever you find is the right spot for this.
That the board recognizes that the guidance,
the board recognizes that comprehensive
wildfire mitigation plans update
are to be prepared at least every three years.
I'll pause there.
Correspondingly we ask
or correspondingly independent evaluations
would be required in instances
where there are comprehensive changes.
-: I don't think it's a comprehensive update.
I think it's every three years there has to be,
is it called a comprehensive update?
Or is it called the of wildfire mitigation plan?
And then in the interim years
like year one and two, there's an update.
-: It calls it a comprehensive revision of the plan.
-: Every three years.
Okay, comprehensively.
The revision is different than an update
because I think you also have the ability to file.
My recollection is to file those updates
every year if you want.
-: Right. Jessica: Absolutely.
-: And my understanding of new document
that we presented for today
is that we've also kind of we've threaded that needle
between updates and comprehensive revision.
So in the rest of the document
so this would be the only place
we would put that intent in the document.
Is that correct?
Jessica, if you wanna answer.
Jessica Nelson if you wanna answer that.
Jessica: Yeah. I think, you know,
I feel we want to address your concerns
and make the information accessible.
And so I think there are ways for us
to provide a cover sheet or,
you know, continue to talk about how we can provide
an update to you to help you navigate the information
and to provide you some updates in the interim.
And so this would cover kind of our concerns
about our ability to implement
and make all of these changes in the next couple of months,
though all of the comprehensive changes
would be something that we would implement
over the course of the next couple of years.
-: Understood.
Board member Armstrong, do you have a question?
Armstrong: Yes.
So just trying to understand this a little bit.
I know this is basically
the advisory opinion that we're gonna vote on today,
is this kinda premature to,
you know, this specifically this language right now,
in this particular document that can't be addressed
in a future document.
I mean, I think there's some time to think
about some of these,
a legal review just to make sure we're not missing
something might be in order.
I mean I just really--
-: Well, let's do this.
I think we, let's do this.
Do you have a specific question?
What I would propose we do now is that we appreciate,
express our appreciation to the associations
for giving us their feedback
and that we dismissed them
and then move to a board discussion
about what we want to do
with the language that's been proposed.
So Mr. Porter, did you have a statement
you wanted to make before we did that?
Or can you wait-- -: No, no, no.
Actually that leads to what it was
that I really wanted to say it.
This is again what I said earlier,
it'd be good for us to see this
and then have that discussion.
Not again adopting the language
but definitely moving to the next segment
of our meeting and actually having that discussion.
Do we add it now? -: Yeah.
-: Do we not add it?
Who has reservations?
I do.
I actually have one now,
since I've seen the language.
And it's just a question that isn't going to be,
well I don't believe it is.
Going to be answered today.
So yeah let's move on to the next segment.
Thank you. -: Great.
All right.
So Thank you to the associations.
Mr. Moline.
-: And I do think that language captures
what we've been talking about
and we definitely appreciate the working nature of this.
Sorry to have took so much time,
but we appreciate the collaboration.
-: Thank you.
As do we.
All right.
So you can continue to watch the meeting
but now we're gonna close off the association discussion
and move to a board discussion on the advisory opinion.
-: Hi Diane.
-: So.
So if you could put-- Yes, Katherine.
Would you like me to continue to share the screen
or stop you? -: No could you,
I was just gonna ask you to stop sharing please.
-: Okay.
-: So before we move to the particulars
of whether we should include the language today or not
because I think that goes to the vote.
I just going to see if any of the board members
and I don't think Chair Edwards has return.
Oh I see her square there.
But Chair Edwards have you returned.
No.
So I'll continue.
Let's structure our discussion like this.
I'd like to take opening comments
from any of the board members,
and then have a discussion among the board members
about the document.
And finally we can get to whether or not
we're prepared to if we wanna accept that language,
all of the language part of the language.
And even before that,
whether we want to look at it today.
So why don't we first see if there's any opening statements
board member Porter, I'm gonna start with you.
-: Yeah.
I'd like to say that this guidance document.
At least I am.
Very proud of it.
Again, it wasn't a document created or devised
to be something of a criticism but definitely a critique
of what we need moving forward
and how we will be able
to express our expertise individually
in examining future WMP from the POUs and the cooperatives.
We're looking for more information,
more context, more how, what, when and why from them.
