-: Welcome to the first Low Income Oversight Board meeting
of 2021, although I'm sure it still feels
a little bit like 2020 to a lot of us.
It's great to be here.
This is a different, very important format
of the meeting for us here today.
We're gonna have a number of great guests,
important presentations.
I think there'll be time to discuss them
throughout the meeting.
But, as far as welcome and introductions to the first item,
I think all I'll say is I was reading through
some of the materials for this meeting,
and it made me search back to the history of the Board.
And I realized this is the 20th year
of the Low Income Oversight Board's existence,
which I didn't realize until a couple of days ago.
And so, with that, on that note,
all I can say is I hope that at the end of this year,
we have an event in person, much like the one we had
in San Ysidro at that middle school,
with that wonderful mariachi band and taquero
Mr. Castaneda brought for us.
'Cause I think that would just reflect all the progress
that we want to see come out of this year.
So with that, before we go to full introductions
of all the members of the Board, I wanted to see first
if the Commissioner, and then Vice Chair Stamas,
have any opening remarks as well.
So, Commissioner, back to you.
-: Yes. Thank you.
Good morning, everyone.
Thank you, Chair Delgado-Olson,
my fellow Low Income Oversight Board members,
and also I have my colleague, Commissioner Darcie Houck,
who are here today for our first quarterly meeting.
I do anticipate that President Batjer,
and also Commissioners Guzman Aceves and Rechtschaffen,
anticipate joining us later.
Also our Executive Director Rachel Peterson as well.
So, first, I would like to introduce
my new Energy Advisor, Cheryl Wynn.
Cheryl replaced Mary Claire Brown,
who is now an advisor to our new Commissioner Darcie Houck.
And Cheryl came from the same team
as Gillian in the Energy Division,
where Cheryl led the Energy Efficiency
Third-Party Program Solicitation Process
as a senior regulatory analyst, and before joining the CPUC,
Cheryl managed Utility Residential Energy
Efficiency programs at Southern California Edison.
I would also like to introduce
our Attorney Liaison supporting
the Low Income Oversight Board, Galen Lemei.
Before Galen joined the CPUC last summer,
he was an attorney for the California Energy Commission
and served as the Attorney Liaison
for the Disadvantaged Communities Advisory Group.
Galen has asked me to remind all of us,
all of the Board members that your Form 700s are due.
They are due by April 1st, 2021.
You should have received a reminder
from him by email yesterday afternoon.
And you can contact him directly if you have any questions.
So we want to make sure everyone completes that form
and does it by the deadline and just reach out
to Galen if you have any questions.
Now, turning to the agenda.
The focus of today's meeting is to hear
from the energy and water utilities
on their transition plans in anticipation of the moratorium
on disconnections expiring on June 30th, 2021.
As we'll recall, the Commission extended utility
customer protection measures to June 30th, in response
to the ongoing economic impacts of the COVID 19 pandemic,
which as Chairman Delgado-Olson indicated,
that hopefully towards the end of this calendar year,
we can actually celebrate in person 20 years of the LIOB.
But meanwhile, we still have a pandemic to deal with.
The emergency protections preserved essential services
to Californians through this unprecedented crisis.
And as we do emerge from the pandemic,
we do not intend for customers to face
their outstanding utility bill arrearages alone.
Today, the utilities will present their plans
to provide effective communications during the transition
to help customers anticipate in managing
their energy and water bills.
Comments on the utility plans are due
from the Low Income Oversight Board by March 19th.
Based on that feedback from the Board
and the Commission staff, the utilities
will finalize and submit their plans
via advice letters to the CPUC by April 1st.
Any comments, and any protest, to the advice letters
will then be due by April 21st, 2021.
I do want to thank my colleagues here
in the Low Income Oversight Board for providing this venue
for the public to hear about these draft plans
and leveraging your expertise and insight to offer feedback
on the utilities marketing, education,
and outreach strategies to ensure
communications to customers are effective
and reach the most vulnerable customers.
I do want to thank our Low Income Oversight Board
Staff Coordinator, Gillian Weaver, for your remarkable work
facilitating the review of the utilities plans
for the Board and organizing this meeting.
Now, before I turn it back over to you, Chair Delgado-Olson,
I would like to see if Commissioner Houck
would like to say a few remarks.
-: Thank you, Commissioner Shiroma.
I wanted to thank Chair Delgado-Olson and Vice Chair Stamas
and all of the Low Income Oversight Board
for hosting this very important meeting today,
and welcoming the Commissioners to the virtual dais.
I also want to recognize the work that you've done,
Commissioner Shiroma, in taking the leadership
on dealing with the customer relief measures
during the pandemic.
I'm looking forward to hearing presentations
from the energy and water utilities today,
and the feedback from the Board,
I'm very interested to hear what the Board has to say.
And again, I'm honored to be here
and looking forward to the meeting.
-: All right. Thank you.
All right, back to you, Chairman.
-: Certainly, thank you, Commissioner.
And Vice Chair Stamas, did you have
any opening remarks as well?
Maria: Just briefly I just wanted
to thank the Commission, the utilities,
and the Board for managing this,
for the intentionality of this process
and for managing this transition (speaking faintly)
and I'm looking forward to the conversation.
-: Very good.
Now we'll go ahead and we'll proceed
with introductions of colleagues on the Board.
I have to admit, it's always a little awkward,
'cause all the checkers are sort of structured differently.
So forgive me for having to call on everyone.
But one idea for future meetings that I'll just plug,
Gillian, if we could set up on the PowerPoint, the roster,
and that way people could just introduce themselves
in the future in the order of their name.
It might be a little easier and less awkward for me.
But with that, Jeff, you're the first person
I see on my screen.
-: Great. Awesome.
Great, thanks. Can everyone hear me okay?
Hopefully my bandwidth is okay here.
But yeah, thank you, Benito and the Board.
I represent the water utilities,
as the water utility representative.
And I appreciate the PUC's continued interest
in both protecting our customers' access
to clean and reliable drinking water
and also the stability of the utility.
So, I'm looking forward to hearing
from the energy and water utilities today on their plans.
Thanks.
-: Thank you.
Jessica.
-: And if folks would mute yourselves
until Benito calls on you.
That's one of those things about WebEx.
We have to mute ourselves
or else there's a lot of background noise.
Thank you.
-: Yes, hi, good morning, everyone.
My name is Jessica Lim.
I work at Southern California Edison.
And I am on the Board representing
the electric and gas utilities.
And I'm very much looking forward
to our important topics that we have to tee up today,
as Commissioner Shiroma has already teed up,
as far as our transition plans
with the emergency consumer protections.
So we have some good information to share
that we'll have good dialogue as well.
So, thank you
-: Lisa Castilone.
-: Good morning, everybody.
Lisa Castilone from Grid Alternatives.
I sit on the Board.
And I'm very thankful to be a part of this.
As being from the Inland Empire
and working with tribal nations,
these conversations are impacting
a lot of people in my region.
So, I'm very thankful to be a part of this.
Thank you.
-: Lourdes Medina.
-: Buenos dais. Good morning.
As public member of this Board now
and launching my third year,
it is very much a privilege and an honor
to serve my community and my California in such a matter.
I really appreciate being on this Board.
And everything that I've learned
and all the tools and information
that have been possible to help us during this pandemic,
and also to help our community of mothers,
of fathers, of children, who have to always
find that challenge of how are we gonna
pay our utilities at the end of the month.
With the increasing costs of life
and the constant battle of employers
not wanting to do a living wage,
our Board is very important.
I take this job very seriously.
And I am an organizer and I am a community member
that is very active in the community.
And I take this, even at 3:00 in the morning,
reading this is very important to me.
I want to say, I appreciate everybody's work here.
And I especially appreciate how much better
the reporting is coming from our IOUs.
I take this very serious,
and I take this with a big responsibility,
looking forward for our children's future,
and also for taking care of our environment.
And on this week that we celebrate
the international Women's Day,
commemorating all those women that have
always given of their lives, the professional,
the homemaker, the teachers and the educators,
who have always been there for us.
I thank you for this time.
-: Thank you, Lourdes.
Jason Wimbley.
-: Good morning, everyone.
Jason Wimbley, I work with the Department
of Community Services and Development.
We administer the Low Income Home Energy Assistance Program,
and I serve as a member to the Board.
I find a great pleasure to be here today
and look forward to hearing the presentations
on the customer transition plans that's been formulated
by both our state and the state water and utility companies.
-: Pat Watts.
-: Good morning, everyone.
My name is Pat Watts.
I am the President and CEO of FCI Management.
It's really my privilege to sit on this Board
representing the private contractors
who support the ESA network and the other
low-income programs throughout California.
We are all really dedicated to supporting,
ensuring that actually our low income community
receives all of the opportunities
of energy efficiency, weatherization programs.
Many of these businesses are small
and minority owned businesses,
and we have all faced our challenges this year,
but we continue to rise to the occasion.
So I am pleased to be here,
to listen to the utilities programs and plans,
to help all of these customers.
And we are here to stand by and make sure
that those get implemented
-: Paul Irvin.
-: Good morning. I'm Paul Irvin.
I'm a public member.
I'm the Executive Housing Director
for the North Fork Rancheria Indian Housing Authority.
I also look forward to today's presentations
and the transitions.
Thank you.
-: And Robert Castaneda.
-: Yeah. Good morning.
I'm Robert Castaneda.
I represent nonprofits, predominantly with human services,
targeting agricultural workers
and farm workers across California.
I sit on several Boards, including this one.
But I'm very excited about this meeting today.
I've been in public service,
in and out, for almost 30 years.
I think that we've reached a pinnacle
in the state of California and across the country, frankly,
in what we're dealing with with the pandemic,
this impact on people,
especially in communities that we represent.
And not only provide information to the Commission
vis-a-vis advice, but also advocacy,
given the fact that we're in a position
to give our communities a voice.
So, having said that, I look forward
to a very robust and informative discussion.
I want to thank the utilities
for their hard work and their thoughtfulness
in putting together with their plans.
I think that given that I've had
and research that's been conducted,
we might have some welcome additions
to helping people in this state or in this period.
So, having said that, thank you very much.
-: Okay. That should be everyone.
Did I miss anyone?
If people turn their screen on and off,
all the checkers and positions move, so. (chuckling)
Anybody get missed? Okay, wonderful.
So we're gonna move on to item two, which is the approval
of the December 10th, 2020, LIOB minutes.
It's an action item.
Any questions, comments, or discussion
about the minutes from the December meeting?
Okay.
If there's no comments or discussion,
is there a motion to adopt the minutes?
-: So moved, Medina.
-: Okay, motion by Lourdes.
Is there a second?
-: Second. Second, Watts.
-: Second, Pat Watts.
Gillian, do we have to call the roll for this one?
-: I think we could just vote on consensus.
We've confirmed everyone's here.
So are there any opposed?
-: No.
-: All right. All in favor?
All: Aye.
-: All right. Great.
-: Okay, great.
The next item is item three, which is the election
of the LIOB chair and vice chair.
And it says here Kapil will be running this item.
-: I think that Alison LaBonte, Kapil's supervisor,
is actually gonna step in for this.
If, I don't know if you can see this slide,
if the slide could be advanced to item three,
the Board elections.
Move ahead to the next slide, please.
-: Gillian, just on this. -: Mm hm?
Lourdes: I have people on the phone,
for the Spanish translation.
Gillian: Mm hm.
Lourdes: And the feedback from the English to the Spanish
is causing a lot of confusion.
So if the translator could only put her audio,
that would be better.
Gillian: Okay. Thank you for that.
We'll work on that.
-: So, Gillian, am I introducing this slide?
-: Yes. I'm sorry for the confusion.
-: Okay, Article Six of the LIOB Charter states the officers,
and the LIOB has a chair and a vice chair,
both of whom are members of the Board
and will be elected to serve the term of one year.
They must then be reelected.
That officer continues to hold office
until a successor has been elected.
The duties are listed as well.
I don't believe that I need to read the duties statement.
And this agenda item is regarding
the chair and vice chair election.
-: Thank you, Alison.
Are there any nominations
for Board chair or vice chair?
-: Yes.
If we were all together in person,
a caucus could have occurred to say, who would like
to nominate Benito Delgado-Olson for another term?
But I'll take that privilege.
So, I guess I would like to nominate Benito
for another term as the Low Income Oversight Board chair.
He has served on the LIOB since 2015,
and as our chair since 2019.
And under his leadership, the LIOB has been able to provide
input to the CPUC, giving us an opportunity to consider
the LIOB's recommendations earlier,
in our current use of proceeding,
creating a greater opportunity for the Board's influence
on our low income energy programs.
Additionally, Benito's leadership for us
has been able to serve as a venue
for the investor-owned utilities
to keep the public and this Board informed of their PSPS,
or public safety power shut-off customer support efforts.
Benito by day serves as the Executive Director
of SupplyBank, a non-profit at supplybank.org,
a non-profit operating in a food bank model,
but for supplies to address unmet material needs,
things like backpacks, diapers, and so forth,
that many of us don't even realize,
there are a lot of people, as Lourdes outlined too,
that have barriers to health, education, and employment,
for lack of some of the basic kinds of things you need
to forge pathways out of poverty.
So I'm nominating Benito.
Are there any other nominations?
Lourdes: I would like to second that nomination.
-: Okay.
I think we can close the nominations.
And we can do a vote.
-: All right.
So just to reiterate, the nominations are for Board chair.
Did you also say vice chair or just Board chair?
-: Doing just the chair and then after--
-: Chair? -: We can do vice chair, mm hm.
-: All right. Understood.
All right.
So, I will just call a vote and go through the roster.
Sorry, I'm also having the same screen issues.
Board Member Castaneda?
-: Aye.
-: All right, Board Member Linam?
Jeff: Aye.
-: Board Member Wimbley?
Jason: Aye.
-: Board Member Lim?
Jessica: Aye.
Gillian: Board Member Medina?
Lourdes: Aye.
Gillian: Board Member Irvin?
Paul: Aye.
Gillian: Board Member Castilone?
Lisa: Aye.
Gillian: Board Member Watts?
Pat: Aye.
-: Board Member Delgado-Olson?
Don't know if you can vote.
-: Aye. -: And Board Member Stamas?
-: Aye.
-: All right.
-: Oh, don't forget me.
-: And Commissioner Shiroma?
-: Aye.
(chuckling)
-: All right, so,
all affirmative.
Do we have any nominations for vice chair?
-: Again, Board members,
I'm gonna take the privilege of putting forth
Maria Stamas for another term as our vice chair.
Maria has served on the LIOB since 2018,
as vice chair since 2019.
Maria serves on the Natural Resources Defense Council
Director of Climate Equity, for their,
and can folks mute themselves, thank you,
for their American Cities Climate Challenge.
And in this role, she advances
equitable climate policy solutions
at the intersection of economic development,
public health, and affordable housing.
So I'm putting forth Maria for another term as vice chair.
Thank you.
-: I'll second that motion.
-: All right, any other nominations or comments?
Or otherwise I'll go to the vote.
Okay.
This is a vote for Maria Stamas to be vice chair.
Board member Wimbley?
-: Aye.
-: Board member Castaneda?
-: Aye.
-: Board Member Medina?
-: Aye.
-: Board Member Irvin?
-: Aye.
-: Board Member Castilone?
-: Aye.
-: Board Member Lim?
-: Aye.
-: Board Member Watts?
-: Aye.
-: Board Member Linam?
-: Aye.
-: Board Member Delgado-Olson?
-: Aye.
-: Commissioner Shiroma?
-: Aye.
-: And Board Member Stamas?
-: Aye.
-: All right.
It will be noted that both
Board Member Delgado-Olson was approved as chair
and Board Member Stamas approved as vice chair.
Thank you.
-: Excellent. Thank you, Gillian.
And then I'll be very brief.
Just wanted to say thank you to the Commissioner,
Vice Chair Stamas, and all of my colleagues on the Board,
for their trust and leadership for one more year.
