As Utility Wildfire Reform Talks Barrel On, Insurance Companies are Key Issue
Source: The Sacramento Bee |By Andrew Graham and Stephen Hobbs
Gov. Gavin Newsom’s last ditch effort to pressure legislators to change the way the state handles utility-caused wildfires involves an array of measures. But one issue in particular has become a flashpoint in the ongoing negotiations: Whether insurance companies should be able to recoup money from a utility company after a fire.
Newsom is not alone in his stance, including from people who are not traditionally aligned with utility companies. Mark Toney, executive director of The Utility Reform Network, an organization that works to protect ratepayers from increased electrical rates, backs the idea of eliminating the ability of insurance companies to recoup money. He sees it as a way to help sustain a state wildfire fund and prevent taxpayers from being asked to keep refilling it.
Source: Communications Daily | By Philip Athey
Ryan Johnston, a telecom regulatory attorney for TURN, said that beyond the Verizon/Frontier merger requirements, the condition could undermine California’s Lifeline program and possibly even its carrier of last resort (COLR) obligations and minimum service quality requirements for both phone and internet use. While the state would receive its $1.4 billion in deployment funding, “when you look across at something like the California Lifeline program, saving about 1.7 million people $20 a month for the next 14 years, that comes out to... almost $5 billion itself,” he said. “There is not an equal weight on both sides of the scale here.”
Consumer advocates in California are calling on state officials to fight a provision added to the BEAD program by the Trump administration that would require the state to stop enforcing its net neutrality law and consumer protections on BEAD subgrantees for 14 years.
Source: Consumers’ Checkbook | By Herb Weisbaum
Ryan Johnston, a lawyer with The Telecom Regulatory Reform Network (TURN), a consumer advocacy group in California, called the original rule “a really good transparency tool” that was working as intended. “It’s pretty straightforward. We all know how to read food product labels,” Johnston said.
The Federal Communications Commission (FCC), which has become far more business-friendly under the Trump administration, has ordered changes to its broadband label rule. The original rule, approved during the Biden administration, made it more difficult for companies to obscure the full prices of their services.
Source: Canary Media California Wire | By Jeff St. John
In addition, SB 905 would encourage utilities to measure how efficiently they’re using their existing grids — a precursor to setting up regulations that could steer them toward prioritizing lower-cost solutions over expensive grid upgrades. These aren’t the only affordability proposals on the table. The Utility Reform Network has a list of bills awaiting Newsom’s signature that offer even wonkier ways to ride herd on utility costs.
Democratic Gov. Gavin Newsom — who everyone knows is eyeing a run for the White House — has one last chance to show his true colors on energy and climate change. Rising electricity costs are a major issue in California, and Newsom must decide by the end of this month whether to sign a host of bills that could help cut utility rates while also advancing the state’s clean energy transition.
Source: Bakerfield.com | By John Cox
Executive Director Mark Toney of Oakland-based The Utility Reform Network said by email he was encouraged the CPUC’s new chairman, John Reynolds, is looking at potential improvements such as requiring utilities to include more information in their rate-case applications. “TURN is urging the commission to protect ratepayers and hold utilities accountable to spending within their budgets to provide safe, clean, affordable energy by requiring utilities to: Aspire to limit (general rate case) spending to as close to inflation as possible, rein in overspending in accounts outside of the GRC, and auditing actual shareholder returns versus authorized returns,” Toney wrote.
Work began this month on a regulatory process intended to boost affordability, accountability and transparency in the way California’s investor-owned gas and electric utilities apply for permission to raise their rates.
Source: Lifeline with Craig Roberts (podcast) KFAX | By Craig Roberts
This podcast featuring Executive Director of TURN Mark Toney aired September 15th 2026
Craig: I want to get your response to the failure of the California Legislature to pass SB 492 and PG&E’s answer that their financial risk to harden their infrastructure results is way too much for lenders and investors, so they will hold off on that.
Mark: Just because PG&E can’t get what it wants, they can’t just pick up their toys and go home. I told their executives that they need to spend less money burying lines underground (which is extremely expensive and takes an extremely amount of time) and do what Edison has done by insulating overhead power lines. It is just as safe and costs one-fifth, and can be done five times faster than burying the lines.
Craig: why isn’t PG&E insulating the lines and reducing the immediate risk of fires? There is no sense of urgency.
Mark: Shareholder returns. The more money they invest in capital investments, the more they can get in returns. Returns is not the only thing; we need safety. If you don’t have safety, lenders charge a higher interest rate because of the risk, and you and I pay the higher interest rate. What we are saying is reduce the risk as quickly and inexpensively as possible, so we have less of these shutoffs and wildfire disasters.