And we want them to give it to us
in a fashion that it's collaborative
and it's advantageous so that we can get to the work
that we're all here for which is reducing the risk
of municipality utilities being a source of ignition
or even dealing with black swan event.
So again, very proud of this examining,
many of my fellow board members
have put things in there that I probably never
would have considered.
Very comprehensive.
Back to you, a vice chair.
-: Thank you.
And I wanna take this moment to acknowledge
that board member Porter was part
of the publicly owned utility and cooperative,
Bagley-Keene Group.
And as was Chair Edwards and myself
were also in that Bagley-Keene Group,
and I can attest that if it wasn't obvious
from our workshops that board member Porter
read every single one of these WMPS,
and thoroughly thought through what the process
would be like.
And I wanna acknowledge his contribution
to great contribution,
to shaping the process not just the document
that the process that we have today.
So Thank you, board member Porter.
Board member Armstrong.
-: Yeah, Thanks Vice Chair Fellman.
I also want to echo what board member Porter said,
that we're kinda proud of this document.
It's a lot of work went into it.
And again, we're just working as a group like this,
individuals that come from different backgrounds.
You know, I did learn a lot as well.
You know, I personally, the recommendations
where I spent a good portion of my time
were into grid design and system hardening,
vegetation management and inspection.
And, you know, as I read through
or read through all 50 of those wildfire mitigation plans,
you know, one of the things that is very helpful
and would be very helpful in the future is,
you know, just like any risk assessment,
you know, you got identified the risks.
So when we started looking at high fire threat districts,
you know, with the POUs and even the IOUs,
but, you know, just identifying if you have those areas
in your service area
what assets you have in those areas,
you know, just identify those risks.
Once you identify the risks
then you can narrow your focus on,
you know, mitigating those particular risks.
So, you know, I do appreciate all the work that went in
on of the POUs from my fellow board members.
And again, just Thanks for letting me
be part of this process.
-: Thank you.
Board member Syphard.
-: Hi.
Yeah, my comments are really similar
to what everybody else has said and that,
you know, the spirit has really been one of collaboration
and a lot of my input had to do with requests
for additional detail and more information.
And the idea is not to create more work
or to try to pull out any kind of confidential information,
it's really to just make the review process
more efficient and effective.
And so it's meant to be able to elicit
that kind of information that describes the risk
so that when the plans are evaluated and reviewed
it is easier to be able to understand the plans relative
to the risk in that particular POUs.
Because of course everyone is different.
And something I really liked that a lot of the POUs
did was provide maps and those maps are a nonverbal way
to very effectively convey the risk of a certain POU.
It allows us to see,
especially if there's air photos
or satellite imagery as a background
to look at the vegetation condition
look at the relative amount,
look at it in proximity to the infrastructure
or the assets at risk.
And this speaks to something that I contributed a lot to
which was the vegetation management part.
And so I was interested in knowing more information
about why certain areas were designated
in different areas of the high fire threat zones
and why those different areas were put into those classes
and then how the treatments were designed
relative to those classes.
In addition to what is done with vegetation
that is not in any high fire threats district.
And again, this just allows us to make a better assessment
of the actions that are being done
and proposed in the wild term mitigation plan.
And the other is the recommendation
to better understand the qualifications of the staff
who are designing the vegetation management plans
or practices and who are out there doing it.
And, you know, I understand that it's not possible
to add people to the staff,
but perhaps there's a way that in the future,
we could develop collaborative opportunities
or have workshops or other kinds
of educational opportunities
that can help to bring ecological knowledge
and scientific and botany expertise
into the vegetation management planning process.
And so in the spirit of collaboration,
and this is an iterative process,
this is, you know, where my comments were coming from.
-: Thank you.
-: Board member Block, do you have any opening comments
on this discussion topic?
Block: Not many.
Just to say that even though there were very many of them,
I really enjoyed seeing different POUs
perspectives on the plans.
And as I mentioned earlier,
also building on what Alex just said
it's helpful to get these environmental context
show where the risks are and where the assets are
and this extra information will be super helpful
in the future.
And look forward to, you know,
I'm also really proud of this document
and really Thankful to our staff,
Katherine, Jamie for getting all our thoughts together
into a coherent document.
And I'm really looking forward to seeing
how this is going to evolve as an iterative process
and really grateful for the representatives
today who could be with us and collaborate with us on it.
So I'm looking forward to the future too.
Thank you.
-: Thank you.
And rounding of the comments, board member Mader.
