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Riverside utility and fire department outline joint approach to wildfire risk, training and defensible space
Summary
Riverside Public Utilities and the Riverside Fire Department told the California Wildfire Safety Advisory Board they coordinate closely on training, deenergization for firefighter safety, and defensible-space enforcement, and that about 8–10% of RPU’s overhead miles fall in high-fire-threat tiers.
Riverside Public Utilities and the Riverside Fire Department told the California Wildfire Safety Advisory Board on March 4 that close operational coordination, joint training and targeted investments are central to protecting the city from wildfire risk.
Daniel Honeyfield, assistant general manager of energy delivery for Riverside Public Utilities, said the utility serves roughly 114,000 customers across 82 square miles and operates more than 300 miles of distribution lines. “We are committed to the highest quality water and electric services at the lowest possible rates,” he said, adding that the utility operates internal generation and distributed solar to support customers during emergencies.
Chief Steve McKenster of the Riverside Fire Department described the department’s all-hazards mission and capacity. “We protect life, property and environment by providing exceptional and progressive all-hazard emergency services,” he said, noting the department’s 14 stations and roughly 47,000 incidents a year. McKenster emphasized that mutual understanding between departments improves emergency response and firefighter safety.
Senior electrical engineer Renee Valdez walked the board through the city’s exposure: she said about half of RPU’s overhead circuit miles are within Tier 2 fire-threat areas and under 10% of the system lies in high-fire-threat tiers. Valdez also noted that several overhead transmission lines serving Riverside are owned by Southern California Edison; if those lines were deenergized in a safety event, Riverside would rely more heavily on internal generation.
The presenters gave concrete examples of coordination. Valdez described joint safety training that staged bucket trucks, fire apparatus and confined-space simulations to improve rescue and substation response. McKenster and Honeyfield outlined procedures for deenergizing circuits through the grid control center so firefighters may safely enter structures or accident scenes with live conductors.
The city has updated its municipal code to require defensible-space maintenance in high- and very-high fire-threat parcels; RPU and the fire department said they will coordinate inspections and outreach under the new code to identify missed or noncompliant properties. Honeyfield called for knowledge-sharing across utilities about specific hardware choices — mentioning ductile-iron poles and non-explosive fuses as examples seen in recent field visits.
Board members asked whether coordination is formalized in memoranda of understanding. Presenters said much of the current collaboration is informal and benefits from established leadership relationships, but they agreed that as programs mature a more formal structure may be useful.
The board’s discussion closed with an invitation for more technical exchanges: members said they found the site visits informative and requested further staff briefings to translate field lessons into review criteria for wildfire management plans. The board will continue its site-visit program and use those findings in future WMP reviews.
