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Senate approves utility wildfire‑liability bill after heated debate over caps on damages; chair objects to late provisions
Summary
The Hawaii Senate approved S.B. 897, a bill intended to help finance wildfire mitigation, but several senators sharply criticized newly inserted language that would allow the Public Utilities Commission to cap utility liability for future wildfires.
The Senate passed S.B. 897, Conference Draft 1, a measure that authorizes securitized borrowing to fund wildfire mitigation projects and includes a contested provision directing the Public Utilities Commission (PUC) to choose whether to set a per‑disaster cap or a multi‑disaster period cap on utility liability.
Senator Keohokalole, the Senate committee chair who oversees the bill's subject matter, said he opposed the measure as written and criticized the insertion of sweeping liability‑cap language late in the process. "This isn't just a wildfire mitigation bill," he said on the floor, arguing the provision gives the PUC "the unilateral power to cap the utilities' liability" and could leave victims of multiple fires without full recovery if the PUC selects a time‑period cap.
Keohokalole cited other states' experience and warned that a single cap covering multiple disasters could be exhausted by one major event and thereby deny compensation to later victims. "If the PUC chooses to set a cap for a time period, say 10 years...the utility could be shielded from full responsibility for all those fires combined," he said.
Senator Lee and other members expressed reservations but supported the bill with qualifications; those senators emphasized the complexity of matching financing, utility solvency, insurance availability and rate‑payer impacts. Lee said PUCs in other states had at various times taken leading roles in post‑disaster regulatory work and that Hawaii needed a durable policy to make the grid resilient without triggering insolvency risk.
Senator Elefante and others said they would vote against the measure because it delegates major policy choices to the PUC and because the late insertion of liability language deprived stakeholders — including insurers and subject matter chairs — of adequate review.
After floor debate the Senate voted on final reading. The clerk recorded a vote of 20 ayes and 5 noes, and the bill passed.
Why it matters: S.B. 897 couples financing for wildfire mitigation (securitization) with a mechanism for limiting utilities' exposure to future wildfire damages. Supporters said it enables low‑cost financing for high‑priority safety work; opponents said the liability‑capping language is an unprecedented and risky delegation of policy that could leave victims uncompensated.
Provenance: Extensive floor statements opposing the liability‑cap language appear in the transcript (floor remarks beginning ~s=7593.38 to ~e=8275.17 and continuing); the vote and clerk's tally are recorded later in the legislative record (tally announced at ~s=9524.045–9525.98).