Mark: Please ask your listeners to call (916) 445 2841; this is the phone number that the Governor’s office has to make public comments on bills. Ask your listeners to call this number and urge him to sign SB 905 and the other six TURN affordability bills. They know what these bills are and we’ve been working with them since January. The Governor’s office needs to know that your listeners come from all over California.
Craig: this is a comment line set up with the Governor’s office and believe it or not, these calls matter. We have learned that each call represents hundreds of people who want to make a difference.
Source: KTVU Fox 2 | By Tom Vacar and Allie Rasmus
Mark Toney, CEO of The Utility Reform Network, known as TURN, a longtime critic of PG&E, was upset. "The legislature adopted nothing," he said. Toney said things TURN wanted were also ignored to keep the California Wildfire Fund able to cover liabilities caused by electric utility equipment. "We need a plan that makes the $40 billon last and doesn't get depleted," he said. "That didn't happen.” TURN's position is that PG&E should live within the money it has and quit the slow, expensive process burying power lines. "At a cost of $4 million a mile and we're gonna replace those with insulating overhead powerlines, insulated poles, at one-fifth of the cost and it can be done much faster," he said.
Pacific Gas and Electric Company announced plans on Wednesday to postpone roughly $2 billion in capital investments next year to bolster its finances, aiming to "reinvent" itself and improve its financial outlook. The reduction in capital spending could impact project timelines for connecting new homes, establishing data centers, and implementing clean energy initiatives.
Source: ABC7 News | By Dryden Quigley
The Utility Reform Network, a consumer advocacy group, said it supports the measure. "We need a way to basically penalize the utility executives for starting wildfires. And that's never happened before," said Lee Trotman with The Utility Reform Network. The organization said it supports the bill in its entirety, arguing that it protects ratepayers while prioritizing wildfire survivors through a faster payout process. "There's no way you can compensate someone for the loss of life, right? Their families, etc.. but you make it financially painful. You make sure that the utility executives have skin in the game," Trotman said.
California lawmakers are a step closer to an agreement on who should be held responsible when a utility causes a wildfire, after the Governor, Senate and Assembly leaders reached a compromise reflected in Senate Bill 492. According to the California Public Utilities Commission, utilities have caused roughly half of the state's most destructive wildfires.
Source: California Senate Democratic Caucus | By EIN Presswire
“TURN is very pleased to see SB 327 make it to the governor’s desk. Preventing utilities from using ratepayer money to stop municipalization and protecting the Public Advocates Office’s right to investigate utilities for compliance with the law is more important now than ever before. At a time of skyrocketing utility bills, people deserve to choose a lower cost option like a municipal utility,” said Adria Tinnin, director of Race Equity and Legislative Policy for TURN. “We thank Sen. McNerney for this important legislation and urge Governor Newsom to stand with California families and businesses and sign SB 327 into law.”
The California Legislature today approved Sen. Jerry McNerney’s SB 327, which would protect ratepayers by strengthening oversight of investor-owned utilities (IOUs) and barring IOUs from using ratepayer funds to fight local efforts to create municipal utilities.
Source: The Sacramento Bee | By Andrew Graham and Stephen Hobbs
Newsom is not alone in his stance, including from people who are not traditionally aligned with utility companies. Mark Toney, executive director of The Utility Reform Network, an organization that works to protect ratepayers from increased electrical rates, backs the idea of eliminating the ability of insurance companies to recoup money. He sees it as a way to help sustain a state wildfire fund and prevent taxpayers from being asked to keep refilling it.
Gov. Gavin Newsom’s last ditch effort to pressure legislators to change the way the state handles utility-caused wildfires involves an array of measures. But one issue in particular has become a flashpoint in the ongoing negotiations: Whether insurance companies should be able to recoup money from a utility company after a fire.
Source: Capitol Weekly | By Guest Opinion by Matt Freedman (TURN)
My organization TURN, which represents the interests of residential customers of the utilities, partnered with a diverse coalition to support a community solar program that could help achieve our broad clean energy targets. Due to increasing delays in connecting generation to the state’s high-voltage transmission network and rigid opposition by the Trump administration to placing renewable energy projects on federal land, California needs to deploy community solar and storage projects, which connect to the lower-voltage distribution system and don’t need any approvals from the federal government.
California’s environmental leadership is at risk. Despite the growing demand for clean and cost-effective energy, the state lacks a viable community solar and storage program that allows customers to participate in the development of shared clean generation facilities.