Latest news with #HouseBill3666
Yahoo
31-03-2025
- Business
- Yahoo
PacifiCorp involved in bills in Oregon, western states, limiting utility wildfire liability, damages
PacifiCorp has been involved with bills across western states in recent years that woud offer some protection against lawsuits for powerline-ignited wildfires if companies get mitigation plans approved by the state. (Photo by Robert Zullo/States Newsroom) The Oregon Legislature is expected to advance two bills this week that could provide electric utilities with a financial safety net and some level of protection from bankruptcy-inducing lawsuits if their equipment starts a catastrophic fire. The bills bear striking resemblance to others being considered and passed by legislators in three other states, as well as controversial laws passed in Utah in 2020. PacifiCorp, owner of Pacific Power in Oregon, contributed to all of the bills and the Utah law. Each of those bills confers upon utilities some version of state-sanctioned approval for 'acting reasonably' to prevent wildfires, if they get wildfire mitigation plans approved annually or every few years by the state. Cooperative and private investor-owned utilities such as PacifiCorp say they need this to ensure that they are making smart investments in wildfire prevention and grid reliability, and to ensure they don't go bankrupt. That's the argument being used by Oregon's bill sponsors, too. But trial lawyers across the West, who represent victims of utility-caused wildfires, say the bills are meant to shift the costs of utility-caused wildfire damages from companies to customers. Oregon's House Bill 3666 would grant utilities a state 'wildfire safety certificate' for having annual wildfire mitigation plans approved by the Oregon Public Utility Commission, while House Bill 3917 would set up a catastrophic wildfire fund that utilities pay into. Victims of utility-caused fires could collect from the fund 80% of 'allowable damages,' as long as they agree not to sue the utility that caused the fire. The utilities would be allowed to raise customer rates to pay for the fund. Reps. Pam Marsh, D-Ashland and Kevin Mannix, R-Salem, are sponsoring both bills, which could be voted out of the House Judiciary Committee as early as Tuesday. Marsh contends Oregon's bills do not in any way infringe on wildfire victims' ability to sue utilities for maximum damages for causing wildfires. She said in an email that legislative attorneys assured her House Bill 3666, offering utilities state certificates for having approved wildfire plans, would not provide immunity or limit liability to utilities. Trial lawyers do not agree. 'This sort of regulatory compliance defense is a standard thing that corporations across the country are always asking for. This is what they would love,' said Daniel Hinkle, a lawyer and senior state affairs counsel for the American Association for Justice. 'They would love to check a box and get it rubber-stamped by an agency without opposing counsel, without anybody there to sort of push back on it, and then be able to use that prior certification as a complete, total defense against any claims for accountability later on.' The Washington, D.C.-based association made up of trial lawyers has been tracking bills across the country that were introduced this year to limit utility-caused wildfire liabilities, including in Oregon. 'The overall goal, as I see it across a lot of these bills, is to shift the cost of this (utility-caused wildfires) onto ratepayers,' Hinkle said. Insurers, as well as timber, farm and ranchland owners have come out against the bills in Idaho and Wyoming and expressed concerns about Oregon's bills. Kenton Brine, president of the NW Insurance Council, said in an email Oregon's bills would likely impact policy holders and insurance companies. The group has not taken a formal stance on them yet. 'The impact for property owners of bills that limit or grant immunity from liability is significant,' he said in an email. He said he shares concerns with the trial lawyers over Oregon's approach, and that legislation as proposed is 'likely to impose a new burden of proof on a property owner seeking recovery after a utility-ignited wildfire.' In Oregon, PacifiCorp lobbyist Annette Price and lawyer Jennifer Hudson participated in Marsh's work group on the bills, along with representatives of Oregon's cooperative and public utilities and lobbyists for the two other electricity monopolies operating in the state, Portland General Electric and Idaho Power. Combined, the three monopoly utilities control 75% of Oregon's electricity market. Omar Granados, a PacifiCorp spokesperson, said in an email that the company's work on bills such as Marsh's are business as usual. 