-: Well, first I want to say how much I appreciate
the effort that went into both the guidance document
and to the wildfire mitigation plan that we reviewed.
It was a comfort to have my colleagues
and their expertise be able to look into areas
that I'm not an expert, but I know that they are,
but I can apply that work needed to be done.
And it was great to be able to confident
that, you know, my colleagues would be able
to look into those areas
and provide their expertise and advice.
Also, I wanted to acknowledge the efforts
of the POU engineers and others
that put these plans together.
I know, you know, when we reviewed a large POU like SMUD,
I expected those resources to provide an excellent plan
and I wasn't disappointed,
but I was also really impressed by the efforts
of the smaller POUs in the engineering department
and the efforts that they put together.
The professionalism was astonishing.
And I really do appreciate that.
When I looked at the entire effort,
I couldn't help but notice that there are many of the POUs,
and that risk profiles are not high.
That I would like to see us look at in the grouping area
about different types of reporting levels
because really what we're looking at for is,
you know, assets that are in the high
fire threat risk areas.
When I was looking at these plans
and as noticed by others, you know, I, you know,
looked immediately to and I read the comments
in the workshop from the presenters
from the IOUs, I mean POUs,
reflected that the priorities and risks reduction,
vegetation inspections, maintenance,
and just asset evaluation.
Those are the big buckets that we need to look at.
And I caught some really excellent work on,
and I mentioned this earlier
in trying to reduce the risk profile
by looking at the type of assets that they're replacing,
the expulsion fuses with non expulsion fuses,
work like that, low-hanging fruit,
I saw that as done time after time.
I would like to see us come up
with these templates and checklists
where the POUs can attest quickly
that they did that analysis.
You know, sometimes the analysis was shown in
it was very professional,
but I was looking for, was it done?
Were these things considered?
And I'd like to see that in a very quick and efficient way
to be able to attest to that.
And then on the operating practices,
I saw diversity of approach.
You know, it's going to the comments,
the public comments that we heard today.
You know, it's our focus on making sure
that water pumps that city services,
that sewer pumps all were taken we're in power,
or sometimes that the recognition that the risk was so high
that the PSPS would have to be used.
I saw a diversity,
and I just like to see
a forum where these type of practices
could be shared with each other.
So we could see them proliferate
through all of these plans.
And then lastly, you know,
when I started seeing that when I was looking
at these plans from a technical perspective,
I focused on overhead in a high fire freight district area
because that's where the obvious risk is.
But I think that we also need to continue
to encourage a questioning nature,
a challenging nature,
upon our assumptions about where the risk is and to see,
I'd like to incorporated
into these wildfire mitigation plans,
a questioning section.
We have a recommendation on that.
So my overall impression was I was very pleased
with the professionals and thoroughness of the plan.
And I think that there is a lot that we can learn
both from the individual plans
and from the POUs from each other.
Thank you.
-: Thank you.
And I have nothing to add to my colleagues' statements.
I feel that they covered all the bases.
And again, Thank you to everyone,
the board and to the municipal associations.
But and I just wanna remind everyone
that we are not a paid board.
We're not a permanent board
that everyone has other things that they do
and the enthusiasm and dedication that all of you
as individuals to this is really astounding thing.
And I mean, it's not only can't quite say,
it's a joy to do this work
but it's certainly a pleasure to get into it.
And I've learned so much from everyone.
So Thank you very much
for putting it together this document.
And what I'd like to do now is open discussion
on the document.
Let's put aside the changes.
And first I'd like to solicit if there's anyone,
it seems that we've gone over this today.
We've discussed with the associations,
what we were doing,
now is our turn to discuss among ourselves
because of our Bagley-Keene limitations.
We, our requirements we do this in public
to see if any of you have comments on the document itself,
because we have our recommendations
and the purpose of today's meeting is to,
we don't adopt the document necessarily,
but to vote on it and issue it as a public statement
of our position.
And so is there anyone who wants to make either comments
in support of a document and what we've done?
I think most of you have done that already.
So maybe I should see if there's anyone
who has any exceptions
that they wanted take where they do not agree
with the document and perhaps would write a concurrence
or that would have a different point of view
than we have already included in the document.
So I'll just open that up to the board.
Is there any basic,
that was a very long way of saying,
I've heard that everyone supports the document based
on their individual reviews.
Is there anyone who has any exceptions or differences
that they want to put out to the full board now
for either writing a concurrence
or potentially changing the document?