It's not taken lightly.
And to really echo Lourdes' opening comments,
I understand the work ahead is very important.
But also, if I can just take 60 seconds for privilege.
I've really appreciated how much the Board
has grown in the last year and how much talent
and dedication and hard work there is here.
Working on the Technical Advisory Committee with Jason,
I think we've made great strides
for coordination with public agencies,
on tribal issues with Paul Irvin and Lisa Castilone,
with the Commissioner's Office's partnership and leadership.
And really more engagement from the IOUs
and working with contractors
under Board Member Castaneda and Watts.
It's really a privilege just to work with all of you.
I'm looking forward to one more year.
But I also do understand that
changes in leadership over time are important
to the health and productivity of Boards as well.
And so I'm hoping that this 20th year is a good year,
where we're coming out of a difficult time
and making difficult decisions,
but also building the foundation for what's next.
So thank you all very much, I really appreciate it.
With that, I'd like to move on to item four.
Item four is public comments.
Just as a reminder to those in queue,
public comment is intended to provide an opportunity
for members of the public who wish to address the Board
on a topic that is not on the agenda.
Members of the Board are not allowed
to take any formal action on an item not on the agenda.
If possible, it is requested that public comment
be limited to two minutes per speaker.
Before we start public comment, Gillian, I am just curious,
how many people are in queue right now for public comment?
-: Thank you.
So, as a reminder, to request to provide public comment,
please use the raise hand feature.
Right now I don't see any hands raised.
But while people make sure that they do that,
I did just want to remind everyone that this,
the audio of this meeting is being translated into Spanish,
in real time, through a separate phone line.
So, please remember to speak clearly
so that the interpreters who are listening
to the WebEx meeting can translate into Spanish.
And also, those on the Spanish phone line
do have the opportunity to provide comment in Spanish.
So, I'm going to take this moment
to please ask the interpreters
to please provide any Spanish callers
the instructions on how to public comment.
Benito: And do we have any public comment
for items not on the agenda?
Gillian: I still do not see any hands raised.
I just want to confirm with IT Support
that they also do not have anyone who's requested to speak.
IT Technician: I'm not seeing anybody
with their hand raised at this point.
One reminder, call-in users can raise their hand
using the star-three function
on the key pads of their phones.
Gillian: All right, and--
-: Oh, and Gillian, there is a slight delay for folks
who are watching on the admin monitor.
There's about a 20 second or so delay
for people to hear the instructions.
And by the way, we have 176 participants this morning.
And that's really one of the silver linings
about holding meetings virtually.
It gives the opportunity for more people
to attend the meetings. (chuckling)
We do welcome that.
But I'll stop there and see if anybody has
raised their hands or pressed the star feature.
-: I don't think that there is any public comment
from the Spanish line, we haven't seen a request to comment.
And I do not see any hands raised in WebEx.
Okay. So I think we can move on.
But there's no public comment for items not on the agenda.
-: Gillian? -: Yes?
-: Gillian, this is Lourdes.
I'm sorry, I'm a pain in the butt,
but I did press star-three,
and I did not get recognized on the phone.
So, let's just make sure next time
that that does work better.
-: Okay, so star-one is for the Spanish line.
-: He said push star-three, yeah.
-: Star-three is for if you joined WebEx
using phone audio in English.
So, sorry for the confusion.
So, again, star-one, if you are on the Spanish phone line.
And if you are listening to WebEx in English
from your phone, it's star-three to make a comment.
-: Okay.
Are we okay to move on then, Gillian, to the next item?
-: I will triple check, but I don't,
I don't see anyone with their hand raised, so I think so.
-: Okay.
Before we move on to item five, Commissioner,
I see another one of your colleagues has joined us.
Would you care to make an introduction?
-: Yes, thank you. Thank you, Chair.
We are very privileged to be joined
by our President Marybel Batjer.
Thank you, Marybel, for joining this morning.
-: Thank you very much, Commissioner Shiroma.
I appreciate that.
-: Thank you very much.
Would you like to say a few words?
-: First of all, I apologize
for getting on a little late this morning.
It seems like the day starts early and doesn't,
it just keeps on going.
So thank you all.
This is an important session that we're having today.
I'm very much looking forward to hearing
from the IOUs and from all of you
who are going to be commenting on public comment.
So, I just look forward to the engagement.
So, thank you for allowing me to be a part of this.
Thank you.
Genevieve: Okay. Thank you.
All right, back to you, Benito.
-: Okay. Thank you, Commissioner.
So, before we move on to item, or begin, item five
for the transition plan presentation,
beginning with four larger IOUs
and then the small municipal jurisdictional utilities,
just a couple of clarifications on formats.
Both the IOUs and the small jurisdictional utilities
will have a representative present on all their behalves.
And then open it up for Q and A.
They've all been asked to use about 1/3 of the allotted time
for the PowerPoint presentation on their transition plans
to allow 2/3 of the time for questions and answers.
At the conclusion of their presentations,
we're gonna pause and see if any
of the Commissioner's colleagues may have
some clarifying questions and then we'll proceed
to Board members' questions immediately thereafter.
A couple of other things that I thought I would note.
The Board did have a joint committee meeting
about a week ago for initial thoughts and reactions
after the presentations are concluded.
I'll just list out the very high level
eight or so bullet points of what those were,
to refresh everyone's memory.
But, I thank the IOUs in advance,
in reading through their presentations,
I see some of that feedback has already
been taken into consideration in their presentations.
So appreciate it.
And with that, I understand the representative
of the IOUs presenting our first presentation this morning
is from Southern California Edison.
So I thought I would ask Jessica
if she would care to make the introduction.
-: That's great. Thank you so much.
So, I will share that the IOUs have proactively
gotten together and put together an integrated presentation
in the interest of time, rather than each individual ones.
And so we'd like to introduce our speaker shortly.
Before that, just want to give everyone
a run down of what to expect.
We're going to have Eric Lee from Southern California Edison
present a short three slide presentation to start.
That is a integrated view of all of the IOUs
in terms of similarities in our marketing,
education, and outreach approach,
beneficial programs available to customers,
and the alignment on resumption of activities.
And then we're gonna go straight into PG&E,
for them to highlight a couple of slides.
And then we will have Q and A dedicated to PG&E.
And then we'll have a specific slide or two from SCE,
and then we'll have Q and A for SCE.
We'll then move on to SDG&E and end with SoCalGas.
So that's the overview and what to expect.
And we did try as much as we could to incorporate, also,
requests that we received a couple of days ago,
and we can also voice over as well
and address in the Q and A.
And so I would like to ask if we can hold off on Q and A
until we have each of the Q and A sections for the IOUs.
Thank you very much for giving me the opportunity
just to give a quick introduction.
So, at this time I will turn it over to Eric Lee.
-: Hi, good morning, everyone.
My name is Eric Lee.
It's my privilege here to come and speak
on behalf of the IOUs this morning.
Really appreciate the opportunity.
If you could move on to the next slide for me, please.
So, as Jessica mentioned,
here's kind of a high-level agenda
of what we're gonna go through.
And there's gonna be specific slides
and Q and A for each one of the IOUs, in that order.
I will also pause at the end of every slide
should there be any specific questions on that slide,
and we can kind of start addressing
some of them at the beginning.
In terms of the schedule and the next steps,
what we wanted to really highlight here is the 19th,
so that's next Friday, I believe,
and that's the date that we're asking and requesting
that LIOB provide us with their comments,
given the opportunity to kind of sneak in
to the subcommittee meeting from last week,
I had heard something along the lines of,
there'll be something kind of in
more formal written comments.
So that's kind of the date that we're hoping
that you can give us to, to get us that information,
which would then give us just
a little bit under two weeks, I believe,
to kind of take a look and incorporate
and put that into our formal transition plans
that would have to go out on April 1st.
So it's, we understand it's a time constraint on your end,
but it's also a time constraint on ours.
And so we're trying to compromise here
and buy both of us some fair amount of time to make sure
that we can incorporate whatever your thoughts are.
Also at the end of our agenda, or, sorry, our slide deck,
we've also added an appendix.
So, within that appendix we've provided
a little bit more detailed information.
That's also coming from what we heard
in the subcommittee meeting.
And so we wanted to make sure that there was
a little bit of additional information there
for those that would want to see it.
Specifically, I think it's worth pointing out
that there's a new proceeding that just came out recently,
to address energy utility customer bill debt
accumulated during the COVID-19 pandemic.
That's quite a mouthful.
So I'm just gonna start calling that the pandemic debt OIR,
if everyone's okay with that.
And so that's expected to have a kind of
a pretty compressed schedule,
but a proposed decision in maybe late May
and then a final one sometime around late June,
just before the end of emergency customer protections.
So there's gonna be some interplay there with,
depending on what happens,
and some potential program or policy changes.
And so we've included that interplay in kind of
a schedule format in the first slide in the appendix,
just so that everyone's aware.
And recognize that even though these advice letters
go out on the 1st and some of our marketing
will start going out as well following that,
there might be some some changes in the future.
So if we can go on to the next slide here, please.
So this first slide, we figured that everyone
would really want to care about is,
is the marketing, and education,
and the outreach channels that the IOUs are aligned on,
and how we are gonna go out and speak to the customers.
On this left-hand box here, what you're gonna see is,
is here's the list of things that we're gonna go and use,
to specifically engage customers regarding
the end of emergency customer protections.
And the IOUs have agreed to do that 60 days
before the end of the customer protection.
So with the end being June 30th, this would back us into,
at least before April 30th, we would start having
this communication go out to the customers.
What you'll also notice is that these channels on the left
are able to hopefully be a little bit more targeted.
What the IOUs have recognized is that it's good to have
maybe a more targeted approach to hit customers
that are specifically in arrears
that would benefit from understanding
that these customer protections are ending,
rather than a very wide kind of just blast going out.
But that's not to say that there aren't
ongoing and current communications that are going out
regarding just normal programs
and then benefits and things of that nature.
And so what we've done on the right-hand box here is
we've included, here's what also can be used to communicate
in regarding to the benefit programs that we'll talk
a little bit more in detail on the next slide,
but here's what's going out for the benefit programs.
And all of these are being used to go and communicate
with customers in general, but specifically for the end
of emergency customer protections,
we're using what's gonna be in the left-hand box here
to talk through and connect with our customers.
So we hope that this gives the customers enough time
to really evaluate and understand their options
and kind of strategize and figure out
what their next step should be.
And also to get in contact with the IOUs if they need to
or if they have questions, if they want to discuss.
So that's kind of the reminder there.
So let me just kind of pause here
and see if there's any questions
or concerns here with that rationale?
-: Yeah, this is Lourdes.
Again, I have a couple of people listening through Spanish.
And I'm also doing the monitoring.
And the translator may be just reading what's on the slide
would be more helpful for the Spanish speaking community,
versus what you, the presenter, is saying,
'cause she is not catching up.
-: I understand. -: That would be my advice.
-: Sure, so not a problem at all.
So in terms of communications to the customer
regarding the end of emergency customer protections,
the idea would be to use our utility webpages,
outbound emails, bill onserts and messaging,
any direct mail for customers that we can identify.
Community and faith based organizations, so CBOs, and FBOs.
The customer call center should there be the need
for outbound calls and or interactive voice
kind of recorded line messaging.
And then to also work with our CCAs,
the community choice aggregators.
And other agencies as well,
like the LIHEAP service providers.
And so those are kind of the avenues that we think
we can communicate emergency customer protections through.
And then the additional examples of what
some additional channels for outgoing,
kind of just assistance program, marketing in general,
that would include newsletters, radios,
any kind of digital advertising or search marketing,
and then social media.
And so, I guess to maybe expand on that a little bit,
it makes a little bit of sense
for when you want to do enrollments,
that you go very broad and very wide
to try to hit as many customers as possible.
In terms of kind of maybe talking through
emergency customer protections, we're really wanting
to target and try to hit the customers
that are gonna most likely to benefit.
So those that are in arrears,
those that are behind on their bills,
are the ones that we're trying to target.
And so that's why there's kind of a differentiation here
between maybe more targeted or more broad outreach efforts.
Genevieve: Say, Eric.
It's Genevieve.
Eric: Morning.
-: Morning.
If you could slow down a little bit
for the translator, that'd be great.
It's hard. (laughing)
-: Absolutely. I apologize for that.
It seems I have the same thing, I'm just rapid fire talking.
Now, I may have missed this, but have you,
you're doing multiple languages.
I know that the investor-owned utilities,
in their public safety power shut-off communications,
have multiple languages that they have targeted
in terms of an understanding of their customer base
and what have you.
And so is there a similar effort underway here
in reaching out to the customer base?
-: Yes, absolutely.
I think off the top of my head, I know Edison
put out our fact sheets in 15 different languages,
and we're gonna continue to do the same
for the end of customer protections fact sheet and updates.
And I believe all the other IOUs are aligned
and are doing very similar efforts.
I don't know the exact number for everybody else,
but we're all plus minus.
-: Thank you.
-: Hello, Eric.
This is Bob Castaneda, a Board member.
I'd like to, just to take a second to,
basically speak to some of the lessons we learned
with COVID outreach, especially with
hard to reach communities in agricultural regions,
predominantly in the Central Valley,
together with the Imperial Valley and Coachella,
which the utilities have service territory in.
Having said that, some of the best things that we found
is a lot of the person to person
that creates the viral marketing and the supportive message
within the community to build trust.
Having said that,
we have the extensive energy services network
that are directly in customers' homes
and have that credibility
because they've been running these programs for 20 years.
So as I looked over your list of activities,
which I think is excellent, by the way,
I think it can also be served by having
a lot of the workforce that we have in the field
with the low-income energy program,
that you folks administer, as a primary carrier
of the message so they can develop the link
between the household and the utility, to go ahead,
engage in the AMP and other sort of support activities.
So having said that, I'd like to make that suggestion,
that that's an available resource that you could be using.
Thank you.
-: Thank you. I'll jot that down.
Any more thoughts or comments
before we move on to the next slide?
-: Hi, Eric. This is Jason Wimbley.
Kind of tied to Bob's comment there.
-: You're on mute, Jason.
-: Sorry, is there a way that,
I would imagine that, for the transition plans,
the marketing and the education outreach budgets
are gonna grow tremendously to undertake
all of this critical messaging and education
that we need to deliver customers
within this short timeframe.
Is there a way that the utilities can represent
the type of deliberate investments that they're making
in those community based organizations,
similar to what was done in the past
with like capitation contracts
and things of that nature?
So that way it gives us a better visual on the role
that these types of organizations,
that Board Member Castaneda was referring to,
are gonna be integrated into this overall marketing
and education strategy that the utilities are laying out?
-: Sure.
So, I think we're definitely all engaging
with the community and faith-based organizations.
I don't know the exact details for the other utilities,
but at least I can speak on Edison,
that we do have a large number, I forget if it was,
it's over 1,000 that I know that we engage with.
And then we also have selected, I believe, like 30,
that do even more detailed dives into it,
and there's like incentives associated with that
so that we're actually helping to fund
some of these efforts.
And so there's a breakdown there
and definitely we can share a little bit more
about that in the final transition plan that goes out
so there's awareness across the Board for what we're doing.
-: Appreciate it. Thank you.
-: You got it.
-: Eric, this is Commissioner Rechtschaffen.
I appreciate your response to Commissioner Shiroma
about language concerns and outreach.
I think this probably goes well without saying,
but I'm gonna say it nonetheless,
that it's critical that in these communications,
the utility speak in plain simple,
easy to understand language.
Not talk about arrearages or fancy debt management,
but really simple, clear, directions to people.
There's a lot of information people have had to absorb
between unemployment, COVID stimulus bills,
our moratorium, the utilities moratorium,
eviction moratoriums, and so forth.
And it's very confusing.
So I really urge you to take a double and triple look,
all of the IOUs, to make things as simple and easy,
intuitive as possible, in your communications.
-: Understood. Thank you for the feedback.
-: Yeah, hi, this Robert Castaneda again.