'Consistent with our long-standing practice to provide information to lawmakers who are considering energy policy legislation that could impact the utility and our customers, we provide comments, answer questions and participate on a number of proposed energy policy bills in the states we serve, which include Oregon, Washington, Utah, Idaho and Wyoming,' he wrote. Marsh has said in public hearings that she started working on House Bill 3666 and House Bill 3917 after hearing from constituents about lackluster wildfire prevention work being done by Pacific Power, her area's monopoly utility, and to ensure utilities operating in the state don't go bankrupt. She said House Bill 3666 'will hold utilities to a high standard of performance through implementation of a safety certification.' Marsh said House Bill 3917, establishing the catastrophic wildfire fund, is needed so wildfire victims have options. 'Without the fund, individuals have these paths: 1) Those with insurance can use their coverage. 2) Those without insurance will, most likely, struggle to cover basic needs with savings, government assistance, or friends and family. 3) All affected individuals can choose to take the utility to court,' she wrote in an email. About 2,300 homes burned up in her southern Oregon district during the 2020 Labor Day Fires. Because no cause of the fires in that area were identified, her constituents weren't able to collect any damages from an at-fault party and those without insurance have been left with nothing. She added that she sees the bill as a starting point. 'If people agree that a fund of some kind could be useful, we will need to discuss questions around structure and operations, including coverage, administration, the mix of fund contributions, and so forth.' Cody Berne, a governor at large for the Oregon Trial Lawyers Association and an attorney at Portland-based law firm Stoll Berne, said Oregon's catastrophic wildfire fund as proposed would likely encourage low-income fire survivors and those without insurance to forgo collecting maximum damages in a lawsuit against a utility in a powerline-ignited fire and instead settle for less from the fund — a fund seeded with victims' own money, collected through rate increases by utilities. 'This bill would charge customers to create a fund and also make them pay the next time Berkshire Hathaway burns down an Oregon town,' Berne said. Berne is representing survivors of the historic 2020 Labor Day fires that killed 11 and destroyed more than 4,000 homes. Some of those fires were found to have been started by PacifiCorp equipment. PacifiCorp is owned by the multinational conglomerate Berkshire Hathaway. A jury in 2023 found the company guilty for negligence and recklessness. A recent report from the Oregon Department of Forestry concluded that PacifiCorp did not start fires it was previously found to have started in the Santiam Canyon, refuting statements from first responders from the U.S. Forest Service and trial testimony. PacifiCorp executives estimate the 2020 Labor Day Fires and 2022 wildfires caused by the company's equipment in Oregon cost them nearly $2.7 billion. Berkshire Hathaway estimates it could face up to $8 billion in claims related to lawsuits over California and Oregon wildfires since 2020. That's a bit more than half of Berkshire's 2024 revenue — a record $14.5 billion. 'Most people — including fire victims — have to live with the justice system as it is. But when the justice system holds billionaires and their trillion-dollar corporations accountable, they think they can change the rules,' Berne said. PacifiCorp had its first success in contributing to legislation that limited its liability and the damages wildfire victims can collect in a powerline-ignited fire in 2020. PacifiCorp lobbyists provided comments and answered questions for lawmakers working on Utah's House Bill 66, according to spokesperson Granados. Granados did not answer questions about whether the lobbyists or company lawyers participated in bill workgroups or helped with the bills in the drafting stage. 'This was an effort by a broad coalition,' he said. The Utah law offers electric utilities statutory protection from negligence charges in powerline-ignited wildfires if the utilities have an approved wildfire mitigation plan. It also limits damages that survivors of wildfire can collect in suits against utilities as the lesser of either the cost to rebuild, or the difference of the fair market value of the home before the fire and the fair market value of the property after the fire. That means if it costs $300,000 to rebuild a burned home, but the fair market value of the home before the fire was $100,000 and the fair market value of the scorched property after the fire is $20,000 a victim only gets to claim $80,000 in damages. In the years since Utah's law passed, PacifiCorp attempted to pass liability limits via states' utility