And I'm just looking for a show of hands
if anyone has anything to say on that topic.
Seeing none, we'll now turn to the changes.
In the chat, what I've done on the side is asked Katherine
to prepare a document with just the changes
and then Jason to tell us what our options are
and then we can discuss what we wanna do about those.
So, Katherine, could you please share your screen?
And then could you walk us through both changes?
-: So the change here,
the request from the POUs association
was to the sentence here.
This is on page III.
"The board recognizes that comprehensive revisions
"of the plan are to be prepared at least every three years.
"Correspondingly, independent evaluations
"are required in instances
"where there are comprehensive changes."
Those two sentences inserted at the end
of the introductory section.
The only other changes were in this section two.
And...
When did it go away?
They wanted to recommend in that changing budget to funding.
In several instances,
when I heard that recommendation
this is how I incorporated that.
So there is budget is in one place
but it was just in this first sentence.
Municipalities have year-round budgets
but in all other instances, I changed it,
and then funding from changing,
and here where it said so this sentence is additionally,
"WSAB is interested in understanding
"the context regarding how utilities are
"then validating their plan."
And before it said budget,
but said, I put funding allowances
and reporting that to the board to the...
"Reporting to the board that the funding was used
"the way it was planned."
So that was me with the word funding.
And then the other change is that to add the sentence,
"The approval process incorporates funding
"that is needed to complete any work
"that is included in any WMP."
-: Thank you.
And now I'll call upon Jason Reiger
to tell us what our options are
with respect to this language.
Jason: Yes, good afternoon.
I believe the board has a couple options before it.
It could vote out this document
without any of the edits suggested.
It could vote out the document with the edits
that are up here on screen and the public has seen.
It could also continue to make more edits
if it so chose right here right now
on the public facing screen.
It could also give staff some direction to edit the document
and then come back at the next meeting and vote it out
with version 2.0 or whatever we want to call it.
Lastly, you could vote it out today
pursuant to those options I just gave you.
And if you chose,
you could bring it back at a few future dates
and agenda size it properly,
and make additional edits or revisions then.
That may not be your first choice given the time
and perhaps confusion of the stakeholders
as to if they're not tracking
that it was subsequently revised.
But it is an option available to you.
Thank you.
-: Thank you, Jason.
So we've had, so Katherine,
I think you could take your screen down now.
-: Will do.
-: And then we have had a couple opinions.
So now that we've heard from our legal counsel
and seeing the changes,
I'm going to first call upon board member Porter
just to see what your view is on this language
and whether we can adopt it.
You have any changes that you would like to see
and adopt today or you still feel we need more time
to look at it?
Or what option would you feel comfortable with today?
-: So I was tracking with Jason
and to let you know the the first change
concerning funding,
there is absolutely no substantial change
to what we meant there.
It gives us a little bit more clarification
and if it makes the POUs more comfortable,
I'm good with adding that change.
The problem I do have is with the IE being employed under,
I think it wasn't substantial, comprehensive changes.
I don't wanna obligate them even though I don't think
they anticipated this or anticipate us
ever interpreting it this way
but eliminating the access to an independent evaluator.
And also, how are we going to define what comprehensive is?
Ultimately, we're looking at a comprehensive
happening every three years.
Would that be instituting a whole replacement program
as a part of the hardening protocols?
Is that substantial enough
or comprehensive enough to employ
or elicit a independent evaluator?
Would we even interpret that?
That I'm a little weary about that.
However, the funding,
if we could split the baby in half today,
I could see adding the language for funding
or removing budget and adding funding.
There is no substantial or contextual change there.
-: Thank you.
And I'm right with you.
I'll just put that out for the board.
I concur exactly with that view and it's not,
and I'll use the vice-chair prerogative.
It's not that I necessarily disagree
with the language on the IE.
It's just to me, it's a substantive statement
and deserves more thought and conversation.
And then there's a whole idea of the document
and we talk about that later in the document
and it's recommendations
and we wanna look at the role of the IE.
Okay so is there anyone who has a different point of view
than board member Porter put out
about perhaps splitting this today?
Mr. Armstrong.
-: So, yes.
I agree a hundred percent with the changing.
I mean to me changing the language from a budget to funding
is not an issue at all with just one change to that.
And I think it was brought up in the conversation
but making the change to the beginning of that,
just basically that the board recognizes
in front of that sentence.
