SAN FRANCISCO (KCBS RADIO) – As California works to end its housing crisis, a Bay Area state senator says PG&E is impeding some of that progress.
According to San Francisco Sen. Scott Wiener, the problem is connecting new construction to the existing power grid.
"Where you get the permits, you do all the work to build it, and it's all done and ready to open, and people are ready to move in to live there, and PG&E doesn’t turn on the lights," he said.
"They don't connect the building to the electric grid," said Wiener. "And it takes potentially months and sometimes even longer."
"There have been some real horror stories," he added.
Some people have been told they need to wait years for a hookup to the power grid.
A bill, SB 83, that Wiener recently introduced would attempt to solve this problem by reducing that wait time to no longer than eight weeks.
PG&E maintains that while there have been delays in connecting new customers, but the utility is "working to meet growing customer and energy demand while continuing to invest in our system to mitigate wildfire risk and complete safety-related work," according to a statement the utility provided to KCBS Radio.
"We'll of course meet with PG&E, we would love to just work it out and come up with a resolution that works for everyone involved," said Wiener.
"We didn't want to have to introduce this legislation but it just reached a breaking point," he said.
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