I just want to, Cliff you made a most important point.
The objective here, I think, initially,
with many, many of our households is building something
in Spanish we call (speaking Spanish), which is trust.
So, my sense is that, yes, when you get too complicated
or it looks like it's much more of a,
sort of a bill collecting or things of this nature,
it has a tendency to build in distrust and fear.
So again, I think that, again,
the more straightforward, user-friendly,
you may want to run a focus group or two.
I know that we don't have a lot of time.
But I think that there are people on this Board
that are uniquely qualified to maybe address
some user-friendly content, as well as some graphics,
that may be helpful.
But I think that that's huge.
Because two things happen, is number one,
we're not scaring people.
And number two, we're creating a message
that's more likely to be adhered to,
if that makes sense.
-: Chairman?
And by the way, thank you, Robert.
Chairman, we just heard from Commissioner Rechtschaffen.
Welcome.
We also have Commissioner Martha Guzman Aceves
on the WebEx, and so I just wanted to take a moment
to see if either would like to say a few words.
It's up to you.
-: Thank you, Commissioner -: I--
-: Go ahead, Cliff. -: Go ahead, Martha.
-: I just was gonna say, I'm gonna wait
until I hear the whole presentation,
unless I missed it all already.
Okay. Thank you.
-: And in fact, folks, okay.
So we are on our second slide and it's almost 10 o'clock.
So, we want to have commentary and questions, absolutely.
-: But Eric? -: I just--
-: Yes? -: Commissioner Shiroma?
-: Oh Cliff, Cliff.
-: No, I don't have much to say, but I just,
I really appreciate having the expertise of the LIOB here
to help guide us on how the utility
should develop these transition plans.
As Robert just mentioned, there's a lot of expertise
in the body, and we really want to ensure that the utilities
communicate the plans to customers in a way
that's most helpful and that there are no surprises.
And obviously this is part of a larger piece
of efforts that we're working on,
that we don't need to reiterate here.
We have the protections in place.
We've thought very long and hard about how to do that.
But we need to make sure that the transition
is not abrupt and painful and hurtful
and all the hard work we've done
to keep households afloat, that doesn't go to waste.
So this is a really critical point of our effort,
and I'm very glad to engage the LIOB with their expertise.
-: Thank you.
Thank you. Wonderful.
-: Sorry, I realize we do need to go on.
I just had a quick clarifying question.
Is it certain that the protections will end on June 30th?
Or are there other processes undergoing about that?
-: So, Resolution M4849 that extended
the emergency customer protections until June 30th
also has a qualifier in there that says,
it gives an option for the Commission to extend that beyond,
but it kind of leaves it at that.
So right now we're just using that assumption
of June 30th as the date, and we'll obviously
work with whatever comes out after.
-: Great. And just a follow up comment.
If communications are going out April 30th,
just being mindful of if protections do extend beyond that,
we're not creating, not miscommunicating about that?
-: Absolutely.
So we're trying to find out the best balance
between giving the customers enough time
and then also hopefully not giving them
incorrect information as well.
-: Okay, thank you.
-: Thank you, Vice Chair Stamas.
And then, Eric, just to echo
Commissioner Shiroma's comments,
you took the words out of my mouth,
I appreciate you being willing to pause
at every slide for questions,
but it is 10 o'clock, and we have limited time.
So if we could proceed to the end of the presentation
and then open it up for Q and A and broad discussion,
I think that might make sure that we have enough time
so everybody can ask questions they might have.
-: Absolutely. I'm happy to get off the hot seat.
So, moving on to the next slide, please.
So, on this slide, we have the benefit programs,
the list of benefit programs that are
currently available to all of our IOU customers.
So given the audience here, I'm not gonna go
too much into detail on the first couple,
which is the California Alternate Rates for Energy, CARE,
and Family Electric Rate Assistance Program, FERA.
I'm assuming that there's pretty broad knowledge of that.
We will talk a little bit more
about the next one, the third bullet here
which is the Medical Baseline program.
So, like CARE and FERA, Medical Baseline
has also had its verification
and recertification requirements temporarily suspended
as a result of emergency customer protections.
What's gonna be a little bit different about Medial Baseline
is that that actually requires a signature
by a qualified medical professional
and for the customer to have a medical device.
And so the IOUs currently are all working
or have completed the ability to do e-signatures
for Medical Baseline, so that it makes it
a little bit easier for the customers
to go get their signatures
from the qualified medical professional.
And so those should all be out
or will be coming out shortly.
And they'll definitely be out
before the end of emergency customer protections.
The other item for a Medical Baseline is
that all the IOUs currently have pending advice letters
that talk about increasing and that.
And so there's a recognition that we do want
to increase the number of customers that are eligible
or get outreach to them to increase enrollment
Marybel: Eric, this is Marybel.
Excuse me. -: Sure.
Marybel: And I know time is short.
I just want to ask a quick question on this one.
Eric: Absolutely.
-: There are a whole lot of folks in the Medical Baseline
that don't have access to a computer or to broadband.
So is there a way that they can use
the old fashioned United States mail service
to mail something to a doctor
and have that doctor mail it back?
-: Yeah, absolutely.
This is an additional option.
-: I think this would necessitate them
going into a doctor's office,
which also is very difficult these days.
-: Totally understand and we hear you.
So one, it's been suspended for now
so that they don't have to,
no customer has to go and do that right now.
And they can get on the Medical Baseline program
without having to do so.
And then two, yes, there's still the paper form
that they're able to use.
So this is just an additional,
e-signature is an additional option provided to customers,
should they want to take that option.
-: Thank you.
Appreciate the clarification for those
who are listening in.
Thank you.
-: Yep. Absolutely.
Thank you for asking and making me clarify.
So, the next ones we'll go through pretty quickly as well.
So the Low Income Home Energy Assistance Program, LIHEAP,
we're gonna, we've all committed to continue to work
with our LIHEAP service providers
to communicate the latest available programs.
And so recently all the IOUs have done that
with the Arrearage Management Plan.
We've either given them like fact sheets
or provided some kind of training option
to our LIHEAP service providers.
And then, so we're also, additionally,
we're also working on a portal
to make it a little bit easier
for these LIHEAP service providers to do online pledging.
My understanding is that previously it was all through,
a lot of it was through interactive,
with IVR, our interactive phone system.
And it might've been a little bit harder,
especially if they're doing a lot.
So, we're working on portals and those should be coming out,
I believe next week, for everybody.
And in that same token, we've also kind of engaged
the California Department of Community Service
and Development, CSD, just because
of their interplay with LIHEAP.
And so we've also given the same kind of training
and fact sheets regarding the the latest AMP program.
ESA, the Energy Savings Assistance
for income qualified energy efficiency.
That's been ongoing since I believe,
like late May or early June of 2020.
And so, we're gonna continue to do that
and continue to leverage that.
And as we kind of heard in the previous slide's discussion,
we can look into definitely using the subcontractors there
to help promote some of these messagings.
So the last couple we'll get through pretty quickly.
So all the IOUs have committed to providing residential
and small commercial customers, small business customers,
with 12 month payment plans.
I believe Edison's draft might have said six
when we submitted that, but we've since adjusted that.
And so we're all aligned across the Board,
of 12 month payment plans for everybody here.
And then the next slide down
is the Arrearage Management Plan that we call AMP.
And so in the appendix, the IOUs have added
a little bit of extra information there,
specifically about the details
of what the program is about,
as well as we've also then given
our latest AMP enrollment numbers.
And so we want everyone to have some kind of understanding
of what this program is and it's very similar.
And then when you look at the enrollment numbers themselves,
while you'll see that there's kind of differences
in the enrollment numbers, when we did the analysis
in terms of eligible customers,
we found that we're approximately plus minus
of each other in terms of the number of eligible customers
versus the number of enrolled customers.
And so we're not that far off from each other
in terms of the IOU's benchmarking.
We do realize that some customers that may be eligible
are not enrolling in AMP, and that could be due to
a variety of reasons beyond our control.
And so we recognize that.
But we do expect those numbers to
continually increase over time,
especially as the emergency customer protections are ending.
And then finally, we have a list here
of the like bill relief or the direct payment assistance
from each one of the IOUs.
We recognize that the naming is slightly different
for each one of us, but they all provide
a very similar function in that they help some customers
that are unable to pay their bills.
So maybe we can, in the interest of time,
jump onto the next slide, please.
Thank you.
So, this slide is gonna be the last one
for the joint IOU presentation piece of it.
And we'll get into the IOU specific ones right after this.
But here, what we wanted to really highlight
is that the first bullet in bold at the very top,
is that at the end of the emergency customer protections,
right now estimated to be June 30th,
there's not gonna be a customer
from any of the large energy IOUs
that will be immediately eligible for disconnection.
So June 30th, on July 1st,
there's not gonna be any customers
that are eligible for disconnection for nonpayment.
And we want to make sure that that's very clear
and everybody understands that point
and that also get communicated out.
And you're gonna see in the IOU specific slides
they're gonna, each of us will go into a little bit about
what that really looks like in terms of timing.
But we're mostly aligned in that
the earlier a customer can be disconnected
is not gonna be until late August,
so we're looking a month and change,
a month and a half, two months, two months out, for that.
And all the IOUs have some kind of ramp up activity
that's gonna occur so that it's not gonna be
very broad or overreaching, so to speak.
So we wanted to make sure that that was very clear.
We recognize in the subcommittee meetings
that there were a lot of concerns around that.
And so we wanted to definitely highlight that piece.
And so what we've also included in the appendix here,
and along that same line, is a list of customer protections
for residential customers,
from the Residential Disconnections Proceeding,
that was Decision 20-06-003.
And I think that's the second slide in the appendix.
So it has a list of all these customer protections
that would also have to happen,
that are available to customers
and before the customer could be eligible for disconnection.
And then one of the items that I heard
during the subcommittee meeting was
we're accounting for weather.
And so that's also in there and it specifically has
a bullet point talking about being unable
to disconnect customers, for example,
when the look ahead forecast is more than 100 degrees.
And so based on the timing of the end
of emergency customer protections being in summer,
we also, as the IOUs, kind of would just recognize
that there's probably gonna be quite a few of those days
that are coming in July and August.
And so this is all additional things that we're looking at.
And so it all backs into, there's just not gonna be a,
I think the term that I'll use is,
a tidal wave of disconnections.
That's just not gonna happen.
And then from the IOU standpoint,
the additional piece that we wanted to make sure
everyone was aware of is that the IOUs
have never disconnected the maximum number
of customers that are eligible for disconnection.
There's always operational concerns,
and as well as the new disconnection cap
that would prevent us or keep us from doing so.
It would be kind of just illogical to go out
and do very wide and broad disconnections because
we're not able to necessarily handle
the volume of calls that would come in.
And so all the IOUs are very, I would say proud,
of having reconnections at at a pretty high rate.
I think we're in the high eighties across the Board,
plus minus of each other, in terms of getting
customers reconnected within a week.
And so in order to keep facilitating that and making sure
that that happens, we do kind of artificially limit
the number of disconnections to make sure
that our customer call centers are able to handle it.
The next piece for all residential
and small business customers that
we kind of talked about about on the previous slide was,
they'll all be offered payment plans up to 12 months
so that they have some time to work through
their previous debt that has been unpaid
and give them some, hopefully, some options.
In the bottom left, what we have here
are the impacts to residential customers only.
So, in that decision from the Residential Disconnections
Proceeding that I spoke about,
deposits and reconnection fees have been eliminated.
So those would not be coming back to residential customers.
And then the second kind of topic there
is that CARE, FERA, Medical Baseline,
the verifications and recertification requirements
are gonna start up again.
And so that those would get communicated out to customers.
And then we don't think that there's gonna be
much of a change for ESA,
as those activities kind of resumed last year.
On the bottom right-hand box what we have is
a discussion about small business customers only.
And so for small business customers,
the deposits and the reconnection fees
will start resuming on July 1st, 2021,
for all the large energy IOUs.
So that brings us to the end of this slide.
We can, I don't know if there's any specific questions
that we want to address now or we can just jump
straight into the PG&E ones and do it through
the Q and A for each individual IOU?
Benito: Would it be possible just,
in being cognizant of time that we have
for each of the presentations, to go through
the entirety of the slide deck
and then just open it up for Q and A at the end?
'Cause my fear would be is that,
if we did if for each individual IOU
we would simply run out of time.
So would it be possible to just do a brief overview
of each slide and then open it up to discussion at the end?
-: Okay. Yeah, we can definitely do that.
So maybe PG&E can speak and then we'll just
kind of skip through the Q and A until the very end.
So if we can get the next slide,
and PG&E, feel free to jump in here.
-: Sure. Thanks very much.
Appreciate the background there, Eric.
My name is also Eric.
I'm, Eric Olsen, Product Marketing Manager
at Pacific Gas and Electric Company.
It's my pleasure to introduce
our customer protections transition plan today.
At the heart of PG&E's transition plan
is really our commitment to help customers.
And what is shown on this slide
is the timeline of activities.
This shows, broadly speaking,
where our activities intersect,
where we've got a number of campaigns that are aligned
and how those are complimentary,
as well as really showcasing early on what we're doing
in advance of the transition date of June 30th
to make customers ready for this transition.
We're especially focused on
small business and residential customers
that are struggling to pay bills and who might be impacted
by collection activities, program recertification,
and when verification activities restart.
The objective of our plan overall
is really to ease customers through
the COVID protections transition.
And our approach is simple.
We're going to reach out.
We're going to help them to find and enroll in programs.
Help them manage their utility bills.
And inform them of changes to the programs
in which they're already enrolled.
As you can see here, with the January to June timeframe,
and what we've called out for financial assistance,
payment plan, Medical Baseline,
and income qualified program enrollment,
we've already begun this outreach effort.
We've begun to create early awareness
around scheduling changes for customer protections.
We've begun and continued to educate customers
about the status of their account.
And we're providing access to programs
that will help them reduce past due balances
and help them stay current in the future.
We're particularly focused on messaging
and coordinated offerings to customers--
Man: Zero nine, zero two, five seven.
Eric: I think we've got, somebody'll have to mute.
Woman: Okay, perfect.
In a few minutes, I'm going to send retainers for,
Richard, to your email address, so he can sign by--
-: Please mute yourself if you have not done so.
Woman: I have him on the phone.
-: All right. Thank you.
We're particularly focused on messaging
and coordinated offerings.
And we're looking at customers with the most intense needs.
This can be things such as the duration
and the amount of their past due balances,
income qualified program enrollments,
Medical Baseline qualification,
hard to reach and vulnerable customer populations,
access and functional needs, and any combinations thereof.
These are the characteristics we're really focused on
as they're indicative of customers
who are most in need of our support.
Our key strategies really focused on customer experience.
And I heard some things earlier
in the comments from our Commissioners
that really resonate with our plans.
Ease of engagement.
Availability of information.
Access to programs.
We've gotta be simple with our messaging.
Absolutely agree with these points.
And how we deliver is key.
Repetition of messaging.
This is not going to happen with just one or two touches.
We've gotta repeat our messages over time.
And we do this through coordinated campaigns.
And I'm gonna repeat that, through coordinated campaigns,
where we plan to involve more access to information
through community-based organizations, through local media,
social media, targeted outreach newsletters,
really running the gamut of all forms of communication.
We plan to leverage all these channels
as we drive awareness and enrollment,
because that's the most effective way
that we've found to reach customers.
We've also found through our initial input
gathered through customer focus groups,
community based organization focus groups,
involving LIOB and AFN participants,
that we also have to make sure
that the message hits home and it really resonates.
And to do that, we've gotta be relevant.
Next slide, please.
So what does that look like?
This slide explains at a high level
how we're looking at different segments of the audience,
what key messages we plan to drive home,
what programs we offer that are relevant
to those messages and to those audiences,
and what some of the channels are
that we plan to use across all of these campaigns.
We start with customer needs.
What can we do to help guide customers to a path of support?
We accomplish those through data-driven targeting.
