PG&E’s new CEO wants another chance. If they get it, California will get burned again
I was physically sitting in a cold, whitewashed bunker in PG&E’s San Ramon campus, but my mind was not there. I was 188 miles away, three years prior — almost to the day. I was standing once more in the wet, white ash of Paradise, a mere month after a PG&E transmission line sparked the Camp Fire, and death roared through the little town on the mountain.
I was walking through the still-smoldering streets, sticky with debris. I was listening to the hundreds of desperate phone calls to 911 from PG&E customers burning to death inside their homes. I was choking on the orange, dusty smoke that has smothered California nearly every summer since then and before.
I had been invited to sit down with Pacific Gas and Electric Co.’s new CEO, Patti Poppe, and learn more about what the company is doing to mitigate the state’s catastrophic wildfires — many of which have started due to the company’s routine neglect of basic infrastructure. The invitation came after a Sacramento Bee editorial called for the state to initiate a public takeover. It was not kind to the infamous utility, and I should know because I wrote it.
In San Ramon, I perched myself on a high stool that was uncomfortable in the way only bulk-purchased chairs can be. Across the table, Poppe’s eyes locked earnestly into mine. Her words were sincere, and her manner was confident and kind. My eyes stared back into Poppe’s, and I wondered if they conveyed my anger. My thoughts were full of emotion, so I listened. Otherwise, I may have started to speak. And if I started to speak, I may have started to cry.
“I would love to begin planting some seeds to help you see that the company is changing,” she told me. “We have a whole new leadership team. I was thrilled by the people who joined me, people from the best of the best utilities across the country — people who are committed to making it right and making it safe.”
Across the room, there were several large monitors buzzing from their mounts on a large wall in the “Hazard Awareness Warning Center.” I couldn’t see the numbers clearly, but I was assured the long bars and colorful maps represent wildfire mitigation and safety for 5.2 million customers across Northern California. PG&E’s communications team had clearly chosen to gather us here for appearances.
Just a year into her new position, this new CEO is already famously open to the press. I might have found it encouraging if I didn’t already find it suspicious.
“We know how important it is that the people of California have trust in their hometown utility, and that’s who we are,” she said.
I sought for what was visible of her face behind a cloth mask in a vain attempt to suss out a deeper meaning. Did she know what it feels like to watch your home burn? To hear your neighbors’ terror and watch their shock unfurl? To see a city’s body count rise higher and higher and watch white crosses fill black hillsides in memoriam? So I asked.
“Have you gotten to walk through any of the burn sites?”
“Yes.”
“Have you gotten to see the destroyed neighborhoods?”
“Yes.”
“Did you get a chance to listen to any of the 911 calls?”
Poppe paused here for a beat.
“You know, all of it is heartbreaking. And that’s why we get up every single day. It’s why I came,” she said. “I saw from afar that the people of California and the people of PG&E needed a leader who is experienced and capable.”
My hands started to shake. I didn’t know if it was from anger or adrenaline, so I steadied them on the table and hoped no one noticed.
Poppe came here last year from CMS Energy, a public utility company based in Michigan. She brought with her a “Lean Operating System,” as I was breathlessly told, over and over, by her team. This system, which consists of regular meetings across the company — some 1,400 meetings daily — is supposed to streamline problems right to the top. At that day’s meeting, someone announced to the gathered employees that there were no reportable fires for the month of November and the room burst into polite applause. It was surreal.
Poppe said she earnestly believes she can help turn this company around. That her new systems for reporting problems and her prior experience as a utility CEO can, day by day, make a difference for this disaster-prone company. And I believe she believes that.
But it’s too little and much too late. Because I cannot help but think of the wildfires to come. The sparks that have not yet caught. The homes and lives that are fated to be destroyed. Poppe can stare earnestly into my eyes and make me believe that she’s trying to make changes, but you don’t get an A for effort in this game. And I have had enough of PG&E’s promises.
This company doesn’t deserve any more chances to make a mistake. Their work today — or tomorrow — will go up in smoke the second the next line sparks, or the next gas line bursts, or the next cable fails. And it will. Because the largest private utility company in California is too big to rein in.
After the meeting, I walked out into the bright sunshine of a spotless courtyard. The famous Bay Area fog had lifted, and it was a truly beautiful day. I allowed the warm sun to fill the nagging holes in my heart and realized there was simply nothing Poppe or PG&E’s team could ever say that would convince me to give this company another chance. And there’s nothing I could have said that would convey how little their victims care about their latest promises. They are too big to change, and we are too small to force them to.
At the end of our meeting, Poppe reached out her hand in farewell, and I took it, a case of ingrained manners winning out over anger. I wished her luck with her goals, but what I really want is for this rusting, decrepit hydra to be sliced into such tiny pieces that it can never again hurt someone.
There’s no amount of money or promises Poppe or PG&E could ever make that will right past wrongs. There’s nothing they can do to bring back the people who have died at the hands of their greed and failure to maintain their equipment. No number of promises can cease the never-ending string of megafires and billions in restitution passed on to its customers every year.
The only answer is to end this constant, tiresome charade of California giving PG&E chance after chance after chance. Poppe, alone, may not deserve the simmering anger I’ve harbored for three long years. But her company does not deserve our trust or forgiveness.
We’re just going to get burned again.
This story was originally published December 10, 2021 at 5:00 AM.
