BAKERSFIELD, Calif. (KERO) — County Supervisor discusses assistance for residents impacted by public safety power outage
- Phillip Peters' said his office has contacted So Cal Edison, CPUC, local lawmakers and others in regards to the ongoing public safety power shutoffs
- Cooling center at the Lake Isabella senior will remain open during power outages through the neighbor-to-neighbor grant
- Working with CAP-K, KRV Bridge connection to provide meals
- KC Health is available to work with property owners when it comes to their water wells
BROADCAST TRANSCRIPT:
The Kern River Valley has been under siege by many public safety power shutoffs over the last two weeks. Joining us in studio B this morning, Supervisor Philip Peters to get the latest on this. And thank you for coming in.
Thank you, Mike. I appreciate it.
When did your office first start getting notified, well, really under siege on this entire thing?
So really, we started getting contacted a couple of weeks ago when this started. Uh, this was something that we weren't expecting and we're finding out about it at the same time as the community. When these shutoffs are happening.
So the public safety power shutoffs are going on, obviously, the power company is saying this is to reduce the risk during wildfire, high wind events, and whatnot. What has been the consensus among your constituents when it comes to this?
So you know, there's an incredible amount of frustration, justifiably so, in the Kern River Valley. Uh, the, there's always wind in the KRV, and the threshold for those shutoffs has, uh, almost seemed arbitrary, you know, we, and we, we're seeing them last longer and longer. They're occurring more frequently. And families just can't plan for the future. They can't, uh, cool their homes. They can't pump water for many of them. They can't, uh, keep, keep their food stored at a reasonable amount. So it's just been extremely frustrating and difficult to deal with up there.
Has your office then reached out to Southern California Edison?
We have. We've talked with the president of SoCal Edison, the director of the California Public Utility Commission, uh, their boards of directors. Uh, we've been working quite a bit with Senator Shannon Grove and Assemblyman Stan Ellis trying to find solutions. Uh, but it's, it's been a challenge. Uh, as I said, you know, this isn't something that the SoCal Edison or any of these uh utility providers check with the county first, so we're trying to come at this, uh, you know, from a reactive position and. Uh, figure out ways that we can at least support the community until we can figure out a solution for it.
So, how have you supported and what do you, I'm guessing, are planning for, you know, as we head into the hot summer months?
Yeah, absolutely. So we right now, what we're doing is we're working with the aging. Adult Services, uh, the department of the county, is to open our cooling centers. Those are being funded through a state, uh, it's called the neighbor to neighbor grant, uh, through the state of California, and we're providing food, a cool place to go, uh, you know, water to impacted residents. We're also providing transportation to those centers. Uh, we're working with, uh, Capa and, uh, local groups at the Kern River Valley Bridge connection to try and provide shelf-stable meals to the community.
The public health department is working with well owners to make sure that they're, they have the information that they have support to make sure that their wells are, uh, disinfected and operating, uh, as they should be when power does come back on. And of course we're, we're keeping in touch with the SoCal Edison and CPUC and trying to get them to look at this with a little more common sense approach because it hasn't been working.
They've been some residents have been reaching out to us, obviously your office, and just different agencies expressing that frustration is the easiest thing as of right now for someone in this position is to go to the center, the senior center, to get the information there.
Continuing to run the senior center, the information is available. Uh, my office would be happy to help point you in the right direction, but I would just really encourage residents to keep reaching out to SoCal Edison and the CPUC and let them know your frustrations. Uh, like I said, we've been talking with them and trying to work, work through ways to get this fixed, but they need to hear from, uh, residents how this is impacting them.
Supervisor Philip Peters, thanks for coming in this morning. Thank you, Mike. -- I -- appreciate it.
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