REDDING, Calif. (KMJ/KRCR) – Pacific Gas and Electric Company has avoided criminal charges related to its role in starting the Dixie and Kincade fires as part of a settlement with California prosecutors.
The District Attorneys of Plumas, Lassen, Tehama, Shasta and Butte Counties on Monday announced they have reached a settlement with PG&E over that company’s responsibility for the 2021 Dixie Fire.
The settlement requires PG&E to make rapid payments by this summer to those who lost their homes in the Dixie Fire; to continue to make extensive improvements in the safety and reliability of PG&E infrastructure in the North State and the affected counties; to be subject to oversight by the District Attorneys though an independent safety monitor; to pay nearly $30 million to recompense local charities and organizations involved in mitigating the effects of the fire, and to pay penalties and costs of the investigation to the DA offices.
The utility can not increase rates in an effort to recover the loss of funds due to the settlement.
Prosecutors say they filed a civil rather than criminal complaint in Plumas County Superior Court accusing PG&E of unlawful business practices. After negotiations with PG&E, a stipulated Final Judgment was filed Monday resolving the case.
The attorneys noted the Civil Judgment allowed more flexibility in demanding changes in PG&E’s safety practices and obtaining rapid restitution to those who lost homes and property in the Dixie Fire while putting the company on, essentially, a five-year probation.
The settlement was part of a larger settlement involving the Sonoma County District Attorney’s settlement of the 2019 Kincade Fire that also occurred today in the Sonoma County Superior Court.
Prosecutors stated they decided to pursue the Dixie Fire as a civil prosecution rather than a criminal prosecution to maximize the return to the fire victims rather than to seek criminal penalties.
The maximum criminal fines possible in the Dixie Fire were $329,417. The civil contributions, penalties and payouts established for PG&E in the settlement judgment will instead be in the hundreds of millions of dollars.
by ASHLEY GARDNER, KRCR
