Sacramento CA: Previous Explosion-related Senator Hill Bills Signed Into Law

Governor Signs Six Bills by Senator Jerry Hill Stemming from the San Bruno Pipeline Explosion
In All, 13 Related Hill Bills on Safety, Ethics and Ratepayer Relief Have Been Signed into Law Since the Deadly 2010 Blast

SACRAMENTO – Six bills by Senator Jerry Hill that grew out of the fatal Pacific Gas & Electric Co. gas pipeline explosion in San Bruno were signed into law by the governor this week, bringing to 13 the number of blast-related safety, ethics and ratepayer relief measures the Peninsula Democrat has authored in the four years since the 2010 blast that killed eight people and destroyed 38 homes.

Additionally, Senator Hill has announced his intention to introduce legislation in December to require that the bulk of the penalty against PG&E for the San Bruno explosion—a sum now slated to go to the General Fund—go instead toward safety improvements, the creation of a pipeline safety trust to advocate for pipeline safety before the CPUC and federal government, and an independent monitor to track PG&E’s pipeline safety expenditures.

Below is a list of Hill’s other explosion-related bills signed since 2010:

2013

SB 291 – CPUC Electric Safety Enforcement (Chapter 601, Statutes of 2013)

Requires the California Public Utilities Commission to develop a safety enforcement program for gas and electric violations. Following National Transportation Safety Board and Independent Review Panel recommendations, the CPUC has allowed staff to cite utilities for gas safety violations, but the CPUC has not developed a program to improve safety using this increased staff authority. This bill also requires the CPUC to extend this staff authority to electric safety violations. Roughly 13 people a year are killed at high-voltage electric facilities, but before this year the CPUC had not opened enforcement actions against utilities for electrical violations of anything short of a massive wildfire.

2012

AB 578 – Federal NTSB Safety Recommendations on Gas Pipeline Safety (Chapter 462, Statutes of 2012)

Requires the California Public Utilities Commission to act on gas safety recommendations by the National Transportation Safety Board (NTSB). Before the San Bruno explosion in 2010, the NTSB had repeatedly recommended the installation of emergency shutoff valves, which might have shut off the gas to the fire in as few as five to 15 minutes instead of the 90 minutes it took PG&E to manually close the valves. Also, the autumn 2011 the explosion of a Cupertino condominium and a seven-hour fire in an intersection in Roseville were caused by a type of pipe that killed forty people in the 1990s and about which the NTSB had made recommendations that the CPUC never acted on.

AB 861 – Utility Incentive Compensation (Chapter 464, Statutes of 2012)

Requires the California Public Utilities Commission to determine the appropriate ratemaking treatment of bonus compensation for utility executives based on the utility’s stock price or financial performance. Utilities are not typical corporations. They cannot increase their profit by increasing market share or selling more product. They cannot raise their revenue as the total amount they are able to recover in rates is set by the CPUC. The only way a public utility can increase its profit is by cutting its operations and maintenance costs, as has been clearly demonstrated by PG&E in the years leading up to the San Bruno explosion.

AB 1456 – Gas Safety Performance (Chapter 469, Statutes of 2012)

Requires the California Public Utilities Commission to develop measures and standards for gas safety. The CPUC’s own Independent Review Panel criticized the CPUC for not monitoring and enforcing safety performance at PG&E prior to the San Bruno explosion. This bill would require the CPUC to determine what constitutes safe operation and give it the ability to assess penalties against utilities for poor performance.

2011

AB 50 – San Bruno Disaster Victim Tax Exemption (Chapter 18, Statues of 2011)

Exempts San Bruno disaster victims from paying state taxes on any financial compensation they received in the wake of the disaster.

AB 56 – Natural Gas Pipeline Safety Reform (Chapter 519, Statues of 2011)

Holds utilities and regulators more accountable for inspections and repairs to California’s aging pipeline infrastructure. Contains several reforms including:

Ø Requires natural gas corporations to develop and submit to the CPUC a plan for the comprehensive testing of the operator’s natural gas transmission system to ensure safety.

Ø Requires natural gas corporations to report annually to the CPUC on safety issues.

Ø Requires a gas corporation to demonstrate in its general rate case that the revenues requested will be sufficient to maintain safe and reliable service in a cost-effective manner.

Ø Prohibits a gas corporation from recovering any fine or penalty in rates.

Ø Requires natural gas corporations to meet annually with local fire departments to review emergency response plans.

Ø Requires the CPUC to require natural gas corporations to install automatic or remote-controlled shut off valves on natural gas pipelines in areas of high population density or which cross active seismic faults, if the valves are necessary to protect public safety.

Ø Requires the CPUC to establish “balancing accounts” to ensure that funds given to a gas corporation for safety projects are used properly.

2010

AB X6 11 – Tax Relief for City of San Bruno and Explosion Victims (Chapter 2, Statutes of 2010, 6th Extraordinary Session)

Provides tax relief to victims of San Bruno disaster. Allows homeowners who had qualified for a $7,000 state property tax exemption to still receive that write-off even if their home was destroyed as a result of the September 9, 2010, gas pipe explosion. Also provides assistance to the city of San Bruno, local schools and San Mateo County by requiring the state to backfill first-year local revenue losses resulting from downward reassessment of taxpayers affected by the disaster.

News Release - Office of State Senator Jerry Hill, D-San Mateo and Santa Clara Counties
Contact: Aurelio Rojas, 916-747-3199 cell; Leslie Guevarra, 415-298-3404 cell

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Robert Riechel

http://patch.com/users/robert-riechel

Photo Credit: San Bruno Patch Archives

Source Credit: State Senator Jerry Hill

Read more of my postings by going directly to:

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Learn all of the reasons to VOTE YES on Measure N by going to the following link

http://sanbruno.ca.gov/comdev_election.html