Messaging is next.
Empathy, care, humility.
I've heard some of these words on the call today.
We're here to help, and we want customers to know this.
We've got real solutions to offer.
So next we're bundling what those offerings are
and doing so in a meaningful way
that makes sense to customers
and is intended to make their customer experience easy.
And I want to highlight, and Commissioner Shiroma,
I appreciate your raising this question earlier,
what will our approach be when it comes to translations?
We are adopting the same translation plan
as we've got for PSPS, and also taking lessons learned
from our Community Wildfire Safety Program Outreach,
in terms of AFN audiences and really ensuring
that we've got the most accessible communications we can.
So we've got less than four months remaining
until the planned end of these customer protections.
But we feel that with the input gathered here,
in meetings like this, for our engagements
with these groups, and with ongoing input,
we really have an opportunity to be successful.
Our internal mantra has become all hands on deck,
and I really invite that here.
And we look forward to your input and feedback.
Thank you very much.
-: Thank you, Eric.
I believe next up is Southern California Edison.
-: Hi, I'm gonna bounce back to the other Eric again.
So, what we have here, on the slide up,
is one, we want to make sure that everyone's aware
that this, and when Edison's presenting,
all this stuff also applies to our Catalina Gas.
I recognize that's not called out specifically,
but it's one and the same to us for all of these.
And then so to really start getting into this slide,
we recognize that obviously for some of you,
and especially those at the CPUC,
Edison talking about our Customer Service Re-Platform,
the CSRP, is probably gonna sound like
a broken record at this point, but we are almost there,
and we're getting pretty close now,
we're less than a month away.
However, we wanted to kind of make some broad awareness,
is that when CSRP kind of froze or was being
kind of designed and worked through,
the state of the system at the time
did not account for many of the things
that have happened recently, in the past year.
A quick example would be the same decision
that we've been talking about, that Decision 20-06-003,
that had some additional requirements that went in.
And so, when we're switching over,
because we're copying the old system
and then kind of transitioning that over,
there's some additional work that has to be done
before our system is ready to start
some of these collection activities
so that we're in compliance
with all the ordering paragraphs in that decision.
So, as a result of that, we,
after the system's installed in early April,
there's gonna be a little bit of a stabilization period
to make sure everything translated over correctly.
And then we're gonna start getting, to doing some work.
We're gonna make some additional adjustments
and change some things out.
A quick example would be, making sure that we have
the correct language in all of our disconnection notices.
And so before those notices go out, we wanna make sure
we have the right language, which is going to be entailed
in this additional work after the system goes live.
So, as a result here, what we're really talking about
is then, that means that we're not gonna
really start our disconnection activities
until an additional month later.
So we're looking at August 2nd for the date.
And so we want to be very transparent
and clear about what that looks like.
And so that means that residential customers
are not gonna get disconnected at the earliest
until September, early September, September 7th.
So that gives them an additional 69 days or so
beyond the emergency customer protections.
And then for small business, that's gonna be about 51 days,
'cause it's slightly different in the way that
the collections path goes, but it goes until August 20th.
The other thing in our transition plans,
well not on the slide here, but within
the transition plan is, we're gonna also artificially limit
the number of customers that are
going through this collections path.
So meaning, instead of every customer that is eligible
for overdue noticing and being pushed down this path,
we're gonna start with a small number, 500 customers,
on that August 2nd, August 3rd date.
So 500 customers means that, historically,
about 50% of those would then go proceed onto the next step
and not take any action and end up with a final call notice.
So the 500 becomes 250.
Historically, then, about 8% of those final call customers
proceed on to ultimately being disconnected.
So that would, if you take 250 and you take 8%,
it's about 20 customers.
So those are some of our historical numbers
and that's what we're kind of forecasting.
But again, the historical numbers also don't account
for all the additional customer protections
that we've kind of talked about that are in the appendix.
So we expect those numbers to be even lower.
So, really when we're talking about
that first date of disconnections,
we're talking closer to a small number,
of handful of customers, that hopefully are at that state.
And so definitely, we're artificially limiting
and starting the collections activity slower.
We're also artificially limiting
by starting the number of customers
that are going through the path at a much lower number.
And if we can keep it--
-: Say, Eric, I'm breaking my own rules
about not breaking into the presentation.
But I know the term of art,
as the Edison representative,
you're using the term eligible for disconnection.
Well, ordinarily when we use the word eligible,
it usually means, hey, you're eligible for a program,
for a benefit, for an opportunity.
Here, we're talking about
the severe action of a disconnection.
So, these folks are triggering disconnections.
And then also, I know you're focusing
on the anticipation of a small number of folks
who trigger the disconnection,
but I imagine and am hopeful that Edison
is really focusing on those 12 month plans
and all the different things you outlined earlier,
towards keeping folks from being disconnected.
I have no doubt that's your focus,
as you're trying to tell us how few people you anticipate
are actually getting disconnected.
I just wanted to give you that feedback.
-: Absolutely.
-: Back to you, back to you.
-: So, let me make sure that we address that comment as well.
So, in that example of 12 month payment plans.
There's a specific order for residential customers
that cannot be disconnected prior to being offered
a 12 month payment plan.
That was not historically there.
So that's why we think that that 8% would go even lower
as a result of that or be further delayed.
So there's a very good possibility that,
on September 7, zero disconnections happen,
because there's all these additional protections
that we've kind of outlined in the appendix.
So, it could be zero.
But what we also wanted to be transparent about
is should there be customers that ultimately do nothing,
that even though they've gotten outreach,
they've done nothing, here's the earliest date.
'Cause we, I think we've also been asked that
in numerous other forums about, well,
when's the date that this could happen?
And so we did want to try to be
as transparent about it as possible.
If we could proceed to the next slide, please.
Thank you.
So, this is Edison's last slide.
And what we're talking about here is
how does the verification activity
and recertification activity start or look
for CARE, FERA, and Medical Baseline customers,
when we had said we're starting
all this activity on July 1st?
So we want to be as transparent about
this as possible as well, and stating,
basically, during the emergency customers protection period
from March of 2020 all the way up until June 30th of 2021,
for any customer that enrolled or reached
their recertification anniversary during that period,
Edison basically automatically just pushed them forward.
So most of these are gonna be two years.
And so the example here at the bottom we're showing is,
we just assume a two year recertification period.
And so Edison pushed them out for two years,
meaning that if you enrolled this week for CARE,
your next recertification or ask would be two years later.
We're not gonna ask anybody right on July 1st,
just because they happened to have enrolled
during a certain time period.
And so we have an example here of what that looks like
in terms of the different years
and vintaging of when you enrolled.
And then any customer that is requested to recertify
is gonna be given the standard 90 days
to provide the requested documentation.
So really quick, to go through the examples.
If a customer enrolled on August 1st in 2018,
that means that their standard recertification
would have been August 1st, 2020, right?
And so during that, that was during
the emergency customer protections period,
so we just pushed that forward.
So then they're, the first time the customer
will see anything is August 1st, 2022.
For the customer that enrolled August 1st, 2019,
their standard is August 1st, 2021, and that's outside
of the emergency customer protection period,
so we're gonna move that into,
we're gonna ask for something on August 1st, 2021.
And then if a new customer had,
or a new enrollment had come in, on August 1st, 2020,
there's no recertification 'cause it's a new customer,
but they would have the same recertification request
in August 1st, 2022.
So we're trying to be as transparent as possible.
And these are kind of illustrative.
There's certain ones that can go out for four years,
depending on fixed income and whatnot,
but the same kind of rules apply,
we just want to kind of illustrate how this all works out.
In terms of the verification,
what that really then means is,
is on average every month, Edison's probably gonna go out
and ask for about a total of about 8,000 verifications,
that's what that's gonna look like.
And so right now, I think we have about 1.4 million.
So, over the course of a year,
we're gonna get to about 7%, 8%,
is what our historical average has been and what we plan
to maintain and continue that moving forward.
So that's all Edison had. Thank you very much.
And I appreciate your time.
-: Thank you very much, Eric.
Next up, we're gonna move on to SDG&E.
But before we do, I just wanted to do a time check.
So according to the agenda, we're supposed to move on
to small jurisdictional utilities at 11:05.
But that's probably not going to happen.
But just as a courtesy to SDG&E and SoCalGas,
we have all read in depth.
Sorry about that.
Took great notes on them.
So possible to be a little concise with your presentation
so we can move to the discussion, that would be wonderful.
So thanks very much.
And with that, SDG&E is next, I believe.
-: Hi, good morning. Thank you.
This is Michelle Somerville from SDG&E.
And with that, I'm going to try to be as brief as I can
and just hit the highlights that you haven't heard already.
I agree with the discussion and the goals
that my colleagues at the other IOUs have said.
We really want to help the customer through this transition.
And so we thoughtfully considered how best to do that
through our marketing techniques.
So, all of what PG&E said about marketing tactics
and targeted applies to SDG&E as well.
I did want to hit some of the specifics
around the resumption of program recertifications,
as Eric was just talking about for Edison.
SDG&E is also going through a customer system upgrade.
And so, in the midst of all of this, we are trying
to make sure that our customers are well communicated with.
Write with it, simple message to take action on
and trying to coordinate the systematic impacts of that.
So, for CARE and FERA and Medical Baseline recertifications,
we have a very similar construct
that Edison just talked about.
We're gonna use the anniversary dates
of those customers' enrollments as recertification dates.
And we're also going to have like a 90 day window
after the protections are lifted,
to which we don't recertify.
And those customers would just move on
to the next year's recertification.
For CARE and FERA, for Medical Baseline,
that will be 60 days.
Just to manage our systems and also manage our customer base
and give them enough time to have all of the feedback,
the outreach and the targeted customer conversations
and actions that need to happen,
in order for these customers to enroll and make sure
that all their documentation and enrollment
in programs is helping them through this transition.
So let's just go ahead and go to the next slide
so that we can go ahead and move on quickly.
The other thing I wanted to hit here
is the resumption of credit and collection activities.
Again, as Edison went through,
these are kind of an example of dates and timing
of how things would proceed through the collections process.
There would be no one eligible or at risk
for disconnection on July 1st.
And again, July 1st is the date currently selected.
If that date were to move, all of these examples would move.
The timing of these examples would move
with that date if it were extended.
And what I want to highlight here
is there are several notices that go out,
15 day notices, 48 hour notices, the reach out,
that the marketing and outreach, during this process.
So we are reaching out to the customer.
We are coordinating with our community-based organizations,
LIHEAP providers, to reach out
to the most vulnerable customers,
all during this time to help the customer
make those decisions that are gonna be best suited
to manage their bill and their energy needs.
Hopefully they will be enrolled in programs
or even the Arrearage Management Program
and get on a payment plan and those types of things.
So again, yes, when it comes down to the timing
of when they would be at risk for disconnection,
they would have taken steps to make sure
and we would help them take those steps
to make sure that that doesn't happen, that is our goal.
But this is sort of an idea of how that would look
if they took no action through that time,
or we were not able to help them through the process
and they were still behind in their bill.
With that, I will end my part of the presentation.
And I guess we're gonna take questions
at the end, is that correct?
Okay, perfect.
Well then I will pass it on to my colleague.
-: Okay. Thank you so much, Michelle.
And SoCalGas, Karen, whenever you're ready.
-: Hi Benito.
Hi, LIOB Board, Commissioners, and everyone attending,
taking time, thank you very much.
My name is Karen Mar.
I am the Policy Lead here for the Low Income Program.
And I feel very privileged to speak on behalf of our team.
Benito, would it be okay to just say ditto?
That everything my predecessors have said before me,
SoCalGas is in line.
I was...
But with that said, I will go ahead
and call out some key points for SoCalGas.
SoCalGas, along with everyone else, we will be resuming
the collection related activities on July 1st.
But two months prior, so in early May,
the pre-disconnection letter will be sent to our customers.
This two month prior timeline is in step with the outreach
and communication efforts that was discussed earlier.
We've gone ahead and provided a table for you.
This table outlines some key collection activities.
Again, May 1st, when the pre-disconnection letter is served.
Then on June 30th we have the ending
of the COVID-19 protections.
Afterwards, we have several resumption plans
for payment notifications.
And as Commissioner Rechtschaffen had mentioned earlier,
we've ensured that our language is direct, to the point,
and no business jargon that would cause confusion.
A simple message such as, "We've noticed that
"we've not received your payment."
Something that will trigger attention in customers
to reach out to us.
Then on August 30th, we resume
the field orders for disconnection.
And as Eric had mentioned earlier,
when we say we resumed the orders for disconnection,
the activities for disconnection,
it's not this blanket switch for, at least for SoCalGas,
switching the gas off for everyone in our service territory.
This is a phasal approach.
So between May 1st and August 30th,
our customers will have had about 120 days
or four months to contact us.
And during those 120 days, again, the outreach
and communication efforts will be continuing,
with the channels that will be presented before you.
So we are hoping that our customers, again,
in the four months that they have
before the disconnection efforts start rolling out,
they'll be reaching out to us, and we are ready.
We are ready to engage our customers
and get them on some type of a payment plan.
Next slide, please.
So this slide is giving a similar timeline of activities
regarding the CARE and medical activities
once it resumes, again, on July 1st.
And following the similar table that was shared by Edison,
we have some scenarios here to show you that
we thought about what would be the best practice to ensure
that our customers won't find anything confusing,
just of ease of continuation of the services
that they're offering.
So customers reach their recertification anniversary
during the emergency customer protection period,
we are recommending that they will automatically
be recertified for an additional year.
And for SoCalGas, that would be around 900,000 customers
who won't have to be bogged down with additional paperwork
and they'll continue on getting the discount.
So as the IOU that's closing out the presentation
for all four larger IOUs, just want to,
again, echo what Eric has shared earlier
about the disconnection, at least for SoCalGas,
and I'm pretty sure it's similar amongst all four IOUs,
that when the disconnection process starts in late August,
for SoCalGas, we will not disconnect
any customers who has a Low Income
Home Energy Assistance Program pledge pending,
customers who make a payment of at least
20% of the amount due,
customers who are on Medical Baseline,
customers who already have payment plans in place,
customers who are enrolled in our AMP Program.
And so again, looking forward to getting
some additional recommendations.
And thank you very much for, on behalf of all four IOUs,
thank you very much for your time.
We're open for questions now.
-: Thank you very much, Karen,
and all of your colleagues, IOUs,
and Jessica for your work in coordinating everything.
I'm sure that took a lot of time.
Going back to what we said at the onset of item five,
Commissioner, if your colleagues
would like to ask questions first, we'll start there.
And then we'll move on to members of the Board.
-: Okay, thank you, Benito.
Yes, I see Martha's hand is raised.
-: Thank you, Commissioner Shiroma.
And thank you to the IOUs for that excellent presentation.
I think there's many very good points raised.
I know even pre-COVID, there was a lot of triaging
already happening by them on the disconnections.
I know that in one particular territory,
very sad to say that nearly one in four customers
was eligible for disconnections at one point.
And so this is something that is obviously
already well triaged.
I did want to make sure, just to put a pin in the fact,
that we will need to coordinate with our staff,
our disconnection staff in particular,
to provide clarity in these plans
on how the monthly cap on disconnections will work,
so that we are consistent with what has been
laid out in these plans, which is that we don't want to see
a massive spike in disconnections.
And unfortunately it looks like our formula
for maintaining a balanced monthly cap was based on
basically previous months' levels of disconnections.
So, without getting into too much detail,
I think I look forward to working with the staff
and utilities on making sure we come up with
a good rule that governs the monthly cap.
So we stay at a non-disruptive level.
And it's, basically, had we had
an annual level of disconnections going,
this would not have been an issue,
but since we're starting at zero, the formula doesn't work.
So, I won't spend any more time on that, but just to know
that I would like to see in the transition plans
a really clear acknowledgement of how that's gonna work.
And I'm glad to see that the plans already acknowledge
that we're not gonna see a full attempt
to try to exercise and get into the cap all at once.
