Idaho Bills

Adds to existing law to establish the Wildfire Standard of Care Act.

This legislation creates the "Wildfire Standard of Care Act" under Title 61, Chapter 18 to create a standard of care through electric utility wildfire mitigation plans, subject to approval by the Idaho Public Utilities Commission (lPUC) for regulated utilities. In recent years, wildfires have bankrupted utilities and driven their customers' monthly bills to crippling levels. In part, this is due to courts holding utilities liable for wildfire damages, despite no finding of fault or causation. Many of Idaho's utilities, especially small and rural co-ops, could not survive those losses. Higher bills would harm Idaho's economy and place extreme burden on low- and fixed-income customers. The "Wildfire Standard of Care Act" protects customers and member-owners from the impacts of wildfire by empowering the IPUC to setclearandconsistentexpectationsforutilities'wildfiremitigationefforts, holdingutilitiestoarobuststandard of care in operations, maintenance, repair, and upgrades, and outlining liabilities for utilities that fail to meet IPUC requirements. It also motivates federal agencies to promptly authorize wildfire mitigation work.