commissions. In Idaho in 2024 the company asked the state's commission to include language that would have made its electric utility Rocky Mountain Power liable only for 'actual economic damages' in a powerline-ignited fire, excluding noneconomic, punitive and incidental damages. It made nearly identical requests to commissions in Washington, Oregon, California and Wyoming, according to reporting from Boise State Public Radio. Idaho's commission declined to approve the changes, so the company went to the Idaho Legislature. Other state legislatures followed. Oregon's bills share similarities to that original 2020 Utah law. House Bill 3197, establishing a catastrophic wildfire fund, also limits recoverable damages from the fund to the lesser of either the cost of repairs or the difference in the fair market value of the property immediately before and immediately after a catastrophic wildfire. 'The goal has been in a lot of these bills to restrict the recovery to the loss of fair market value, which is always going to be less than the cost of repair,' said Geoffrey Louden, a lawyer with the American Association for Justice. All of the bills requiring approval or certification for wildfire mitigation plans that PacifiCorp has weighed in on in the West include language that describe the utilities as having acted 'reasonably' and 'prudently' to prevent fire in securing state approval. Trial lawyers take the greatest issue with those words, as they are often used to establish a statutory presumption that an entity has not acted in a negligent, grossly negligent or reckless manner in cases of civil wrongdoing. Hinkle, of the American Association for Justice, said getting laws passed with language like this is 'standard corporate behavior 101.' Marsh recently amended House Bill 3666 to remove language that previously said a wildfire safety certificate from the state 'establishes that an applicant is acting reasonably with regard to wildfire safety practices,' to instead say a certificate indicates the utility was 'consistent with the commission's wildfire safety standards,' and cut off a provision making the certificate valid for 12 months. She said she worked with trial lawyers on the amendment. But Berne of the Oregon Trial Lawyers Association and large landowners say this is not enough. 'If the goal is safety, this bill won't accomplish it,' Berne said in an email. 'It recycles fire safety rules that are already in place. There are no resources to investigate and make sure that investor-owned power companies are following the rules. The bill just gives the appearance of safety.' Betsy Earls, a lobbyist for timber giant Weyerhaeuser, said issuing safety certifications to the utilities could have unintended consequences for companies like Weyerhaeuser even with Marsh's amendment. 'It will amount to perhaps a thumb on the scale when juries are deciding and people are thinking about what's being introduced and proven in court,' she told lawmakers at a March 18 public hearing for House Bill 3666. The company's 1.5 million acres in Oregon are prohibitively expensive to insure, she said, and though it deals every year with all kinds of fires and losses, sometimes the fires are caused by utility equipment, and the only recompense the company has for its losses is to sue the utility. 'We have no other way to recoup losses that are due to others' negligence unless we go to court,' Earls said. In 2019, California passed laws creating a wildfire safety certification program for utilities as well as a catastrophic wildfire fund. But the policies in California are far different than those being proposed in Oregon and other states in the West, according to Berne of the Oregon Trial Lawyers Association. Wildfire safety certificates in California cannot by law be used to limit utilities' liability in lawsuits because monopoly utilities in California are considered 'strictly liable' for any fires they start. Having an approved plan and certificate from the California Public Utility Commission means the utility is allowed to raise rates to pay for wildfire prevention work and to participate in California's catastrophic wildfire fund. The fund is available for qualifying utilities to recoup costs after they've paid fire victims damages. The fund does not send money directly to victims, who are never forced to give up their lawsuits, and who face no artificial caps on what they can collect in damages from utilities. PacifiCorp did not contribute to California's legislation, according to Omar Granados, a company spokesperson. SUBSCRIBE: GET THE MORNING HEADLINES DELIVERED TO YOUR INBOX
Yahoo
19-03-2025
- Politics
- Yahoo
Bill that could have offered utilities protection from fire lawsuits gets fix
