Victorville Municipal Utility Services is only a distributor and does not own or operate any generating plants. The service area for Victorville Municipal Utility Services only includes the Southern California Logistics Airport (SCLA) and the Foxborough Industrial Park, less than 60 customers combined. VMUS only serves commercial and industrial customers. Southern California Edison serves all of the residents of the City of Victorville and any commercial / industrial customer not located within the VMUS territory.
Victorville Municipal Utility Services entire electric supply system is located underground in conduit and vaults. Historically, underground electric lines have not been associated with catastrophic wildfires. The undergrounding of electric lines serves as an effective mitigation measure to reduce the potential of power-line ignited wildfires. Based on a review of local conditions and historical fires, VMUS has determined that its electrical lines and equipment do not pose a significant risk of catastrophic wildfire.
Despite this low risk, VMUS takes appropriate actions to help its region prevent and respond to the increasing risk of devastating wildfires. In its role as a public agency, VMUS closely coordinates with other local safety and emergency officials to help protect against fires and respond to emergencies. In its role as a utility, VMUS follows all applicable design, construction, operation, and maintenance requirements that reduce safety risks associated with its system. This Wildfire Mitigation Plan describes the safety-related measures that VMUS follows to reduce its risk of causing wildfires.
SB 901 requires each POU to "contract with a qualified independent evaluator with experience in assessing the safe operation of electrical infrastructure to review and assess the comprehensiveness of its wildfire mitigation plan."² Additionally, the independent evaluator's assessment of the comprehensiveness of the POU WMP must be issued in a report that is both posted to the POU's website and presented at a public meeting of the POU's governing board.
SB 901 requires that the qualified independent evaluator that performs the assessment of VMUS' WMP must have experience in assessing the safe operation of electrical infrastructure. The Victorville Fire Department (VFD) is the primary response agency for fires and other
2 Cal. Pub. Util. Code § 8387(c).
4