Letter: Is your PG&E bill too high?
Ken Hale. Photo from LinkedIn.
– So why are our PG&E bills so high? PG&E is a corporation, not a public utility owned by the state, county, or municipality. This means it is designed “for profit.” Money is PG&E’s driving force. Several federal judges hearing cases against PG&E have stated that profit takes precedent over everything else, including customer safety. Indeed, one of them called PG&E a criminal organization. PG&E asked the California Public Utilities Commission (CPUC) for rate increases six times last year.
CPUC granted all of them. In 2024, PG&E took in $2.47 billion in net profit, meaning all expenses of any kind have already been deducted, so PG&E made almost $2.5 billion in pure profit. Every dollar of that profit comes from us, the rate payers, with the open approval of the CPUC, an organization that according to California State Law is supposed to be watching out for the citizens of the State of California, not granting every request PG&E makes to them, regardless of how badly that decision affects those forced to pay for all this outrageous profit.
PG&E has submitted yet another rate increase, this one asking the CPUC to increase our rates so that this corporation can pay its shareholders for the “risks” they take by investing in PG&E. I thought that was what dividends were for, especially in view of the record-breaking profits PG&E made last year. PG&E claims that this amount is justified to help attract more investors and that it will only cost the average household an extra $5.50 per month. When $5.50 is multiplied by twelve months, then multiplied again by the number of PG&E customers, this request amounts to another $363 million dollars of pure profit coming directly from our collective pocket. That is approaching another half a billion dollars we will pay PG&E in pure profit if this increase is approved.
There is much more to this story. In all the years I’ve been investigating PG&E, one element has remained crystal clear. PG&E believes in profit over everything else. Year after year, this corporation has moved millions of dollars from maintenance to profits and dividends. We pay the price of this dereliction when fires break out and homes burn to the ground.
According to Cal Fire Red Book statistics, since 2015, PG&E has caused 2,410 fires in Northern California, scorched 1,720,000 acres of California land, burned 30,817 homes and other buildings to the ground, and incinerated at least 135 people. Now PG&E wants us to pick up the tag for their gross negligence, and the CPUC is letting them do it. We need rate reductions, not more increases!
I represent the grassroots organization “Stop PG&E.” Along with “Reclaim Our Power” from the Bay Area, we are going to attend the CPUC meeting in Sacramento at the Alquist Building, 1516 9th Street, on April 24. There, we will speak to the commission during Public Comments. Any person wishing to speak to the commission should join us at 10 a.m. in front of the Alquist Building.
Those who wish to be heard must sign in at the Public Advisors Table. For those who cannot make it to Sacramento, call-in comments are accepted at 1-800-857-1917 (pass code 9899501#). A protest will be held at Capitol Mall immediately following the CPUC meeting. Join us at Area 1 on the Mall itself, corner of L Street and 15th Street near the Vietnam War Memorial at 2:30 p.m.
Come join us. Tell your story to the CPUC, then join the protest against PG&E.
-Ken Hale
Batt Chief, Ret. Cal Fire
Stop PG$E Now (stoppgenow.com)
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