I also wanted to acknowledge PG&E for working
with a CSD on some of the LIHEAP coordination.
They seem to be a little ahead of some of the other,
some of your utilities there.
So I will also be following up with staff on making sure
that we have that level of depth and coordination with CSD
in preparation for the moratorium lifting.
And I look forward to working with folks on that.
This effort on the transition plans, as we know,
is in constant, will need constant coordination
with the new rulemaking that the Commission
has opened on COVID arrears.
I noticed that many of the elements of the plan were
from the Disconnections Proceeding, which is good to see,
but we will be needing to maintain that coordination
as we continue to hear from the public on what
additional measures may be needed prior to the end of June.
So just to note that that's gonna be important.
And certainly the workshop that is planned,
we'll put out a ruling soon, for the 25th and 26th,
will be critical to implementing,
not necessarily anything in the plans themselves,
but just the awareness of that.
So, I think that those cover the issues.
And also to support the earlier comments that
the importance of having resources provided
to the CBOs that are doing so much of this work.
I just recall some of the partner organizations,
like during the Disconnections Proceeding,
and how much work they do to make sure folks are aware
of the Arrearage Management Plan,
the payment plans in general,
and how important that's gonna be during this transition.
So, hope to see some of that
further delineated in the plans.
Thank you.
-: Thank you, Commissioner Guzman Aceves.
And again, that's March 25th and 26th,
is that right, for the upcoming public workshop
on the current rulemaking.
Other Commissioners, with questions or comments.
Yes, we'll go with Commissioner Houck
and then Commissioner Rechtschaffen.
President Batjer, I wasn't sure if you've raised your hand,
but we'll go in that order, how's that?
Okay, Commissioner Houck.
-: Thank you, Commissioner Shiroma.
And thank you for that great presentation.
The AMP Program went live on February 1st.
And I just wanted to hear a little bit about
the utilities rollout and the fact that
there's not much time between now and this June 30th date
and what efforts are being made
to get enrollment in the program?
If there's been any major issues or concerns
and how utilities are gonna plan to deal with that,
to make sure we get folks enrolled?
-: Hi, so I can answer, for Edison at least.
So, Edison, we currently offer two paths to enroll,
one being, call in and speak to
a customer call center representative.
The other being what is on our online, on sce.com.
However, we want to make sure that for,
that there's kind of an understanding, at least here,
about what that really entails.
We're working and trying really hard
to make it as seamless as possible for the customer.
However, on the back end,
it is very much a manual operation.
So, on sce.com right now, there's a form
that the customer can fill out and then they hit submit
and it looks like it's online enrollment.
But if you kind of like peel back the curtain.
it really is like a hamster wheel there,
there's an analyst, there's people looking at it,
and they're transitioning and they're making sure
that that that customer is eligible.
And we had to build a separate database on the side
and then temporarily start looking at
which customers are eligible
so that we can kind of match quickly.
So there's a lot of work in order to do that.
But I'll also say that Edison is gonna start engaging
in outreach to eligible customers after our CSRP go live.
And the intent is to hit all customers that are eligible
for AMP prior to the end of emergency customer protections,
so that they all have an opportunity
to be aware and and understand.
And we'll probably stagger that, so that
not all 90 some odd thousand that are eligible
call in at the same time.
And so we'll want to stagger that to make sure
that they can get quick call times through the call center
if that's the avenue that they choose to enroll in.
-: Other utilities? Want to weigh in?
San Diego?
PG&E?
-: Sure, I can speak for PG&E.
So far we've seen, I believe,
in the range of 8,000 enrollments to date.
We have been doing primarily person to person outreach
through our credit team doing outbound calls,
our call centers doing outbound calls.
We've also been integrating
AMP messaging into communications,
courtesy account status letters going to customers,
really trying to kind of walk before we run,
as far as the enrollment goes,
and making sure that we are getting
the word out in a way that makes sense.
And we're making sure that our messaging
is making sense to customers.
-: San Diego or SoCal, anything else to add?
Michelle: This is San Diego,
it's Michelle from San Diego.
And much like Edison and PG&E just iterated,
we are reaching out to customers on social media,
just to add a little bit of tactics, social media,
as well as engaging in our energy solutions partner network,
which I'm sure the other utilities are as well.
We've also done bill inserts.
And so we are using all of our normal tactics
to reach and to target to customers on this issue
And look forward to continuing to do that.
And that's why this marketing lead up to
when the protections will actually end
is extremely important.
And so we'll make that concerted effort
in the upcoming days as well, and weeks and months.
-: PG&E, adding a couple of stats that just came my way.
We have been making approximately 350 to 400 calls a day.
Of those, about 100, or in addition,
100 emails or going to voicemail.
In total that amounts to approximately 10,000 calls.
And the total debt amount forgiven is,
or if those plans are adhered to, $11.5 million.
-: Okay. Thank you.
Shall we go to Commissioner Rechtschaffen.
-: Thank you, Commissioner Shiroma.
Karen, with SoCalGas, I guess I have a question for you,
although it could apply to Edison as well.
And I apologize if someone asked this already.
But your schedule for recertifying eligibility
for CARE and FERA customers, is different
by a month from Edison's.
And SDG&E's is also similar to yours.
It's very late in the day.
You've already made a lot of plans.
I assume or hope you've thought about
trying to coordinate those dates,
and is it possible to coordinate those dates
so that a SoCalGas customer who's also an Edison customer
would not be faced with two different deadlines
under which they have to re-establish eligibility.
I'm just wondering if there's any way
to coordinate that, those dates?
-: Commissioner Rechtschaffen, yeah, thanks for the question.
And absolutely, there's like, we're trying to figure out
how do we keep things consistent
amongst our internal programs, here at SoCalGas,
and still try and partner and match with
our complimentary electric provider as well.
Offline we are looking at these draft schedules
and in discussions.
So, we'll definitely take that into consideration.
Eric, if you would like to add anything.
-: No, I'm gonna say ditto, just like you did.
-: Cool. Thank you.
-: Okay, thank you very much.
I appreciate that you're looking at that.
Hopefully something can be worked out.
-: And Karen, you're coordinating with LADWP as well,
on the Muni side of your customer base?
-: Hi, Commissioner Shiroma.
Yes, at SoCalGas, we're really in a unique situation
because we have our sister company,
as I was mentioning earlier, this syncing up for SoCalGas,
we have that very strong effort we have
with the Munis throughout our service territory.
And we also have to keep in mind
that our sister company SDG&E,
so trying to stay in sync with our family
and with our partners.
But yes, that is all in motion,
as we speak, behind the curtains.
Thank you.
-: Okay. And I think President Batjer says
she did not have any questions at this point.
But I shall check, and otherwise
we will go back to Chair Delgado-Olson,
and I notice Lourdes Medina had her hand up.
Okay. Back to LIOB.
-: Okay. Thank you, Commissioner.
Before we go to questions, I did want to,
it was stated at the committee meeting a week ago,
not too much in the substance,
because I'm sure the members of our Board
who are the experts on them will bring them up,
but to recap some of the takeaways from a week ago
in terms of what we discussed
as Board members of the committee meeting.
We talked about extreme climate protections
and beyond the 72 hours into the future.
We talked about the CARE subsidy rates
for the most vulnerable households.
We talked a little bit about data sharing,
although that was more related to water.
There were a number of questions regarding Medical Baseline.
There were questions related to increases in the marketing
and outreach budgets on a one-time basis
for some of the objectives listed
in the draft advice letters.
There was a lot of discussion around
how we're going to measure success.
Best practices from the Aliso Canyon incidents.
As well as enrollment and or referrals
into weatherization program and other offerings,
as well as coordination with public agencies.
And overall household prioritization.
We also talked about arrearage dollars for water
going toward LIHEAP, but I understand
that actually already happened, which is great news.
Perhaps we can confirm that.
But I wanted to just start with the first item,
which was extreme climate protections
as an opening question.
So I noted in the draft advice letters, it was stated
in numerous places that there's a 72 hour cutoff
in the future for an extreme climate incident.
And so, a question that my colleagues and I had was
one, a clarification of does this include cold and heat.
Another was, we noted that
the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Agency,
I hope I said that right, cites an 80% accuracy rate
in predicting extreme climate incidents
seven days into the future.
So why three days with that level of accuracy
being documented with years of data.
And then, I think we were all
hard struck by what happened in Texas.
And so we also wanted to ask about the feasibility
of a power restoration plan.
If there is an extreme climate episode
that's going to happen and a household
has already been disconnected, is there an easy way,
if it's eminent within say a day or two,
to restore the power so that that household and family
are protected during that incident.
And so that's the question I have.
And then Lourdes, I believe, you're next.
-: Did you give me the word?
-: No, it's a question for the IOUs
with respect to climate protection?
-: Sure.
Maybe I can start off with answering some of that.
So there is a low end as well.
So, on the high end it's 100 degrees
and on the low end it's below 32 degrees.
So, it's on both sides, in terms of the 72 hour look ahead.
So, that's the first question.
I don't have historical context
as to why a three-day versus a seven day.
So we'll have to take a look at that and get back to you,
unless one of my other colleagues wants to jump in here.
And then in terms of, I guess, turning back on,
like operationally, I guess we would have to look at it
and see what the issues are or what that would look like.
I think theoretically, it's a doable ask,
but I do want to kind of confirm with the operations team
and check in on that.
-: Okay. Are there other comments from any of the other IOUs?
Michelle: Hi, this is Michelle
from San Diego Gas and Electric.
And I would echo Eric's comments.
Just a little food for thought.
So these three day heat and cold,
sort of extreme climate terms are in our tarrifs.
And taking a look at it, maybe we have better research today
and the Commission and others
might want to explore changing those.
But right now, those are the parameters in our tariffs,
so that's what we were guided by.
I just wanted to point that out.
And so anything different from that,
if the Governor or the Commission
wanted us to do something different than that,
we would look for guidance on that, official guidance.
And then also, on the going in,
and if we had an emergency event,
going in and reconnecting customers
who have been disconnected, again,
yeah, I'd have to work with the operational folks
because there may be some safety issues with that,
depending on what that emergency was, right?
We wouldn't want to reconnect power
to places that weren't safe in the environment
that they're in in that particular emergency.
And that's, those are the comments I would have.
-: Okay. Thank you very much.
Board Member Medina.
-: Thank you, Chairman.
So, I do appreciate the slides and the presentations.
I very much appreciate the timeline graph.
It's very helpful.
And keeping in mind that this language here you're using
is also very helpful.
I do appreciate when you're being more sensitive
to the crisis we're all living in at this time.
So looking at the disconnection timeline,
I think it's very interesting and very timely
to see how much response you're getting.
If you've already started since February,
I'm excited to see in the next Board presentation,
what has been your data so far?
So hopefully by the next LIOB meeting you can have reports
on how it's gone so far, from the February 1st date.
Thank you.
-: Thank you, Board Member Medina.
Other questions and comments from members of the Board?
-: Hello, Mr. Chairman, this is Bob Castaneda.
Yeah, I'd like to go ahead and just quickly to my notes,
I believe the gentleman from Southern California Edison had,
well, he had forecasted zero disconnections.
And so that's our collective hope.
But having said that, I have to reflect on the fact
that we have existing categorical programs or resources
at our disposal to be working at full efficacy,
to have our best chance at zero disconnections.
So having said that, what I'd like to see
in some finalized AMP, is detail in terms of
better data exchange amongst key service providers,
stakeholders, including CSD,
including LIHEAP service providers,
including the CHANGES program that we have out of the CPUC,
as well as your Energy Services Assistance program providers
as well as the CARE capitation service providers.
So, in essence, kudos to the utilities
for providing extra time for disconnection.
Actually fundamentally happens in early September.
Hopefully we avoid that.
But at the end of the day, this extra time
gives us another bite at the apple to get it right.
So, one of the things I'd also like to see and request
is a hierarchy of need.
For example, some of the data that I've seen,
again, it's probably not the most current,
but as of December 31, we have more customers in arrears
than we do have enrolled in the CARE program.
So, clearly there should be some detailed outreach
going to these customers to make them aware
that the CARE program does exist,
as well as a potential AMP plan, if they need it.
The other issue that I'm kind of wrestling with,
in terms of this hierarchy of need,
based on better data exchange and targeting of customers,
would be critical care customers.
What I'm talking about are households
that are needing life support systems in their home
to basically just survive.
And then, clearly we have our Medical Baseline customers.
Californians that are having COPD issues
and other sorts of respiratory issues
that requires respiratory equipment.
So, and then we have an ongoing series of levels
dealing with climate zones, where the weather,
it's extremely hot or extremely cold,
PSPS zones, fire zones, and so on and so forth.
So, in my mind that gives us a better way
to sort of dedicate targeted communication strategies
as well as resources to not only avoid disconnections,
but also to service the neediest of the neediest
in the state.
Thank you.
-: Thank you, Robert.
Other questions and comments from members of the Board.
-: Hi, Benito. This is Jason.
I have one quick question.
So, first I just wanted to thank the IOUs
for their well thought out plans and that presentation.
What I wanted to focus on is the triaging of customers.
So, all IOUs have proposed these elaborate marketing
and outreach plans and strategies.
And when a customer's is wanting to (voice distorting)
do they go back to the utility, a company,
where the customers respond to
and get information on the various programs, for one.
And then two is more about the triaging
that I would like to better understand,
of how the utility companies are gonna understand the needs
of the particular customers that are responding
and direct them to the right resources that they would need,
especially in the point that the Arrearage Management Plans,
as a condition of eligibility,
requires participation in CARE or FERA.
So, I guess I'm sensitive to the process
that a client might follow to successfully enroll
in the AMP program if they're not
previously enrolled in CARE or the FERA program.
And then if they are customers that have special needs,
do the utilities have plans to hand off those customers
to community based organizations or partners
that can help facilitate the enrollment in those programs?
Or is the utility prepared to step up to do that?
-: I can quickly answer for Edison.
So Decision 20-06-003 also mandated
that customers be given an opportunity to enroll
in all applicable or eligible benefit programs.
And so for Edison, we've created a list
that includes like CARE, FERA, and then if they're in that,
then AMP, and put them on payment plans.
And so we have a list of programs, so to speak,
that we would be offering the customer
when we're speaking with them.
So imagine a customer calls in and says,
hey, I'm having some trouble paying my bill,
a customer call center rep would be able to see
which ones that the customer is in and on
and make that offer and then kind of record like,
hey, we made this offer, 'cause one of the other things
in that opening paragraph specifically is,
the customer is given two billing cycles
or roughly two months to enroll.
And so we also do want to record like,
hey, we've notified the customer, and then they're on hiatus
while we're waiting for them to go through
and enroll in all these.
So definitely there is communication around that,
specifically for call ins, and then beyond
the broader communication that we talked about
just getting enrollment for customers out there.
In terms of specifically getting on CARE or FERA,
absolutely, I know that we had some questions about if like,
the hypothetical, I think at the subcommittee meeting was,
if a customer lost her job,
after the customer protections ended, could they jump on?
And so at least for, I think this one would be true,
but for Edison, we've definitely run that down,
and we're sure that yeah, they can jump on
and they can certify that they are now eligible for this,
and they would be able to get on.
So we think there definitely are avenues
and we're gonna try to get
the information out to the customers
in as many different formats as possible
and hopefully give them a wide variety of choices
and options for them to consider
and see what best fits their needs and specific case.
-: Okay, thank you for that.
Just a quick follow-up.
I guess what I'm getting at is if a customer,
during that interaction with your utility company,
they assess, having a special need of some sort,
or you sense that they require some type
of special assistance to help them enroll in those programs,
how do those customers get assisted that way?
Because it's great that we're giving them information,
but we also may need to also provide
some additional assistance to help them
walk down the right path or speak to the right organization.
Because I think that's been acknowledged
in these programs all along, where we know that
we have available all of these different ways
for an individual to apply for assistance
and these different mechanisms that we use
to allow entry into the programs,
and they'd need to be utilized.
