Hotel manager warns overnight PG&E vault work will shut bookings, PG&E outlines safety settings

Justin, manager of the Water's Edge Hotel, told the Tiburon Town Council on Oct. 15 that a PG&E project to replace an underground vault and install an electric charging station for the Angel Island ferry will run about six days starting Oct. 29 and has been scheduled for overnight work, which he said will seriously disrupt hotel operations.

The hotel manager said the overnight schedule will expose guests to jackhammers and other loud machinery and that the hotel currently has about 40 reservations (roughly 70 room nights) during the project window. "Most, if not all of them, will likely cancel the reservations," Justin said, estimating conservatively about $40,000 in lost revenue. He said town staff and a Chamber of Commerce representative had a meeting with PG&E but that merchants overwhelmingly preferred overnight timing; the hotel had asked for daytime work to reduce the business impact.

PG&E Government Affairs Liaison Mark Van Gortner gave the council a short presentation outlining how two circuits serve Tiburon and why some customers experience outages even where lines are buried. He described a high-fire-risk buffer zone and said enhanced power-safety settings automatically interrupt power in less than a tenth of a second when a short or contact event is detected. Van Gortner said the setting reduces emissions and helps prevent lines from igniting vegetation. He urged residents to update account communication preferences (email, phone, text) and to enroll any medically vulnerable household members in PG&E's medical baseline or vulnerable-customer programs. "If we don't get a confirmation from someone that's designated as medical baseline or vulnerable, we will go knock on their door," Van Gortner said.

Van Gortner also recommended the PG&E "Report It" app for reporting hazardous vegetation or loose vaults and said that, while large-scale public safety power shutoffs have been uncommon in the area since 2019, unpredictable wind and dry conditions (La Niña year) could cause more outages later in the season.

Council members did not take formal action on the project during the meeting; council members and staff listened to the concerns and later invited the hotel manager to pursue options with town staff and PG&E for mitigation or compensation. Council members asked clarifying questions about utility redundancy and response times, and Van Gortner said crews often arrive within 20–30 minutes for isolated outages, with patrols to locate faults and restore power to unaffected sections.

The hotel manager said he had spoken with a town staff member, Greg, who is "looking into options to help offset the financial loss" but said full compensation had not been promised. The council did not set a deadline for a follow-up but acknowledged the project's scheduled start at the end of October.

No formal vote was recorded on this item; it was covered during the meeting's public-comment period and a PG&E informational presentation.