Oregon is one of several western states where lawmakers are considering bills that could protect utilties from some financial liabilities if their equipment starts a fire. (Photo by Robert Zullo/States Newsroom) Oregon lawmakers on Tuesday tweaked a bill intended to increase fire mitigation to ensure it does not also offer utilities immunity from liability in lawsuits for wildfires ignited by power lines. The change to a single sentence in House Bill 3666 comes as a relief to some critics, who feared that giving utilities wildfire safety certificates that establish they've 'acted reasonably' by state standards would in effect offer them absolute immunity from liability in lawsuits if their equipment causes a wildfire. Others, including the Oregon Trial Lawyers Association and a representative from the timber industry are still concerned that courts could place weight on certificates when deciding liability and that it does little to give the Public Utility Commission the power it needs to enforce wildfire prevention standards and audit utilities' work. Rep. Pam Marsh, D-Ashland, and the bill's author introduced the amendment Tuesday in the House Committee on Judiciary. It changes a single sentence in the original version. The bill previously stated that a wildfire safety certificate was good for 12 months from the date of issuance by the commission, and that it 'establishes that an applicant is acting reasonably with regard to wildfire safety practices and materially consistent with the applicant's wildfire protection plan or wildfire mitigation plan.' Lawyers feared this would allow utilities to argue they had 'acted reasonably' even if they were responsible for starting catastrophic fires like those in 2020 that killed 11 people and destroyed 4,000 homes. In 2023, a Multnomah County jury found PacificCorp, owner of Pacific Power, guilty of being reckless and negligent in a class action lawsuit over the 2020 Labor Day fires and awarded plaintiffs hundreds of millions of dollars. To date, according to the company's website, it's agreed or been ordered to pay more than $1 billion to residents and companies affected by the fires. The amendment clarifies that a certificate merely establishes that an applicant implemented wildfire policies and practices 'consistent with the commission's wildfire safety standards on the date the certification is issued.' Marsh told lawmakers at the public hearing for the bill that it was not her or her collaborators' intention to provide immunity for utilities in the event their equipment starts a fire, and that legislative attorneys had assured her it would not be used as such. 'Nonetheless, we know that not all attorneys who have reviewed the bill agree with that interpretation, and we really want this work to move forward without dispute,' she said. If passed, House Bill 3666 would direct the Oregon Public Utility Commission to establish minimum wildfire prevention standards for electric utilities in exchange for an annual certificate. Marsh said the bill's goal is to set a high standard for utilities for wildfire mitigation work and keep communities safe. Keith Brooks, general manager of Douglas Electric Cooperative, said he needs such standards to ensure he makes the right investments in wildfire mitigation Otherwise, Brooks said rates will continue to rise. Without state standards, 'electric cooperatives can never do enough mitigation work,' he said. 'Without some sort of certification process, I'm telling you as a utility manager, that will drive prices so high that people will not be able to afford to live in the communities that we're all trying to protect,' Brooks said. 'That's not wildfire prevention, that's economic displacement.' Representatives for Portland General Electric and the Oregon Rural Electric Cooperative Association also testified in support of the bill and the amendment. Sam Drevo, a survivor of the 2020 Labor Day fires in the Santiam Canyon, said the amendment was a big improvement on the original bill, which he saw as giving PacifiCorp protection despite having caused the largest, most expensive fires in state history. But, he said, the bill and Oregon lawmakers should focus on giving the Public Utility Commission the regulatory teeth and resources it needs to hold utilities accountable for preventing wildfires. He said the commission has little to show for itself in that regard. 'I've had to wonder why there's no official investigation from the state of Oregon, why there's no report from the state of Oregon on what happened,' he told lawmakers. 'We're entering the fifth year since the (2020 Labor Day) fires, and there's still no report.' The Oregon Trial Lawyers Association is also concerned about the commission's ability to enforce wildfire prevention regulations and audit utilities. They've testified as neutral on the bill with the amendment and are opposed to the bill without the amendment. 'If the goal is safety, this bill won't accomplish it,' Cody Berne, a governor at large for the Oregon Trial Lawyers Association and an attorney at Portland-based law firm Stoll Berne, told the Capital Chronicle. Berne is representing survivors of the 2020 Labor Day fires. 'It recycles fire safety rules that are already in place,' Berne said. 'There are no resources to investigate and make sure that investor-owned power companies are following the rules. The bill just gives the appearance of safety.' SUBSCRIBE: GET THE MORNING HEADLINES DELIVERED TO YOUR INBOX