But I don't see them being emphasized in some of the plans
or at least the presentations that were made today.
-: I hear you, definitely understand
the concern that you're getting at.
So I guess there's, in my mind, there's a lot of different
kind of assistance that could be needed.
I know our customer call center representatives
come in a variety of languages,
so we can address kind of hopefully
if there's a language barrier,
we can get them into their native language
that they can speak to and and make it a little bit easier
to explain some of these things.
In addition, I know that Edison also partners with CBOs
to assist with the customers in these specific cases.
And so it kind of goes back to, I think somebody had told me
we have something like 1600 CBOs
and faith-based organizations that we're working with,
and then an additional 30 that really target
these hard to reach areas, these specific customers
I think that you're speaking to,
and those that we give even additional,
we provide incentives and we provide some funding
to get the message out there.
And so that's how we're trying to address that,
that piece that you're speaking about.
-: Thank you.
-: I can add to that, on behalf of PG&E.
We have had a customer service outbound call campaign
that has to date reached almost 120,000,
we've reached out to almost 120,000 customers.
That's really intended to be a holistic,
solution-oriented call that talks about
LIHEAP, CARE, FERA, Arrearage Management Plan,
if that's something that customer's eligible for,
but the contact center reps are looking at customer data
as they're having that conversation and also inviting input.
If a customer perhaps has had a change
of financial circumstances, is now eligible for CARE
or had a change of income, is now eligible for FERA.
Those are the kinds of things
that come up in those conversations.
In addition to that, we do plan to incorporate
into our messaging and are already incorporating
into some of the account status letters,
things like those communications,
offering what are the opportunities,
where is there kind of cross-marketing
or cross selling opportunities?
We do know that LIHEAP is a referral for us.
We're not processing those applications internally,
necessarily, so that's where
the cross coordination with other agencies.
And I think what you're suggesting makes a lot of sense,
working with CBOs and CSD and others out there
to really ensure that we're bringing
the strongest package to customers.
-: Chair? -: Yes.
-: Just one more question.
And that, along these lines, and that is
to drill down a bit on the call centers.
What I should have reminded us at the get go is,
we heard at our En Banc a few weeks ago on rates that
the arrearage for our regulated energy is $1.1 billion.
It's over a billion dollars that
our regulated utility companies
are experiencing in terms of customers
who have not been able to pay their bills.
We're talking about some hundreds of thousands of customers.
So, we heard a little bit about the call centers
and phasing things, because call center wait times,
that's really important.
Is there anything else that any of the utilities
want to share with us about what they are doing
to assure that their call centers are ready.
All the other efforts that are on line,
CBOs, the faith-based groups, energy efficiency workers
and so forth, towards helping out here.
But what about anything else
on the call centers, to be ready?
Eric you're nodding your head. Eric Olsen.
-: I am, yes. Thank you.
One of the things that did early on
was we reached out to customers, both through focus groups
with business and residential customers,
as well as to community based organizations,
the LIOB, AFN, to get their input
on what are the right things to be talking about
and how can we present them in a way
that will resonate and really be internalized.
We want to make these communications
actionable and understandable.
It can be daunting.
It can be really challenging.
And that situation for customers,
where they're not sure where to turn,
they're not sure how to get out of a hole
that they might find themselves in
when it comes to past due balances.
So, as we're able to kind of peel back
the layers of the onion and understand
what are those key messages and how can we show up
with a tone and a message that's empathetic
to get past that initial standpoint.
It's really an important piece of the puzzle.
That, in combination with a lot of different channels
and making sure that our message is getting out there
through trusted advisors.
So it's a combination of things.
-: Commissioner Shiroma, this is Karen from SoCalGas.
And I wanted to specifically address your question
about the call center efforts.
For SoCalGas, the call centers are working closely
on the core team that's part of the transition plan,
the collections and billing.
They are communicating with the call center teams
to ensure to give them a heads up about,
as you've mentioned, the coming end of the moratorium
and what type of call volumes we are expecting.
SoCalGas, we are used to high call,
our service, our call centers,
sharing best practices amongst the four IOUs.
We have systems in place and support,
resources, overtime, all of that is in place
to ensure that we keep the level of service
and level of satisfaction at the requirement.
So I think your concern is valid.
And just you sharing that with us, I jotted it down.
We're gonna revisit that.
But I hope this addresses the question you had
about are the call centers ready.
-: All right, thank you.
I see Lourdes has her hand up.
-: Sorry, would it be possible for me also
to jump in on that, to make sure?
Sorry, real quick. -: Oh sure, sure.
Hear from Edison, sure.
-: Yes, for Edison, so we recognize that we also have
all of the same constraints and we actually have
some additional ones because we have
our customer service system re-platforming going on.
So normally Edison has a set number
of call center employees that are in California
that are Edison employees,
and then we also subcontract out to a company out in Texas
to handle some additional overflow.
And so we triage the calls to give the more complicated ones
that require more training to our internal Edison employees.
And then the ones that may be easier,
like I just want to turn on my power,
switch it over to my name,
then those we'll outsource a little bit.
In recognizing that with our system upgrade
we're gonna do probably even more
and have some potential for more customers to call in.
What Edison has done is then contracted
with another company out in Mexico
on a temporary basis to handle even more of that.
And I believe the term that is used is kind of like
just the additional themes like the bubble of it,
so that you can build more and more
as you need to, on a temporary basis.
Proactively though, we also recognize that things like AMP,
that if they go through the call center,
they have a whole list of eligibility requirements
that you see in our in our presentation appendix.
will take up a lot of time and potentially
if a customer calls, a rep has to go through and verify
each one of those eligibility parameters.
It could increase your average handling time
and you would not be able to enroll as many customers.
So what Edison did is proactively,
and I kind of spoke to this a little bit before,
was we built a database that gets refreshed
on I think a daily basis right now that show
here are all the eligible customers
so that hopefully most of the time if a customer calls in,
we can search it real quick, ping against the database,
and we already know if they're eligible or not.
And so we found that that also lowered
our average handling time.
So, things of that, where we can try to speed things up
or do a little bit of work on the back end
before the customer calls,
we find that's been really helpful for us.
Thank you.
-: Lourdes, I think you had your hand up.
-: Yes. Thank you.
Yeah, and actually in regards to the calls,
I did already get two community members call me
that they were called by PG&E.
So I'm excited that I'm hearing that.
And then too, the question that they asked me
is like, well how do I know it's not a scam, right?
I go, well, if you're their customer,
they should be telling you information.
And they're trying to get something from you,
they're gonna be taking information from you.
So, I think that the call centers,
it's also very important also to provide,
for them not to feel they're being scammed
that they could check, well, if you want to call us back,
this is our company number
or this is a badge number or so forth.
And so I think that it's helpful to also note
that for Spanish language community members,
they're always be subject by predator lenders out there.
So I just tell them that if they can give you information,
you as a customer, then that means
that it is the company you're talking to.
Thank you.
-: Thank you, Lourdes.
Other questions, comments from members of the Board.
-: Hey, Benito. This is Pat.
Yeah. I have a question.
In the PG&E's draft plan, they addressed the issue
of the transition of customers to TOU rates
occurring just about the same time
as the customer protections are ending.
So I have a couple of questions.
One is, is that only applicable to PG&E
or are other utilities also doing transitions to TOU rates
to customers during that same period of time?
That's my first question.
-: This is Jessica with LIOB.
I can answer that at a high level.
I understand that PG&E will also be
transitioning time of use as well as SCE.
I believe San Diego has completed, but I would like
San Diego and PG&E to confirm for their IOUs.
-: Thank you, Jessica.
-: Hi, this is Michelle Somerville at SDG&E,
and yes, we have completed
our residential transition to time of use rates.
-: Okay, so my next question,
since PG&E really kind of, sort of,
outlined what their strategy was
really well in their draft plan,
there's a lot of information.
My concern is there's a lot of information,
a lot of things happening with these customers at one time.
And so, there's a lot of activity and scamming,
as Lourdes just mentioned, with people
canvassing the streets, talking about the TOU rates.
And so it seems to me that there's a lot of information
for customers to have to comprehend at the same time.
So, I'm wondering if anybody's just given any thought
to how we make sure that customers are really
understanding the different messages and how we use that
to combat some of the issues of people making phone calls
or walking the streets, knocking on doors,
talking about do you have smart meters,
do you know about changing to the time of use rates,
that aren't even a part of the utility companies.
And I know for a fact that's happening
because someone was canvassing my neighborhood
and then I've also gotten calls from other people
who are receiving phone calls.
So, I just wanted to get some thoughts and input
from the utility companies on how we deal with those issues?
-: Hi, it's Eric from PG&E.
Thanks for the question.
I can take a first pass here.
What the concern he raises is absolutely fundamental.
We do want to make sure to support outreach
and in-person canvassing any of those efforts to ensure
that where we can it's not perceived as being a scam.
One of the ways that we can and have done that is
through some of the coordinated outreach efforts,
making sure customers are aware and notified ahead of time
before someone comes to their door,
making sure that we work with local organizations,
community outreach, and leveraging those channels
and trusted communications through those as well.
It is, I would call it an ongoing challenge
and something that we are definitely focused upon
and want to make sure we're entertaining
and interested in hearing additional ideas as well
-: Other feedback from other utilities to Pat's question?
-: I think the key thing is we do need a commitment
from the IOUs to go back and really take a hard look
at all of these different programs.
Certainly TOU is gonna be very important this summer,
as we all work together to not have
rolling blackouts this summer, okay.
And I know, speaking of all hands on deck,
it is an all hands on deck effort.
But if the other utilities don't have an answer
to Pat's question at this point,
it's to go back and really look at how
that coordination can be smoothly done.
And then get back to the LIOB
on anything else that could inform that effort.
Okay?
-: Commissioner, I just want to say,
and I'm not really trying to be funny,
but I was sitting here thinking about it, and I was like,
we really need an equivalent of Dr. Fauci
for all this utility messaging.
A spokesperson, to really help people understand that.
'Cause I am very concerned that people
get different messages and that there's a lot to comprehend
in this respect with all of the different things
that are happening on the utilities side.
-: Right on.
Yeah, my family, it's like, well, what is Dr. Fauci saying?
(chuckling)
Somebody's trying to speak.
-: Yeah, just laughing at that statement, Pat.
I appreciate any time for humor.
Yeah, I just wanted to share that, at least for Edison,
we are looking at an integrated messaging strategy,
where we look across the entire year.
Because we understand that there are many components
that are going to impact our customers this year,
and we've already spoke about some of them already.
And so we want to make sure that we look across
the entire year to see where are the opportunities
that our outbound marketing education and outreach
could help to provide more of those
umbrella messaging opportunities, really looking
to making sure that we're maximizing where we can.
So that, for example, when we're talking about
Medical Baseline, we're talking about
our Critical Care Back-up Battery program,
we're talking about CARE,
sort of a packaging and looking at it
more from a portfolio standpoint, as what Jason was saying,
triaging our customers and their needs,
and definitely echo what Eric from PG&E shared as well,
there are very tactical things that we can do
to ensure that we assure our customers,
such as sharing the Edison logo,
that this is a verified contractor.
And if this is a area of interest for the LIOB,
I think this could be a future agenda item.
Something that we can get back
and have more robust discussion on
-: Thank you, Jessica. -: Hi, Pat, oh.
-: Oh, please go ahead. -: Oh, sorry, Benito.
I just wanted to address Pat's question.
At SoCalGas, we do have a webpage dedicated
for scams and scam alerts, Pat.
And we'll be sure to revisit that page.
Some of the information that Jessica
and our fellow IOU teammates shared about logos and such,
we have information here, and we'll be sure to revisit it
and see how we can leverage already existing information
regarding scam, how we can leverage perhaps
with the CBOs and FBOs that we work with,
get them familiar with it.
Yeah, your concern is absolutely valid.
With more heightened, there's other opportunists
who go after customers, so yeah.
Thank you.
-: Thank you, Karen.
And Pat, I did have another question,
but Pat, I wanted to make sure is that good for, okay, cool.
One was just sort of a clarification,
'cause it might just be in the definition of terms
for the Medical Baseline consideration.
I noted that in a lot of the draft letters
it stated that "individuals who are permanently disabled
"have continue to recertify."
And so it seems like a conflict of terms.
I'm just trying to understand some of the detail better.
So in other words, if someone,
when I hear a permanent disability,
I think it's going to need a piece of medical equipment
and to charge it regularly, for a condition
that won't improve over time.
So, why do we make them recertify
if we know that it's permanent?
Michelle: Hi, this is Michelle from SDG&E,
and I'll try to hit that one.
I'm not an operational expert, but we do ask them
to recertify because of their location, right?
So our accounts are hooked up to a premises.
And that person, although their disability
will not improve, they may move.
And so we want to make sure that
we are protecting them in the right premises.
I think that's the primary concern.
-: I appreciate that.
I guess the followup would be,
wouldn't it be tied to the individual on the bill
and not the address because if I move
from one location to another, my name is still on the bill.
Is it because it might be someone in the family
who's name is on the bill or how does that work?
Michelle: Yeah, that's correct.
So if you have someone in your household,
maybe your mother or your grandparent
who has the Medical Baseline criteria,
that person's name may not be associated with that bill.
-: Okay. Thank you.
Makes sense.
Other questions or comments from members of the Board?
-: Yeah. Hi, Benito.
This is Bob again.
But I've gotta tell you, I just love what Pat came up with,
which is like all of us, we're getting a lot of robo calls.
We're getting a lot of unsolicited
sort of communication and direct mail.
But, I think that the idea of having
almost like a Dr. Fauci spokesperson,
it's really non-partisan,
it just, kind of like a Californian
to maybe make public service announcements,
maybe a visual for a point of sale,
together with a tagline, for example,
in Spanish, you could say (speaking Spanish)
or a lot of different other things
that could be language specific
that really kind of is appealing and non-threatening
and separates this effort in regards to typically,
and I think Cliff mentioned it earlier,
a lot of times, if we don't simplify the message,
it just simply doesn't get to where
we need it to get or do what we want it to do.
So, I don't know if maybe a suggestion
or a question going to the utilities,
whether or not, with their marketing budgets,
they could factor in public service announcements
with a third party and maybe designate or localize it
to the extent that it has built in adherence
to the communities that we're targeting,
if that's a possibility?
-: I think we can promise to take a look at it.
-: I think if nothing else, perhaps a one-stop phone number
or something that everyone,
that adds uniformity to the entirety of the state,
especially for areas that overlap.
Yeah.
I'm trying to build off of what you just said, Robert,
but I mean, Dr. Fauci, I love that idea,
but he's a world famous individual.
He's up there with the president of the United States.
So I don't know if we can do that.
But I do think there could be a way that the messaging
from the utilities is uniform,
so that it's one number, it's one stop,
it's one place regardless of where you are in the state.
And then you're immediately referred to the utility
that provides you service, so that it can be
advertised across the state that way.
-: This is Jason.
I'd just like to expand on that idea
and that thinking a bit more.
I think it's akin to something we did
during the energy crisis in the early 2000,
where Flex Your Power campaign,
even though that was encouraging individuals
to reduce their power, but there was also mention
of offerings that were being made through the utilities,
as well as parts of the state response
to help control and stabilize rates during,
I guess during that energy crisis.
And I guess this would be kind of on par with that.
We're dealing with a potential crisis.
And then there was a landing page
where individuals could go and verify
some of the statements or information
that they're getting to be true.
And then obviously they can be routed
to the right utility company to get additional information.
Or even partners that the utilities are promoting,
just to bring, just to ensure that they're,
all of the information is legitimized.
-: I remember that campaign actually.
Which tells you they work.
I remember Flex Your Power,
it was everywhere for quite a while.
And I think I was high school kid back then.
So if I remembered it when I was in high school,
that's pretty impressive.
But I guess, Eric, is that something, or Jessica,
is there a potential to have a uniforms messaging front
and a way to refer people to one place
that would refer them to their service provider?