-: Katherine, did you note that?
Does anyone have an objection to that change?
-: Can I see it?
-: And while she's pulling that up,
is there anyone else who,
so what's on the table we'll take a motion to this effect.
But what's on the table is adopting this change
on the part two on the budget to funding shift
and then tabling not making the change
and tabling the discussion on the every three years
comprehensive plan/IE role.
So does anyone have a different point of view?
All right.
Hearing none let's look at the language.
Mader: I had my hand up. -: Mr. Mader.
I can't see you, unfortunately.
So if you want to raise your hand,
please put it in the chat
because I can only see a few people at a time.
And was that board member Mader?
Mader: Thank you.
I'm looking at the sentence,
"The approval process incorporates."
I also have no problem changing budgets to funding.
That's not a problem.
But the approval process incorporates,
approval process incorporates funding that is needed
to complete any work that is included in any WMP.
Is that statement actually accurate?
I mean, isn't there other a way that you can get
funding for projects that might be in a WMP?
I don't know.
I just wonder if that statement is accurate.
-: So that's the statement that was given to us
by the joint associations.
And I think the implication
was that they wanted to have us acknowledge
that whatever work was laid out in the WMP would be funded.
So there may be other work that's not in the WMP,
but goes to wildfire.
I don't know.
But this is how they characterize it.
Mader: Well, but the approval process referenced
in the sentence above references
public utilities code section so forth and so on.
And so is that second sentence consistent
with public utilities code section 83,87,
cause it seems like that additional sentence
is referring to the approval process
which we have linked to the public utilities code.
-: Vice chair this is board member Porter.
Reading this it's with the addition
of board member Armstrong the board recognizes the...
We're saying we recognize the process
that any protocols or programs that are to be done
in the plan have an approval process.
And then what we're really asking for
is additional context, right?
So, which is the next sentence to that.
Those in conjunction give the right contextual meaning part.
At least I believe so.
Unless I'm wrong.
Board member Mader, do you see it differently?
Mader: I may be nitpicking too much, board member Porter.
(Porter laughs)
-: So as the lawyer of our group not legal counsel
but I am a lawyer.
That section and we quoted it specifically
because there was some question
about how to describe the approval process
and the governing boards.
Just requires a governing board to approve the WMP.
So we're not what this added sentence
is it defines what should be included in that process.
And I think if I may observe
what this attempts to do is say,
"Hey if you're bringing a governing board
"or director of my agency or whatever public process I have
"at the end of it I wanna make sure I have money,
"as well as a plan.
"I have money to implement the plan."
So that's how I see it, board member Mader.
Mader: Thank you, Vice chair Fellman.
And I don't really have a significant objection to this.
-: All right.
Is there any other, Thank you.
Is there any other discussion?
So I will now entertain the first.
We're gonna have two votes and legal counsel Reiger
has informed us that we have to do roll call votes
for virtual meetings per the Governor's guidance.
So we will do that.
May I have a motion with respect
to this additional language proposal?
And I'll look to board member Porter,
since he came up with the idea.
(Porter laughs)
-: I'd like to put forth a motion
to adopt new language in section two,
with plan structure added,
changing the word budget to funding and adding the sentence,
"The board recognizes their approval process
"incorporates funding that is needed to complete any work
"that is included in any WMP."
-: Is there a second?
Armstrong: I'll second that.
-: Board member Armstrong.
We'll go to discussion.
Board member Porter may I make a friendly amendment
based on our legal counsel's input and just add at the end
as shown public, during our public meeting today.
So we can indicate that this was something
that was discussed publicly.
-: Yes.
I'm in favor.
-: Okay.
Any other discussion on this motion?
I'm gonna ask Jamie, if you can go off mute to,
in one of your last official acts
to call the roll for our vote.
-: Sure.
So we will start with Vice Chair Fellman.
-: Aye.
-: Board member Porter.
-: Aye.
-: Board member Armstrong.
Armstrong: Aye.
-: Board member Block.
Block: Aye.
-: Board member Mader.
Mader: Aye.
-: Board member Syphard.
-: Aye.
-: And Chair Edwards is unavailable.
So with the motion passes.
Thank you.
-: And so the next task we have is the forest
is moving adoption.
The guidance, I'm gonna read the title.
"Guidance advisory opinion
"for the 2021 wildfire mitigation plans
"of electric publicly owned utilities and cooperatives.