Yahoo
27-02-2025
- Politics
- Yahoo
Bill on wildfire prevention work could give utilities immunity from lawsuits
Sam Drevo walks by the burned foundation of his mother's home in Gates following the 2020 Labor Day fires. (Photo courtesy of Tyler Westfall) A bill that would establish minimum wildfire prevention standards for electric utilities in exchange for an annual certificate from the Oregon Public Utility Commission would give them immunity from being held accountable in lawsuits, lawyers say. If passed, House Bill 3666 would give utilities a state-sanctioned defense against lawsuits when their equipment starts fires, leaving customers holding the bag for damages caused by multi-billion dollar companies that provide electricity to nearly 75% of Oregonians, lawyers and survivors warn. Rep. Pam Marsh, D-Ashland, filed the bill Tuesday to create standards for wildfire prevention work undertaken by utilities, she said. That would result in safer communities and help the utilities stay insured by avoiding costly lawsuits, she added. But critics of the bill, including members of the Oregon Trial Lawyers Association who participated in workgroup meetings on the bill convened by Marsh, said the bill would be used as a 'get-out-of-jail-free card' for the utilities. Each year, the large investor-owned electric utilities are required to submit wildfire prevention plans to the Oregon Public Utility Commission. Under House Bill 3666, the commission would review the plans and issue a 'wildfire safety certification' for 12 months if the plan meets new, state-established standards. 'A wildfire safety certification establishes that an applicant is acting reasonably with regard to wildfire safety practices and materially consistent with the applicant's wildfire protection plan or wildfire mitigation plan,' the bill states. The PUC would also be given the authority and resources to monitor that the utilities do the work promised in their wildfire prevention plans. But Cody Berne, a governor at large with the Oregon Trial Lawyers Association and an attorney at the Portland-based law firm Stoll Berne, which is representing survivors of the historic 2020 Labor Day fires, said utilities would use the certification to their advantage in court: They could argue they had 'acted reasonably' even if they were responsible for starting catastrophic fires like those in 2020 that killed 11 people and destroyed 4,000 homes. In 2023, a Multnomah County jury found PacificCorp guilty of being reckless and negligent in a class action lawsuit over the 2020 Labor Day fires and awarded plaintiffs hundreds of millions of dollars. To date, according to the company's website, it's agreed or been ordered to pay more than $1 billion to residents and companies affected by the fires. Berne said that the state should hold utilities accountable for their actions. 'The Legislature shouldn't give massive corporations a bailout over keeping communities safe,' Berne said. Berkshire Hathaway, PacificCorp's owner, recently reported year-over-year revenues up 71% from 2023 to a record $14.5 billion, and operating profits of $47 billion, up 27% from 2023. Representatives of the Trial Lawyers Association said they warned Marsh that the bill, which has not yet been assigned to a committee, would give utilities immunity from culpability in lawsuits. But she refuted that. 'We spent a lot of time talking about whether there should be additional legal protections associated with this, and we did not attach any of that,' Marsh told the Capital Chronicle. 'The bill does not have, you know, specific statements about what a safety certification implies, from a legal protection point of view; we didn't put those on.' Marsh is among the lawmakers that utilities have courted through donations. Since 2018, she's received $10,500 from Portland General Electric, about $1,500 a year. In its latest donation Jan. 8, PGE gave her $1,000. She's also received $5,500 from PacifiCorp since 2018, including $1,000 from the company in October 2024. She's received about the same amount — $5,500 — during the last seven years from Idaho Power, an investor-owned utility serving about 20,000 customers in eastern Oregon. State Rep. Jason Kropf, D-Bend, is co-sponsoring the bill, along with state Rep. Kevin Mannix, a Republican from Salem. In workgroup sessions, Oregon's big monopoly utilities — PacifiCorp's Pacific Power and Portland General Electric, or PGE – advocated for the wildfire safety regulations in the bill and certification from the Public Utility Commission. Kristen Sheeran, a lobbyist for PGE, said the bill doesn't give utilities 'absolute immunity' but she said the companies need to 'zero out the risk' to prevent insurance loss and skyrocketing premiums, which have tripled for the company in recent years, she said. 