-: Yeah, this is Jessica.
I was gonna just comment that
I think where this conversation is going is,
this is necessitating a Statewide marketing approach
for the condition of consumer protections
and helpful solutions for our customers,
similar to many other Statewide campaigns.
If that's the case, it's a really large endeavor.
And so I just want to suggest that the LIOB
put that recommendation into a letter to the CPUC
or in some other forum.
I believe there was going to be, Benito,
I don't know if it's a letter or some other form
to capture all this feedback prior
to the April 1st filing of our advice letters.
And if there is this now growing interest
in a Statewide campaign,
I would suggest that format and that avenue.
So then the Commission could respond on that
because their decision, or proposed decision, sorry,
that we're all writing our advice letters on,
doesn't have mention of a Statewide campaign.
So it's a bit more in scope than,
we were individually, the IOUs were planning
to respond within our own service area
marketing and education and outreach plans.
So, and I welcome anybody else's feedback on that.
And if we have Energy Division representatives here,
if they have an opinion.
But the thought of a Statewide campaign,
I feel as it's bigger than our IOUs
to individually respond to.
-: That is the case, Jessica.
This is Genevieve Shiroma.
We haven't authorized the IOUs
to collect rates to budget this kind of thing.
But meanwhile, as Jessica outlines,
this can be folded into the comment letter.
We do also have an open rulemaking underway.
There's a workshop coming up at the end of this month.
And all of these ideas are things that
we can take a look at.
Meanwhile, we are on an expedited timeframe here,
because June 30th is just around the corner.
But sharing best practices amongst the IOUs,
as you have already, is very important to pursue.
Yes. President Batjer.
-: Yeah. Thank you, Commissioner Shiroma.
I agree.
I think that given the short,
it would be ideal under different circumstances,
one, that we're prepared to approve something like this,
it would be paid for by the rate payers,
but more importantly to your point, Commissioner Shiroma,
a Statewide campaign really takes
quite a bit of time and planning.
And I think some of the best practices
and some of the things that have been
well articulated and outlined today,
are probably our best bet to get
the word out carefully and succinctly,
thoroughly and in a timely way.
We've really got to get going by June,
and here we are, cruising into the middle of March.
So I agree with you, Commissioner Shiroma,
that would maybe be ideal, but I don't think it's doable.
-: Appreciate that, President Batjer.
And I guess, Jessica, a follow up for you then,
and the other IOUs, I think what we're getting at here
is a question of trust and avoiding scans.
And scams unfortunately are very opportunistic.
That's how they become successful.
So, one of the other questions I would have is,
not for the work that the call centers
or anybody else are doing, but would an increase
in the marketing and outreach budget
that would give a boost to capitation fee agencies,
tribal communities that are at high risk for disconnection,
as well as also, and again, not for the enrollment piece,
but just for disseminating information.
I know we've talked a lot about
the county social service agencies in the past,
as well as some of the associations they work with.
They add informational pamphlets to other things
that are outside of the scope of work they do all the time.
Would that be sort of a middle approach
where if uniformity and messaging through that,
and there's not enough time to do it,
is it possible where, with the timeline we have,
those types of decisions and connections could be made
to ensure that there are a boost of resources
going to the trusted sources that we do have
in all the neighborhood communities,
for these different tools for families in arrears?
-: Yeah, I think that's a fair request
to look at our marketing mix, if you will,
in terms of how we're leveraging
all of our different partners and channels and tactics.
I don't know enough information
about their regulatory process.
Maybe Eric, you can help me out here.
If the ME&O dollars were articulated,
or if that is something that the IOUs are all proposing
in the final advice letter, maybe you can comment on that?
But in terms of the strategies and the messages
and channels and tactics,
I think that the IOUs could definitely
continue their best practices sharing
and determine how they want to make
modifications in their final advice letter.
-: Jessica, I'm not sure if you were referring
to Eric from SCE or myself, but I'll take a crack at it.
-: Thank you.
-: We do have budget currently in
our income qualified programs associated with CARE
for community based organization outreach.
We were asked a question as part
of the transition plan filing in the advice letter,
are we looking for incremental dollars
or would we anticipate the need for that?
Our initial answer was, based on what
we've incorporated into our plans, we anticipate using
existing program funds to support the work.
So if we could,
if there is the flexibility available
to focus on particular audiences of customers
or really amplify CBO engagement
for certain use cases among those customers,
under the guise of CARE and FERA retention and support,
I think we have the funds available to us, as we see it.
But that is a clarification I think we would seek
to put in our April 1st filing.
-: And I guess I can add, I think procedurally,
that that amount is in a separate proceeding.
So we'd probably have to work through that proceeding
on the income qualified side as well.
So there might be a little bit of a lift in reg and law,
but we'll figure it out and we'll take a look at it.
-: Okay, thank you.
Oh please,
I'm not sure who is speaking, but please, go ahead.
Michelle: Thank you.
This is Michelle Somerville from SDG&E.
I was just gonna say ditto.
Currently our transition plans, the way they're proposed,
we were gonna use the existing funding
from those income qualified programs.
So ditto to PG&E and their comments.
-: Okay. Sounds good.
So I just wanted to have a time check.
It is 11:40.
We'll probably be taking lunch
a little bit later than anticipated.
However, there is a hidden 10 minutes in the agenda.
I don't know if you noticed, from 12:50 to 1:00,
there's nothing, so we'll take that time.
But I think it's important for people to stand
and get a snack or whatever.
So, let's take a very short break and come back at 11:50,
if that's agreeable to everyone.
And then we will move on to the next item.
So see you soon.
All right, I think it's a minute past 11:50.
We're gonna resume.
So, I think what we'll do, if it works for everyone,
we'll try to get through the presentations
for the Municipal Jurisdictional Utilities
and then proceed with questions
and try to get to lunch by 12:30, if that's agreeable.
So we can come back around maybe 1:00 or slightly after.
And if we need to continue with the Q and A,
as well as I know there is some public comment on item five,
we'd ask the IOUs and the jurisdictional utilities
to be available for public comment at that time,
unless there's any objections or scheduling conflict.
Okay, great.
So, with that, Gillian, would you make, excuse me,
would you care to make the introductions for presentation?
-: Not at all.
So, if we could pull up the next slide in the slide deck.
And for the small multi-jurisdictional utilities,
Michelle Ansani,
I hope I'm pronouncing your name correctly, will be
kicking off the joint presentation from Southwest Gas.
Michelle, are you on?
Michelle: I am, thank you very much.
Gillian: Perfect.
-: All right, it looks like we've got the slide up.
I think, here we go, okay.
So we have, if we can move on to the next slide.
We are going to start with our group overview as well.
So the six of us put together a table
that shows what type of outreach are we doing
to stay in contact with our customers to communicate
how we're treating the accounts throughout COVID
and then throughout the transition,
once the EDRP does expire.
And you can see here with this chart,
that all of us are really using those bigger, broader forms
like the website, email, letters,
and our call centers in most cases,
to keep our customers informed and for outreach.
And then there are a few other options
that we have that we're taking advantage of
if we have them available within our organization.
Again, many of us are using our community-based
organization groups, our public affairs groups,
to help get the word out as well.
But I'll go through these left to right.
So all of us are going to be using our website.
That is a great avenue to keep customers informed
of what is happening on their account,
how we're able to treat them.
Email is an option that you can see here
that many of us are using.
One thing to keep in mind with email,
the one unfortunate piece is that none of us
are gonna always have all of our customers' email addresses.
So while it is always a great benefit
to use it when we have it, my concern always is
that it will not ever reach 100% of your customer.
So it's always a supplemental form of communication
and can never by any means be
our only form of communication.
So with that, we always use a combination
of bill inserts and onserts and messaging.
100% of our customers will receive that,
whether digitally or through written correspondence.
So that is one of the best tools I always find to use
in order for customers to receive those important messages.
Direct mail obviously is another avenue.
We always have our customers' premise address.
So we will send additional correspondence through the mail.
Again, our public affairs groups are often used
to get the word out through their website.
I know each one of us will go through our own
particular plans here in just a few minutes.
And many of us are using these,
using additional outreach groups,
to put our information on their websites,
just as another tool to reach additional customers.
And then our call centers, which is offered, many of us have
multi-language call center opportunities for our customers.
It's another great avenue because we can train them
to be very adept at escalation,
at payment management techniques.
So this is one of our best tools as well,
'cause we have the ability to answer questions
and go very in depth to the customers' particular situations
and offer more tailored solutions.
So this is us at a glance with our outreach channels.
Our next slide
will show when each of us are going to resume activities.
Again, all six of us are gonna go here
in just a few minutes, so we can certainly
each answer any questions you have on these dates.
But you can see here,
the companies are going from left to right.
And we go first with what is the earliest date
in which we will disconnect customers?
You see dates ranging from early July, as late as September.
All of us are offering some type
of deferred payment arrangements.
And you can see that there are different terms,
anywhere from six months, extending up through 12 months.
Again, here, what's so nice about that
is many of us are offering ranges,
because every customer is different.
And one thing I've learned in my career,
spent quite a bit of time in banking,
it's that this is really something that should be tailored
to a customer, 'cause it doesn't always help a customer
to take $180 and extend that for a period of 12 months.
So we want to help them develop
very strong payment management habits.
So it's great to see these ranges.
As for reestablishing late payment fees,
those are starting between July and August.
So one of the more sooner treatments
that will go back into effect.
And then CARE verification, you can see here
that we're giving our customer some time,
some reinstating regular verification in July,
and then all the way up through October.
So if there are no questions with that broader view,
I can go right into Southwest Gas,
which I should have introduced myself.
I'm Michelle Ansani with Southwest Gas.
So here our transition plan specifically.
I wanted to start and call your attention
to our automatic deferral payment plan.
Now we have always offered, as you saw on that last slide,
payment arrangements for our customer,
ranging based on what they would like to do,
from that eight to 12 months.
However, what we decided to do last month
to help our customers, we had approximately 20,000 customers
that were over 60 days delinquent,
that we wanted to particularly target
that weren't calling us to ask for help.
We placed them on an automatic deferral program
without their asking.
Now what we did do is we sent them a letter
to say a few things.
One, we're placing you on this automatic deferral plan
because we can see your account is in arrears.
Here's our contact center number.
If there's anything we can do to help you
to get you involved, or excuse me, enrolled in CARE.
And we provided information about that.
We also explained of course how that deferral program
would work for our customers.
Then we said, if you would like to pay more,
please pay more, that's a great habit to develop.
We just wanted to try to help you
with as much as we could by extending
your payments out for eight months.
So we're gonna continue to do that.
And we may postpone that in March.
And I say may, because what we've been doing
for the past 11 months during COVID,
I'm sure which so many of my counterparts
have been doing as well, is paying attention
to what's happening with their customers,
watching the spread of COVID-19,
seeing what's happening from an unemployment standpoint.
So we're constantly adjusting this
as we see our customers need more time.
But right now that's tentatively
set to expire early this year.
And we're informing our customers through direct mail.
As for deposits and late payment charges,
those have been suppressed on our customer accounts
and have been since April 1st.
We are not looking to reinstate those until August 1st.
We're gonna let our customers know
in as many channels as it makes sense.
So bill messaging, naturally our website.
We've been informing our customers
in our phone calls and our IVR as well.
In terms of disconnects due to nonpayment,
those have been suspended.
We have not been disconnecting any customer
for nonpayment since March 13th, and we are not looking
to resume that activity until September 1st.
It's come up in a few conversations earlier today
about how quickly we can do this.
So I mentioned we haven't turned anyone off
for nonpayment since March 13th.
We are not looking to catch up.
We can't, we do not have smart meters.
Not that that would be our route anyway.
So we are very slowly going to infuse this
back into our system, again, starting September 1st.
But when we do, we're not completely
turning that spigot on high.
And again, by no means, could we catch up.
What we are going to do is, because we've had our customers
get extremely far in arrears, right,
we did attempt to help with this automatic deferral program.
By August we'll see how our customers fared on that.
But it's certainly given the opportunity
to really assess the risk.
And so when this turns back on in September,
we're looking at the most egregious of situations
of how far behind customers are.
This is after so much outreach has occurred,
certainly additional messaging, outbound calling,
which we have started as well, not to collect a debt,
but to see if there's anything from a financial arrangement
or program we can connect our customer with.
So this is with a lot of care that
we're looking to turn this measure back on.
And then last we have CARE recertification
and income verification.
That has been suspended as well.
And we are looking to turn that on,
sometime in the last quarter of this year.
We want to continue what we think
is really a great practice, having it easier
for our customers to stay within the program,
once they've qualified at some point in time earlier,
prior to the pandemic, and help them through this time.
And then again, with a great deal of care,
bill messaging, direct mail campaigns,
will start to go back to formal former practices
that we had in place prior to COVID-19.
Can I answer any questions?
-: I think, Michelle, what we might do,
in the interest of time, similar with the IOUs,
is to get through the entirety of the PowerPoint,
and then open it up to questions thereafter.
-: Excellent. Thank you very much.
That's it for Southwest Gas.
-: Good afternoon, everybody.
My name is Sean Matlock.
I'm the Energy Resource Manager here
at Bear Valley Electric.
I'd like to say thank you for the opportunity
to speak on this important topic.
And congratulations to the Commissioners, directors,
and LIOB Board members on your 20 year milestone.
That's fantastic to hear.
Similar to the other utilities,
from a marketing and education and outreach strategy,
we realize that our messaging has to be clear and concise
and that we convey this very important message
to all the customers that have some debt
that they need to deal with before coming out
of this COVID season that we're in here.
Our strategy, really we're ready to go.
It's March 2021.
We've already developed our PR templates.
And so once we have the authority to move forward,
we are going to be reaching out
to all of our customer classes
that are in both the 60 to 90 day
and the greater than 90 day debt categories.
And our technique or our strategy is to get them
onto a payment plans as soon as possible.
Once they're on a payment plan that meets their needs,
that will keep the customers from receiving
any further notices or any action on the utility's part.
That's really our goal.
Although we don't have as many zeros behind our numbers,
we realize that it's a very important process
that we're all dealing with here.
So our plan is to work with our CSRs,
our customer service representatives,
and those that will be engaged in the community,
and really began to reach out
to our customers in April of 2021.
I think with our numbers being as small as they are,
we are going to go the extra mile
and actually call each of these customers,
in addition to our media and communication channels,
which I'll speak to in just a couple of slides.
Slide two, please.
As far as our ME&O target audience,
it's the same as the other utilities.
Our tailored messaging will specifically
reach out to Medical Baseline, CARE,
AFN, critical customers, and behind the meter accounts,
in the 60 to 90 and 90 past due payment category
as much in previously.
So that's really our target audience
that we'll be reaching out to,
Slide three, please.
As far as our communication channels,
here's what we have available to us.
We will be working with the local newspaper,
the local radio company, direct mail,
social media, and our website.
In addition, we could, if we chose to do so,
make robo calls and we even have two-way text capability,
which I think is a good way
to reach out to those with smartphones.
We will be working and partnering with local agencies,
including the first responders, that is part of our plan.
Our message deck is in multi-language.
It really targets Spanish and English for our demographics,
but others as well.
And to just make a point, we do not have any CCAs
in our service territory, nor any disadvantaged communities.
So we believe our plan does align with other programs
and targets and requirements.
And we're looking forward to getting this rolled out
and working with our customers.
I would like to say lastly, that our payment plans
are gonna be completely tailored to the customers' needs.
So they will be able to put themselves on weekly,
bi-weekly, or monthly payments up to 12 months.
And so, really, I think that's important for them
to drive the outcome of that,
and that's really going to be our strategy.
And that concludes our presentation this afternoon.
Gillian: Hi, I just want to see,
I never received confirmation from Pacific Power
on who would be speaking.
But, if you either chat me or raise your hand.
Otherwise we can move on to Liberty,
which is the next utility in the slide deck.
Thank you.
-: Hello.
Thank you.
