A group of protesters on Tuesday rallied outside a wildfire prevention conference in San Ramon where PG&E was the main sponsor.
The protesters are calling on the company to take accountability for the recent utility rate increases, matching Gov. Gavin Newsom's call for a federal probe into higher utility costs.
“PG&E is actually the reason why these fires have been occurring and they haven’t been held accountable,” said Nyah Tisdell of the Local Clean Energy Alliance.
Naiamah Williams also participated, saying she and her family lost power for three days last month along with about 42,000 other customers in East Oakland.
She said her grandparents had to leave the area because of the outage.
“We couldn’t eat warm food, we couldn’t charge our phones or laptops, the biggest issue at home from the power outage was my grandfather. We had to help him a lot and he couldn’t plug in his oxygen tanks,” said Williams.
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The protest also targeted the company’s rate hikes after the price of natural gas sent bills skyrocketing this winter.
In addition, PG&E is also asking the California Public Utility Commission to approve a rate increase of 16%, largely to pay for ongoing wildfires.
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The Utility Reform Network argues that if you total up all the proposed increases, it’s closer to 32%.
“There’s so many angles at which these wildfires and all of these things are really hitting communities hard, and rates are definitely a part of it,” said Tisdell. “People are struggling.”
In response to the protest, PG&E said in a statement that its 2022 wildfire mitigation plan outlines the actions it’s taking to provide safe and reliable energy.
The utility said it’s filing an updated plan later this month and said many of the steps it took have proven effective at preventing potential wildfires.
It added, “We are working hard every day to reduce wildfire risk, and we welcome feedback from our regulators, stakeholders, community leaders and customers because we know this makes us better and safer.”
For the protestors, it’s not enough until the power stays on, prices stop skyrocketing, and the wildfires stop.