"as amended by the last vote as revised by the last vote."
Is there someone who would like to move that for adoption?
Board member Porter.
(Porter laughs) (Fellman laughs)
-: I like to make a motion to adopt the amending--
-: We call this a volunteer, right?
(Porter laughs)
-: The advisory guidance document as amended.
-: And I'll second that. -: Sure.
Thank you.
Any discussion?
All right.
Ms. Orman, will you please call the board for a vote.
-: Absolutely.
On the topic of the guidance advisory opinion
with the amended language in section two,
Vice Chair Fellman.
-: Aye.
-: Board member Porter.
-: Aye.
-: Board member Armstrong.
-: Aye.
-: Board member Block.
Block: Aye.
-: Board member Mader.
-: Aye.
Board member Syphard.
-: Aye.
-: And Chair Edwards are your back?
Chair Edwards is unavailable.
The motion passes.
Thank you very much.
What a way to end the year,
a lot of hard work by everyone on this and everything else.
And under very challenging circumstances
who knew we, you know,
when we saw each other in March
that this is right where we'd be meeting
for all these times.
So Thank you all.
Thank you to the publicly owned utilities
and electric cooperative again for bringing this forward
and working with us.
And we look forward to the continuing collaboration
in the new year.
Are there any...
Before we have...
Actually let's have our public comment next.
So as we end, today's meeting with a final round
of public comment, we'd like,
I did the Thank yous already.
If you'd like to participate in this final round
of public comment,
the phone number is +1 800-857-1917.
And the passcode is 1767567.
And press *1 to get in the queue.
So let's check now
with the Wildfire Safety Advisory Board email box.
Katherine Stockton, do we have any emails?
Katherine, you're on mute.
-: Thank you.
We have a few public comments in the email.
Briangavin@130, Dear sir or Madam,
my name is Brian Gavin,
and I have lived in home service
by Southern California Edison most of my life.
We all we always had Santa Ana winds events before.
I don't remember a year when we didn't have them.
I don't remember these power outages.
So what has changed.
Now South Cal Edison is a private company.
They don't care about customers.
They care about the bottom line
and making as much money for their shareholders as possible.
Shutting off the power is more dangerous.
During the cold night, the other nights,
my only option for warmth was lighting the burners
on my stove.
I have several has health conditions
I'm currently dealing with.
I was forced to prep myself for a procedure,
I couldn't reschedule by candlelight and without water.
My home is serviced by a well,
if I don't have electricity
I'm without lights, heat, and water.
My solution to this problem
would be to take the power companies over again.
Infrastructure should not be a get rich quick game
as it is now.
Clearly your regulations have failed us as a society.
My question to you is how do you plan on fixing this mess
because we cannot continue living in the dark ages.
Very disappointed, Brian Gavin.
The next.
There was a note from the Acton Town Council,
Jacqueline Heir.
She said that she was on the phone
and she'd like to make a public comment.
So we'll be diving into that soon,
dial *1 to get in the queue with the operator.
Then we have one question from Daniel Zargosa
from Grid Subject Matter Experts,
but it was a question
about the independent evaluator change.
And he said, "What is the definition
"of a comprehensive or substantial update of the WMP?
"It should be clear when when a IE is required
"other than every three years."
And then finally one from Bill Slocum.
"Dear all please see the attached email from McKell Genoche.
"from Kagel Canyon regarding PSPS shutdown."
So the email from McKell reads,
"With the COVID crisis a lot of people work from home
"and kids are homeschooled.
"With these nonstop power outages
"we lose money and our kids miss a lot of important classes.
"I understand that it is for our safety
"and to prevent wildfires,
"but cutting off the power on any windy day
"is just avoiding solving the problem
"and making a real investment.
"In Europe they buried their power lines decades ago,
"and I don't know if it's the right solution
"but at least they did something concrete
"so they don't shut down the power
"every time it's a little windy.
"In Edison developing a real investment to plan
"to effectively solve problem
"or is there only answered to cut the power with every storm
"and put many families in difficulty.
"Spectrum also cut internet.
"So even though we have a generator
"we still don't have the possibility to work.
"Thank you, McKell Genoche.
And that is the end of the public comment that we received.
Share the email inbox.
-: Thank you.
Operator are there any public commenters on the phone?
Operator: We do have a couple of comments on the phone.
First one comes from Jacqueline Heir.
Your line is open.