'What if the utility has done absolutely everything to reduce the risk of wildfire related to equipment, and then 100-mile an hour wind blows an ember from 5 miles away? Or a squirrel literally climbs into a transformer and creates a spark?' she said. PacifiCorp representatives were also in the workgroup. A company spokesperson, Simon Gutierrez, did not address questions of whether the bill could be used by the company to shield itself from wildfire liability. In an email he said the bill is 'a meaningful and holistic solution to address the foundational issues posed by wildfire risk, seeking to strike a balance between accountability and criticality.' Ted Case, executive director of the Oregon Rural Electric Cooperative Association, which represents 18 electric cooperatives in the state, also participated in the workgroup. He said the group supports the legislation. And Bob Jenks, director of the consumer watchdog Citizens' Utility Board, who attended meetings as well, said the board hasn't endorsed or opposed the bill while waiting for a review from the board's lawyer. But he said having enforceable wildfire prevention standards could be helpful. 'Right now utilities submit wildfire mitigation plans, right? Those plans are accepted, and that's the end of it,' he said. 'What I pushed for is: there needs to be an auditing function for the commission to go and check to see if they're doing those plans,' Jenks said. California's wildfire safety certificate program served as a precedent for House Bill 3666, Marsh said. But California laws on wildfire liability are far more robust than those in Oregon. In California, big electric utilities are, by law, 'strictly liable' for any damages caused by their activity or equipment, regardless of fault or foreseeability. Because the private investor-owned utilities in California, as in Oregon, are considered state-sanctioned monopolies, California law dictates they be held accountable under the same damages laws applicable to state agencies or individuals. California also has a multi-billion fund to pay wildfire survivors, and utilities are required to pay into it. Oregon has no such fund to aid victims in the aftermath of a utility-caused wildfire. Sam Drevo, a survivor of the 2020 Labor Day fires in the Santiam Canyon, is among those waiting for PacifiCorp to pay damages. Drevo said he was 'awestruck' that Oregon legislators would propose offering PacifiCorp any relief while he and many others are waiting for damages to be paid. He and hundreds of other survivors have been forced to each sue PacifiCorp, submit to psychological evaluations, handover medical and financial records and in trial, show that they were not negligent. Despite the jury verdict and settlements with hundreds of victims, PacifiCorp has never accepted its responsibility and the Oregon Public Utility Commission has never investigated, both sore points for survivors. 'Do you think the Legislature should be taking care of PacifiCorp while Oregonians who were burned up in 2020 and 2022 are still suffering, not able to rebuild and move on with their lives?' Drevo said. 'How it could even be brought to the Legislature in this moment is, to me, I mean — are they even representing Oregonians?' The lone bill in the current session to pressure PacifiCorp to resolve the pending lawsuits with Oregonians is House Bill 3161, proposed by Rep. Jamie Cate, would prevent utilities from raising rates while they are still facing years-long lawsuits over wildfire culpability and costs. The bill, in the the House Judiciary Committee, has bipartisan support but has yet to have a hearing. On House Bill 3666, Cate said she can see some rationale for limiting the liability of utility companies who do good work keeping communities safe, but called it 'a slap in the face to victims if a company like Pacific Power could qualify for that protection.' Cate said her bill has been sidelined by some supporters of Marsh's bill. 'I also think it's unfortunate that the push by proponents of absolving utilities from any liability has proven effective in killing a bill that could have helped hold Pacific Power accountable for their undeniable negligence. But doing so would have undermined the argument of why they need immunity from wrongdoing to begin with.' SUBSCRIBE: GET THE MORNING HEADLINES DELIVERED TO YOUR INBOX
