Los Gatos Weekly-Times

Facilitation ends for PG&E's Vasona Substation, but few issues are resolved

Report to PUC judge submitted last week

Hearing resumes soon

By Jeff Kearns

Even before the state Public Utilities Commission received the final report on the Vasona Substation facilitation process, the report and the facilitator were already under attack by a group of residents who live near the proposed Vasona PG&E substation.

The contentious 60-day facilitation process concluded earlier this month, and the final report went to the PUC last week. Administrative Law Judge Bert Patrick put the evidentiary hearing on hold in May, to give various parties a chance to come to some agreement on how to resolve the issue of where to locate the substation. PG&E owns the property at Lark and Winchester avenues where it is proposing to put the substation. Neighbors who live near the proposed site favor moving the substation somewhere else, preferrably away from homes, but PG&E says that solution adds additional expense that will be absorbed by ratepayers, and is also difficult from an engineering standpoint.

The hearing is still on hold, Patrick said, pending submission of comments from participants in the facilitation. A date has not been set for the hearing to resume.

Bill and Ann Burns and other residents who call themselves Impacted Residents, Town of Los Gatos, fired off a letter to thePUC judge, calling professional facilitator Jim Creighton's summary "skewed and incorrect." They claimed Creighton failed to be neutral because he limited the dialogue of residents.

Attorneys representing the Impacted Residents, PG&E and the town had agreed to hire Creighton, a professional facilitator whose company is based in Los Gatos; the PUC ordered PG&E to pick up the bill. All of the committee's decisions were made by the committee itself, not the facilitator.

Ann Burns, who has been an outspoken critic of both PG&E and town officials, criticized almost every key player in the process and insisted that the town "joined" with the utility to push the Vasona substation plan. She was not a member of the committee but did show up to the first and last meetings.

Mayor Linda Lubeck stood by the facilitator's report in her letter to the PUC. She wrote that she believes the report was a fair and accurate summation of the process, and commended Creighton for his patience.

The committee included Lubeck, Councilmember Joanne Benjamin, representatives from PG&E, Town Manager David Knapp, Planning Director Lee Bowman, Tom Yuki (who owns some 40 acres on Los Gatos Boulevard, known as the "North 40"), and residents from Charter Oaks Townhomes and north Los Gatos neighborhoods.

The committee agreed that substations should not be located next to residences, that no residences should be demolished and that PG&E should submit a mitigation plan (subject to approval by the town) that addresses screening, drainage, lighting, noise, fire and potential explosions.

PG&E is sticking by its plans to put the substation on the site it owns at Lark and Winchester. Though the committee agreed that the substation should not go near homes, it could not agree on a an alternate site. Some residents felt that the current site was the best option, while other residents "remain adamantly opposed," the report said.

The committee also took a look at one site proposed by the Impacted Residents group, a triangle of land Between the Winchester Boulevard off-ramp from Highway 85 and the freeway itself. Caltrans owns the land, and said that it would not allow PG&E to put a substation there because it would be in the operating right-of-way of the freeway.

On undergrounding, members agreed that transmission lines should be moved below ground, but could not come to a consensus on how it should be done. Putting the 230-kilovolt lines underground would require building two transition stations, which resemble substations.

Burns says she's not expecting a favorable judgment from the PUC, and that attorney Patrick Power, a former PUC judge hired by the Impacted Residents, is no longer working for the group.

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