Get Full Government Meeting Transcripts, Videos, & Alerts Forever!
Get email alerts on the Performance Assessment topic
No spam. Unsubscribe anytime.
Energy Safety's performance-assessment staff report 5,000 inspections, 89 non-performance findings in 2025
Summary
Patrick Doherty, program manager for Energy Safety's Performance Assessment Division, told the board the division completed over 5,000 field inspections in calendar 2025, issued 89 notices of non-performance or data inaccuracy, and reported nearly 600 wildfire-safety concerns to utilities as part of growing oversight under SB 254.
Patrick Doherty, program manager of Energy Safety's Performance Assessment Division, briefed the Wildfire Safety Advisory Board on June 3 about the division's transition from compliance assurance to performance assessment and the division's operational work.
Doherty said the division now publishes annual performance reports instead of compliance-only reports and applies a five-dimensional performance rubric that covers WMP initiative attainment, data governance, PSPS analysis, risk metrics (ignitions, outages) and outcome metrics (acres burned, structures destroyed). He described organizational changes since early 2024 that increased inspection capacity and resulted in statutory deadline compliance for annual reports.
On field work, Doherty reported the division has nine field inspectors covering all six electrical corporations and said: "we did lodge, you know, over 5,000 inspections statewide" in calendar year 2025; the team documented 89 instances of non-performance or data inaccuracy and reported nearly 600 wildfire-safety concerns to utilities for follow-up. He outlined the independent-evaluator program and said the division is expanding performance investigations and developing staff expertise.
Doherty also noted challenges: improving the quality and timing of electrical-corporation data, scaling inspection coverage with limited staff, and maturing internal human-resources capacity as the division grows.
Why it matters: The statistics and the performance rubric show how Energy Safety is operationalizing SB 254's performance oversight mandate and creating evidence for WMP review and enforcement.
What happens next: Doherty said future annual performance reports will incorporate findings from targeted investigations, and the division will continue to build its inspection program and data-governance tools.