Jacqueline: Hello? Yes.
Can you hear me?
-: Yes.
Jacqueline: Thank you.
On behalf of the Acton Town Council
I want to express appreciation for the comments
from this board regarding your sensitivity
towards the adverse impacts PSPS events
on rural communities.
At this point, no real evidence has come to light
showing that any of Edison's PSPS events
have actually prevented any wildfires.
However, we note that at least three wildfires
were ignited in 2019 as a result of Edison's PSPS events.
We also know that at least at Acton,
Edison has routinely initiated PSPS events
in areas where local wind speeds do not exceed
their PSPS threshold
and where their fire potential indexes values
are not extreme.
In other words, Edison's PSPS events
are often completely unwarranted and unreasonable
if they are initiated anyway,
despite the clear and present danger
that these PSPS events pose.
The Acton Town Council has moved per party status
and the PSPS has rulemaking proceeding before the PUC.
We are an all volunteer organization
with no budget and limited resources.
So while we will do our best
there is great uncertainty regarding the extent
to which we can meaningfully participate
in that broad and robust proceeding.
Because of that rural communities
throughout California are looking to decision makers
like the Commission and advisory boards like yours
to advocate on our behalf in a matter
that at least leveled the playing field in the PSPS arena
which has to date been dominated by utility interests.
Utilities like Edison seem to have unlimited resources
and they have actively used these resources
to blunt and dilute our concerns when we bring them
to the Commission.
For example, two weeks ago,
Edison's attorneys recommended that the Commission
disregard active's concerns is unfounded.
Even though they were carefully documented
and supported by evidence.
In other words the PSPS deck is stacked
heavily against rural communities
and we are powerless to do anything about it,
no pun intended.
So we rely on you and on the Commission
and on other advisory boards and decision makers
to ensure that PSP is implemented properly
and used only sparingly as a last resort.
Thank you very much.
-: Thank you.
And we appreciated your public comment on our draft.
Jacqueline: Thank you.
-: Operator, is there another speaker?
Operator: Yes.
Next we have Tara Georgenes.
Your line is open.
Tara: Yeah.
Thank you.
I've been a resident of the Kagel Canyon
and I am also an educator in LA County
teaching public school online.
I also have children who are going to school online
and I want to kinda put a human voice, I guess,
to what happens when you turn off the power
here in Kagel Canyon.
You are pretty much, when you turn off the power
and then we don't have internet anymore
that is like turning a knife (chuckles)
because we need to go to school, right?
And we also mentally just need that connection.
So to be kinda feeling like we're living
in the dark ages out here it's it's compounded,
you know, with no power.
So not only are we, you know,
we're all trying to be good staying at home,
but to have no power it's making it very mentally difficult.
And also like, I'm sure that people have said before me,
"Students are losing access to education."
Thank you.
-: Thank you.
Operator the next speaker if there is one.
Operator: I'm showing no further comments at this time.
-: All right.
Thank you very much, operator.
Thank you everyone for public comments,
we are a public entity
and we do appreciate all of the input
cause it helps us understand the full scope of our work
and the ramifications of our recommendations.
So that closes public comment.
I will now ask the board before we adjourn
if anyone has some final thoughts they want to share today.
I can see you all so if you just wanna raise your hand,
that's fine.
(Porter laughs)
All right.
I think I can say on behalf of the board
to our able and noble advisors,
Jamie and Katherine, Thank you again,
for everything that you've done to bring us to this point.
It's hard to believe that your engagement in the board
just started in March.
So it wasn't even a full year
that we've produced three major documents
and conducted many,
we had several workshops and many meetings
and even came up with a new risk standards,
sponsored by board member Mader.
So Thank you for that.
And I wish everyone this particularly challenging time
when we can see the end of the tunnel
with the COVID vaccine,
but where we're having record number of infections
that everyone and including some of our board family,
that everyone stays safe and healthy
and have a happy holiday.
So with that, I will take a motion to adjourn the meeting.
-: I like to make
a motion to adjourn. -: Board member Porter.
I assume.
Is there a second?
Nobody wants to second.
-: I was on mute.
I second.
-: Okay, great.
And then I think I'll just refer everyone to Ms. Ormond's
calendar invite for our next session.
So Thank you very much.
And Mr. Reiger Thank you very much for stepping up
during this sort of new dimension to our board meetings
but I think it ended very efficiently and effectively.
So with that, we can end the meeting.