My name is Kate Moranne.
And I act as the customer care manager for Liberty Utilities
in the Tahoe region. providing electrical service.
And we serve approximately 50,000 customers
that require our support as we look to transition
out of this customer protection period,
anticipated to end July 1st.
Throughout the pandemic period you can see
the measures listed on this slide we're all familiar with,
that has either been implemented
and or suspended by utilities.
The purpose of this presentation is to focus
on the transition period and resumption of these activities.
And with that, I'll ask for, let's see,
the next slide, please.
Currently, and over the course
of the customer protection period,
Liberty is and has been placing manual outbound calls
throughout the pandemic to advise customers
of their account status and individually educate
and support them in enrolling
in specific programs available to them.
And that's all ahead of the customer protections
coming to an end.
As we anticipate the transition of our business
back into collections activity,
we look to resume our notification process
outlined on this slide.
You can see all the details explained here.
But one item I think is important to point out,
is that as we resume this noticing procedure,
duration and amount of balances with that to be considered,
as well as our customers that are
a part of vulnerable populations.
The 48 hour door hanger notice here,
I think that's important as well, as it is hung in person
by Liberty utilities staff.
And that gives our customers an in-person opportunity
to speak directly with us.
Notices also speak to payment arrangements
and staff in-office, as well as the field,
are trained to explain assistance programs
and customer options.
As we value customer communication and accessibility,
ensuring bilingual resources are available
in our call centers to support our service territory,
and ensure information regarding
low-income assistance programs, support,
and special payment arrangements that have been extended
can be explained and enacted for all Liberty customers.
Liberty also has out of state support from other regions.
That helps us to support our emergency needs,
in terms of the call center,
to ensure that our local customer call center agents
are available to focus on customer support
with an empathetic approach as the forefront, of course.
A couple of other things on these slides.
So circumstances requiring extra steps
in our collections process that we adhere to.
Master meters, tenants actually received a 10 day notice
in addition to this normal noticing process,
as well as Green Cross Medical Baseline customers
get a personal phone call prior to any disconnection
of any sort to ensure that they can be enrolled
in assistance program or a special payment arrangement
to avoid that disconnection.
Next slide, please.
This slide speaks to the anticipated customer communication
of the recertification processes and resumption
of late payment and reconnection fees.
On June 1st, written notices are planned to be sent
to all CARE customers to communicate ahead
of any recertification requirements
that may be upcoming, as we typically do require
the recertification every two years.
Communication will also be sent out to our customers
to provide information around the anticipated resumption
of reconnection and late fees.
Important here to note that reconnection and deposit fees
that have been waived and not applicable
throughout the customer protection period
are not due prior to service reconnection,
and they are billed on the following statement.
These amounts can be built into
a special payment arrangement, and we look forward
to offering flexible payment arrangement accommodations
in order to really minimize disconnections
and best support our customers on an individual basis.
Next slide, please.
The marketing education and outreach strategy
includes targeted communication to our customers,
including those enrolled in Arrearage Management Programs,
customers with large balances owing,
customers on assistance programs,
and those within vulnerable populations,
including Medical Baseline customers.
We look to communicate programs and options
with our customers through bill inserts,
bill messages, staff training, and that includes
in-office and in-field staff, phone messaging
through our call center phone line prior to reaching a rep,
social media, website communication,
and physical signage throughout our offices
when those are accessible to the public again.
Written communication is shared in a bilingual format
to meet the needs of our Liberty customers.
Liberty looks forward to working directly with our customers
to support them through this transition period.
And we plan to review the transition plans submitted
by all the other utilities and looking for opportunities
to improve our final transition plan
that will be submitted on April 1st.
With that, I'll conclude my portion of the presentation.
And thank you for the opportunity to present today.
Gillian: Hi.
If the host wouldn't mind going back to Pacific Power
and promoting Melissa Nottingham,
and once she's promoted, she'll be able
to speak and present for Pacific Power.
Melissa: Okay. Can you hear me?
Gillian: Yes. Thank you.
Melissa: All right. Thank you so much.
I apologize for that.
Technical issues there, and communication issues.
Firstly, my name is Melissa Nottingham and I am the manager
of Customer Advocacy and Tariff Policy for Pacific Power.
And I appreciate Michelle providing the how
we're gonna be communicating with our customers.
But I just wanted to take this opportunity
to provide just a brief update on who we are
and the status of our customers' current economic situation
and then what we will be doing
for our customers moving forward.
And of course recognizing the time limitation.
The first slide I have is the,
if you go to the next slide, please, just who we are.
We are situated in the most northern part of the state,
ranging from the coast almost to the Nevada border.
We have about 36,000 customers.
Of those, 33% of our customers
are currently enrolled in the CARE program.
Next slide, please.
Just, we have seen a significant increase
in arrears older than 90 days.
About 20% of those customers are CARE customers.
We've seen our arrearages increase,
but the number of customers is staying
fairly consistent in these buckets as far as the 90 plus.
And also, we've been continuing to do extensive outreach
since our moratorium began on March 13th.
We have done outbound calls, texts, bill onserts,
bill messaging, all the other typical,
and what's already been stated, methods of communication.
We also do employee placed calls,
where the employees are reaching out.
There's an example here for the week of,
through February 22nd, where we
outbound called approximately 500 customers,
set up payment plans, or received payments.
We're just trying to continue during this process
to keep our customers engaged and also let them know
of some of the consumer protections
that are currently available.
We've also received approximately
a million dollars in assistance
to help our customers in the 2020 heating year.
Next slide, please.
So our real goal with our communication
and what we've been doing and what we will continue to do,
is to help reduce any customer anxiety
about the moratorium ending.
And I do want to say that it will not be business as usual.
We intend on incrementally resuming
active collections in our communities.
And our goal is to reach out to the neediest customers
first, prior to disconnection.
We're going to continue the strategy
of placing employee outbound calls
targeting the high balance CARE,
medical and life support customers first,
customers greater than 90 days,
and then customers 60 to 90 days, et cetera.
And this we continue to do and will intensify
during the months leading up to the moratorium.
What we're offering our customers is
we're offering some extended
and deferred payment arrangements,
the option of a 12 month payment plan.
We also include a budget billing,
where they can amortize any of their past due amounts
into a flat amount each month.
We're offering down payments of zero to 1/12th.
We are also offering a deferred payment arrangement
for customers with a zero down
and a zero installment on the past due amount
for the first three months of the payment plan.
What we're trying to do is offer a variety
of different options for customers who may have
no money or very little money to start a plan,
but kind of overcome some of the barriers
that are prohibiting some customers
from contacting the company to set up payment arrangements
by offering longer term, no down payment,
et cetera, type of payment plans.
'Cause a lot of times people are, they owe money,
and they hesitate to reach out to the utility.
So we want to make sure that they know
that we have options available to all types of customers,
regardless of what their current economic situation is.
We are gonna continue to promote CARE
and our weatherization program.
We put together some energy assistance flyers
that went out to customers.
For the agencies in their area,
the flyers had information on how to apply,
what you need to apply,
what information you're going to be asked when you apply.
And we partnered with our three CBOs
to develop these customized flyers
so when customers did contact the agencies,
they were prepared for the application process
which alleviated the burden on the customer
and also on our CBOs, which are also dealing in,
trying to work in unusual work situations.
And we will continue to do that.
We have a very good relationship
with Great Northern, Delmar Seniors Center.
Redwood Community Action Agency
and the Karuk Tribe in our service territory.
So, I think that's it for me for now.
Thank you.
-: Okay. Thank you very much.
And Gillian, I understand that was
the last presenter, correct?
Gillian: I believe so.
I don't believe there's anyone online
from Alpine or West Coast Gas,
though their slides are included.
-: Okay. Very good.
So similar to before, Commissioner,
if your colleagues care to ask questions first,
happy to have you facilitate.
-: Okay. Appreciate that.
Let's see if any of my colleagues,
Commissioner Rechtschaffen, any comments?
-: Commissioner Shiroma, I don't really have questions
so much as I want to underscore,
I think we just heard this from, just from Pacific Power,
I'm just spaced on the woman's name who presented,
but we also heard this from PG&E and others,
the very importance of targeting.
As the utilities begin transitioning
and doing the outreach, the importance of targeting
on the neediest customers first.
That's really, really critical.
So I applaud that focus and I think
that's something that all of the utilities
we heard from should really emphasize.
-: Thank you.
And the only thing that I will add,
and then we'll go to the Board members,
for each of the folks who presented today,
I think we heard a little bit about working with CBOs.
I know that some of the utilities are very small
compared to PG&E, Edison, SoCal, San Diego, and so forth.
But that community partnership
and support in this arena is very key.
So does anyone want to add a little bit more
about the CBOs and the other non-utility groups
that they're working with?
I think we heard about three,
the representative for Pacific Power mentioned three CBOs.
Anybody want to amplify on that?
Melissa: Yeah, this is Melissa again.
And one of the,
the geographic challenges that we have
in our service territory,
having 13,000 square mile service territory
and our customers spread out over, it's very rural.
So we heavily rely on our partners in those areas
to work with, and we've been working with them
and developing really good relationships
to provide them collateral and information
on what we have available for customers.
It's just kind of leveraging off of the collaboration
that we've already, that we've had over the years,
but also with the access and functional needs customers,
as far as our wildfire mitigation plan.
So, it's a very critical piece of our strategy
on reaching customers in very rural areas.
So, I appreciate that you're stating that
because that's part of the relationship building
that we have with the community.
-: And Kate, how about your utility?
-: We do currently work with CBOs in our area.
As far as the specifics, I'd have to discuss that
with the area of the organization that works most closely.
But I will just say that we do recognize the importance
of the integration of those relationships,
especially in our outlying territories
to support the customers that most need us right now.
-: Commissioner Shiroma, this is Sean Matlock
from Bear Valley Electric.
You're right, the CBOs can be challenging
in these small towns where we only have 24,000 customers.
We have developed relationships
with the local chamber of commerce,
the DOVES, which works with domestic violence survivors,
some smaller organizations-- (people chattering)
First responders, such as fire and sheriff,
and our other local utility companies.
-: Thank you, Sean. Thank you.
Brittany Errasoff, can you go off mute, (chuckling)
we can hear your conversation.
Okay. Thank you, Sean.
Now, did we hear from Southwest Gas?
-: Yeah, our area is--
-: I'm sorry.
-: No no no, that's okay.
-: Oh, there you are, yes.
-: Our area is definitely the same, yes.
Same thing we are working with,
I should say our CBO is working with the local areas
to make sure that they are fully aware
to properly guide our customers to us
and let them know what we have to offer.
-: Okay, thank you.
All right.
And I know that Board Member Medina has her hand up.
So back to the LIOB. Thank you.
-: Thank you, Commissioner
I have a question, but Board Member Medina, please go ahead.
-: Thank you.
So thank you for this presentation.
In going forth and doing my due diligence,
going into your websites.
I do have to say that only Bear Valley Electric
has a button for language
and manageable to also sign an easy payment plan
or a payment plan idea.
On Liberty, maybe 'cause I'm not a customer,
it's really, really hard to, it looks more like
a presentation kind of like website format.
I don't see how to look that it's more California based,
'cause I do see you serve other communities.
In California we're really special
that we really like to make sure
that we are multicultural, multi-language orientated.
Southwest Gas, again, there's some information in general,
but not a customer reach out to help
kind of with what you're reporting.
Pacific Power, it has pretty good square formats.
And there there's a lot of reading here.
And all I'm getting at is when people are in distress,
this is very challenging for a CBO or for a community member
to go into your website and find some help.
You are saying here that you're heavily going
into your website for marketing education and outreach.
So I just would like to note those things.
Thank you.
-: Thank you, Lourdes.
One of the things I was thinking about
as I was listening to the presentations,
it's similar to recommendations we've been making
to the larger IOUs for the transition plans,
but also beforehand, was around the coordination
with other public agencies.
You guys are private.
So with my gainful employment hat,
we run a lot of programs in all of these rural counties.
And we work with the public agencies in those counties.
And they are very good at finding people who need help,
for things that are almost from a cost perspective,
very minuscule compared to some of the costs
that we're talking about here.
So one recommendation I would make
would really just to be to engage the county leadership,
the social service agencies,
the children and families Commissions,
in particular are very good about some of the communities
that Board Member Medina was talking about,
because they have partnerships
with those CBOs and they fund them,
as well as county offices of education
which are the communication channel hub
for all the school districts and charter schools
and public schools in the county.
Because I think if you're able to utilize
those communication distribution channels,
you would find that you would be
covering most of the county footprint
that's already on another form of public assistance
through those partnerships.
So, I would just really emphasize that
because it seems like in your service areas,
it might be even more important than it is
for some of the service areas of the four larger IOUs
that we've been working with on this for quite a while.
And I'd be happy to help bridge those connections
if you need them.
We do work with them regularly.
Other questions, comments?
-: Yeah. Yeah. Mr. Chair, I'll be brief.
I have a question for Southwest Gas.
My notes here, maybe I got this incorrect.
But I don't think I did.
You said that your late payment fees
are to begin in July, 2021.
Did I have that right?
Hello?
-: That is correct, yes.
-: Yeah.
So, I just put it on the hat of being
one of your customers, and I'm calling because
now I'm out of work or I need some help.
When you say late payment fees,
are those fees, late payment fees,
are they also ascribed to dollars owed
that were accrued during the moratorium?
-: So, that's a great question.
So a couple of things, one, when we just placed last month
everyone on a deferral arrangement,
we sat their amount in arrears back to zero.
And so we are contemplating,
prior to turning late fees back on again,
doing one more round of DFAs.
Well, we haven't turned them off.
So you can imagine, we're gonna continue to do these DFAs,
but we're contemplating doing a second round
for anyone who fell of that first round.
So I say that to explain,
sorry if you're getting some feedback
I'm hearing some on the call,
once late fees kick in that balance is no longer arrears
because they're on a DFA.
If they are not on a DFA, that late fee will be billed
on the balance that is currently on the account.
-: What I'm hearing is that there's going to be an incentive
for me to not only get into an Arrearage Management Plan,
but to stay current with it, correct?
So additional fees, late fees don't accrue to what I owe.
Does that make sense?
-: Yes, yep, that's correct.
-: Okay. Thank you.
-: Other questions or comments from members of the Board?
-: Just again, to note Lourdes' comment
about the non-English customers' ability
to navigate a website and to have information provided.
So, for the utilities on the line,
as you send out direct mail, are you providing
direct mail in these other languages,
in Spanish, Tagalog, and so forth,
as far as how you're communicating with your customers?
-: This is Kate from Liberty.
And the answer for Liberty is yes.
Melissa: This is Melissa Nottingham with Pacific Power,
and we are sending out our mailers in English and Spanish.
We do have translation services available
to all customers that call in
that offer a 200 language translation.
-: This is Sean Matlock from Bear Valley Electric.
Bear Valley Electric will be rolling out
their communication program
in both Spanish and English primarily.
-: This is Michelle with Southwest Gas.
We are rolling out all of our written communication
in English and in Spanish, as well as mentioned previously,
our call center is equipped with over
100 different language translation services.
-: Okay, thank you.
And then, for the future, to really take
a hard look at your websites.
We all need to look at our websites for ease of use.
It's something all of us need to do.
Thank you. Back to you, Benito.
-: Okay. Just a quick time check, it is 12:35.
I know there's still a few questions for public comment.
And I'm not sure if other members of the Board
have additional questions.
I don't want lunch to be too late.
So, if it is possible for the rest of the IOUs
to hang on through lunch break,
I would propose perhaps, if not now,
in a short few minutes, we break for half an hour.
I've gotten a couple of inquiries.
So, would that work if we took a break now
and maybe came back at 10 after?
I suspect we're gonna make up some time
with some of the afternoon agenda items.
But I wanted to check-in just to see
if everyone's good with taking a lunch break now?
Okay, very good.
-: Yes, please.
-: All right, see you all at 1:10.
-: Okay.