Power Restoration Continues In Santa Cruz Co.: PG&E, Officials

SANTA CRUZ COUNTY, CA — As of Friday morning, approximately 66 percent of customers who lost power during the PG&E shutdown are back online, according the county. After a PG&E Public Safety Power Shutoff began late Wednesday in Santa Cruz County, it was announced Thursday afternoon that a "partial all-clear" was given to the county, which means the utility is undergoing safety inspections, repairs and restoration efforts in many areas.

Click here and go to the Outage Map link for the latest in your neighborhood.

PG&E has established a second community resource in Felton, located at Felton Fire Protection District, 131 Kirby Street. It is a “Sprinter”-type van providing charging services for personal devices, including cell phones and medical equipment. Operational hours are from 8 a.m. to 6 p.m., according to county officials.

The Twin Lakes Church center at 2701 Cabrillo College Dr. in Aptos is remaining open from 8 a.m. to dusk during the outage. The center has restrooms, bottled water, electronic-device charging and air-conditioned seating for up to 100 people.

As of Thursday night, areas where all-clear has not yet been declared include portions of Butte, Plumas and Yuba counties as well as Kern County, where a third phase of PSPS was implemented late Thursday morning impacting approximately 4,000 customers. The weather conditions in Kern County are expected to continue into early Friday.

There is still no timeline on when full power restoration will happen. In some areas it could be days, according to the utility.

The Red Flag Warning for the Santa Cruz Mountains expired at noon on Thursday. The
East and North Bays had Red Flag Warnings in effect until 5 p.m. Thursday. Even as the warnings expired, the threat for fire danger remains high, according to the National Weather Service.

Nearly 800,000 PG&E customers in parts of 34 counties in Northern and Central California lost power during the shutoff that began early Wednesday morning as part of the utility company's efforts to prevent its equipment from sparking a wildfire during hot and windy weather.

Solar customers have been affected by the shutdown.

"When PG&E restores power, rooftop solar systems should re-engage automatically," PG&E officials said in a statement. "Solar systems cannot be powered off a generator as the two technologies do not work together. Customers who have a home battery system paired with their solar system may generally have up to two hours of backup power, depending on the size of
their battery."

PG&E officials said the company doesn't reimburse customers for losses during shutdown events "as power will be shut off for safety when gusty winds and dry conditions, combined with a heightened fire risk, threaten a portion of the electric system."

Despite the fact that reimbursement is unlikely, PG&E officials said customers can file claims that are reviewed on a case-by-case basis at any time at https://www.pge.com/en_US/residential/customer-service/help/claims/claims.page.

PUBLIC SAFETY REMINDER: Should traffic signals become non-operational, the California Vehicle Code requires motorists to treat those intersections as four-way stops. Please use caution, and watch for other motorists, cyclists, and pedestrians.

—Bay City News contributed to this report.