As PG&E implemented Public Safety Power Shutoffs across parts of the Bay Area last week, officials with the utility company left residents in the dark in more ways than one.
After a series of delays that left residents and city officials unsure of where, when or even if the power outages would take effect in the Tri-Valley, late on the night of Oct. 9, outages hit isolated areas in southern Pleasanton and western San Ramon that continued in places through Oct.11.
These outages were open-ended, with PG&E reportedly waiting out windy weather in Northern and Central California. San Ramon officials reported all power was restored within the city limits at approximately 6:30 p.m. on Oct. 10, while Pleasanton city officials reported the same on Oct. 11 at 9:50 a.m.
A lack of precise information stemming from PG&E officials combined with the company’s website being unavailable for multiple days left some city officials concerned at their own struggles to provide updates to their community.
“Here is the best update we can give at this point: We don’t know what is going to happen tonight. PG&E doesn’t know, we don’t know, nor does anyone in the East Bay,” San Ramon police Capt. Denton Carlson tweeted mere hours before the first outages. “What we do know is this, we understand your frustration, we feel it as well. When we know, you will know.”
Shutoffs in portions of the Tri-Valley were originally announced to begin taking effect around 1 p.m. Oct. 9, but PG&E then instituted a delay until 8 p.m. due to changing weather conditions. Shutoff times were again pushed to 10 p.m. and did not actually take effect until after 11 p.m.
Poking fun at the lack of up-to-date information coming from the utility company, the Pleasanton Police Department went viral for a social media post characterizing the situation. The post read, “PG&E says prepare for power shutdowns in select areas in California marked in red,” followed by a picture of the entire state covered in red marker.
The post was shared more than 45,000 times on Facebook and was featured in national publications such as the Washington Post and the Los Angeles Times.
According to PG&E, outages affected Pleasanton residents in isolated areas along Foothill and Pleasanton-Sunol roads south of Castlewood Drive starting around Oak Lane. Pleasanton was not affected as severely as other communities, with city officials estimating that only 39 homes lost power in its jurisdiction while about 345 service connections were affected in unincorporated Pleasanton in Castlewood and Kilkare Woods.
In San Ramon the western portions of the city were impacted, particularly along Crow Canyon Road west of Deerwood Road, including the San Ramon police headquarters, which operated on backup generators throughout the event.
San Ramon was briefly hit particularly hard by the outages, with more than 126,000 residents left without power for less than half an hour late on the evening of Oct. 9, according to San Ramon city officials.
Throughout the outages both the Pleasanton and San Ramon Valley school districts did not report any outages during school hours, and remained open as scheduled.
Amid fallout from PG&E’s handling of its Public Safety Power Shutoffs, the company’s president strongly defended their decision to implement the mass outages last week.
Meanwhile, California Public Utilities Commission President Marybel Batjer called PG&E’s management of the process “absolutely unacceptable,” later adding: “This cannot be the new normal. We can’t accept it as the new normal and we won’t.”
On Monday, Gov. Gavin Newsom called on the utility company to give credit or rebate those affected by the outages, saying, “This outage was the direct result of decades of PG&E prioritizing profit over public safety, mismanagement, inadequate investment in fire safety and fire prevention measures, and neglect of critical infrastructure.”
Also last week, a bankruptcy judge cleared the way for PG&E bondholders, wildfire victims to submit a rival restructuring plan for the company in the wake of its Chapter 11 filing.
Residents can recap the Weekly’s full coverage of PG&E’s Public Safety Power Shutoffs online at www.PleasantonWeekly.com.
Editor’s note: Information from Bay City News Service was used in this report.
