Politics & Government
City Council Grills Edison on Reliability
The mayor says he's being asked to look into alternatives to the company, which blames the most recent power outage on a contractor cutting into a main line.
Is Edison's service reliable?
Recent power outages in Beverly Hills brought Mark Olsen, regional manager for Southern California Edison, to the Aug. 3 City Council meeting to answer that question.
In a presentation to the council, Olsen blamed the latest outage—which affected the city off and on from June 29 to July 17—on a contractor who cut into a main power line, forcing the utility to reroute power several times to continue to provide service.
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"If the digging didn't happen, we wouldn't have had any of these outages," Olsen said. "We were asked to come forward and talk about power reliability. Hopefully we can restore your confidence in our power reliability."
He told the five-member council that there were maintenance and improvement projects underway on a regular basis in Beverly Hills.
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Despite assurances that the company's service is reliable from both Olsen and Edison District Manager Henry Darnell, at least two council members expressed their dissatisfaction with the electricity giant.
Councilwoman Nancy Krasne interrupted their presentation to ask about redundancies within the system to prevent power outages.
Darnell said the company has redundancies in place to redirect power. But Krasne stressed that "it was not enough," saying she knew at least 50 businesses that were left without power for four days. She even offered to give a stunned Darnell and Olsen a list of the firms.
"Power reliability is very important to the city, we recognize that," Olsen said. "We appreciate coordinating with the city on any problems."
But those answers didn't satisfy Krasne, who reminded the Edison managers that electricity is a necessity and not a luxury. She also expressed anger over Beverly Hills residents paying higher rates for electricity than people in other cities, basically subsidizing service in communities such as Compton and Bell.
"I have my own generator because my power goes out on a regular basis," she said. "Enough is enough. We get unreliable, despicable service."
She questioned whether it was time for Beverly Hills to contract with another utility or to create its own utility company.
Vice Mayor Barry Brucker voiced his concerns about whether Edison was being proactive on repairing equipment or just waiting for things to break down. Olsen said the company is proactive in its approach to repairing outdated equipment.
Mayor Jimmy Delshad reminded the Edison managers that he is the one who gets the phone calls at 4 a.m. when the power goes out.
"We are being asked to look into alternatives to Edison," Delshad said. "I'm sending you that message."