18:08
who are left in the dark. Uh that was time the engineers should have been spending reviewing, designing, engineering and processing approvals. Our management at the time had already identified some specific pain points that we could address that would help us to deal with that backlog and to help see real rapid change to accelerate development across the city. ED19 allowed us to massively accelerate those efforts not just for the Palisades rebuild but for new residential, multif family and commercial projects all across Los Angeles. As the president of the board of water and power commissioners, I have the
privilege of leading a commission that provides policy direction and oversight to LWP. The other members of the commission and I passed a resolution directing staff to implement ED19 and we still remain fully committed to it being fully implemented. We have to ensure that LED DWP is doing all that we can do to promote growth and economic well-being in Los Angeles. And I'm proud of the change we've already seen. I'm proud of the work that our teams are doing and have accomplished in just the 175 I guess today 176 days uh since ED19 was signed. I see real change in the way new construction and developments are getting energized. That's strategic change responding to what our customers actually need to give
them more predictability, more certainty and more speed to development. Some of you may have heard me talk before about the first steps we took over the summer to implement ED19. We hired more engineers and more staff. We set up internal dashboards. We created pre-engineering templates and the mayor mentioned also for uh for single family homes. We had pre-approved designs that were done. We're now also have self and pre-approved uh engineering templates for larger and more comp complex projects. This all makes development more predictable, more standardized, and quicker. Let me outline five more measures that are worth highlighting today. First, our board of water and power commissioners voted three weeks ago to allow LAWP to absorb the full cost 100%
of extensions that connect new customers or developments to the grid. Now customers will have to share costs only for projects that have unusually high electrical load or if it's the last leg of an extension that would only serve and could only serve one customer. I want to emphasize that's a momentous change. It will lower project costs. It will shorten development timelines and construction clocks. It will reduce the back and forth and will support new development citywide. Second, we've launched and are now accepting applications through the beta version of Power Connect. Power Connect is our new online portal that centralizes project information and communication. Our new portal makes it easier for customers to find the
information they need all in one place to get a clear picture of project status, next steps, and who's responsible to take them. Third, our customers now can get a preliminary meter panel earlier in construction. That means they can plan foundations, uh, grounding, and electrical work earlier in the construction process without needing to wait until framing is complete. Fourth, we've released updated construction work area standards to help accelerate projects and give the customers the ability to utilize the public right of way for staging. This is huge. Previously during construction, many customers would have to make land
available on their site and reserve it for that sort of staging. Now they'll be able to move faster, use the public right away, maybe create more uh potential usable floor area uh and more valuable frontage. And lastly, we formed a new advisory group including developers and constructors uh people who will then have input and keep us informed of what we can do better going forward. We're already seeing results. We've reduced our late inventory by more than 800 projects since the August peak. And that's still while taking in 870 new applications every week.
A friend of mine who builds housing in LA and other cities, uh he recently told me how pleasantly shocked he was to see. He mentioned a cultural transformation at DWP. Uh he mentioned the city being open for business in a way that he had not seen before. And he asked me a question which is now my favorite question. Why wasn't this done 20 years ago? I could only answer, I have no idea, but we're doing it right now. Let me close with a few more words of gratitude.
Not one agency can do this alone. We're part of a city family and ED19 calls for active coordination and collaboration across city agencies and departments. LWP, public works, engineering, street services, building and safety, all of us are now collaborating uh in a more in a more holistic way that speeds projects along and gets approvals processed more quickly. And let me be crystal clear, our work is not yet done. There is much more that still needs to be done to build on this progress. So let us know how we're doing. Tell us what works. If someone comes out and it's a good a better outcome than before, tell us. And if it's not and
there's something else you want to suggest, tell us that too. As we communicate with new clarity and respond to requests for design approvals and inspections more quickly, and we streamline and modernize all of our processes further, our main KPI is customer satisfaction. Our customers deserve an efficient, modern, and predictable process for new connections and real estate development. And that is our commitment to you and to Los Angeles as a whole. Thank you very much. enjoying the mayor. Do you plan on mayor? Well, this isn't a campaign stop. This is an official business stop in the city. But let me say this and the mayor and I have talked a lot and I think it's so important as this election is getting closer. We've got I
don't know how many days left. I'm fortunate I'm not counting days like I was four years ago. 14. Um that we know where both candidates stand, right? And I ask the mayor, I really need you to tell me, are we going to get this city moving back forward again? and she's done her work and she's worked with the team and I compliment this. Now, I've got to be honest in comparison, uh, Councilwoman Ramen has made statements that we should all ask for an explanation to. She's made a statement about Chief McDonald, that she's going to fire Chief McDonald. Um there's been rumors running around about appointing Gas Gone, which would just take this city into a very dark place. And so both of the candidates have to be upfront and honest. I do
show uh extreme concern when a candidate is talking about firing a chief of police who in my opinion as a former commissioner, police commissioner, and somebody that actually worked with Jim McDonald. It couldn't be more foolhardy to make those kind of statements. He is regarded as one of the best chiefs in the country. I congratulated Mayor Bass. We haven't always agreed on everything, but when she appointed Jimmy McDonald, I called her and I said, "That was an amazing choice." And I think Ramen needs to come out and explain herself. Now, if you're going to fire him, why are you going to fire him? If you're going to fire him, who are you going to appoint?
Is it going to look like somebody like a Gascon? Because I don't think we need LA PD being a lab experiment for the DSA. It's gonna take LA in the wrong direction and we should all be concerned about the direction she wants to take LAPD. Just a quick follow. Do you know who you'll be voting for? I sure I know who I'm voting for, but I'm not going to express it at this moment. For the mayor and Rick for each of you, you guys were there was a lot of animosity between you four years ago, two years ago, even eight months ago.
How did that evolve over the time? and how often you talk to Let me just say that um before either of us ran Rick and I had a relationship when I was in Sacramento and also in Washington DC a race is a race and when it's over as soon as it was over and even before then if ever there was an issue that impacted the Grove or other initiatives that he was involved in I always reached out. We always communicated. There was never a loss in communication. After the fires, he came forward with some very specific ideas. First of all, we started collaborating immediately on the recreation center, the city, JJ Reic and Steadfast. But secondly, he initiated using uh artificial intelligence in the planning
process uh self-certification. We looked at those ideas and we adopted them. The exemption for the Palisades from ULA was something that although all the differences that are around about ULA, the one thing that everybody agreed on was that and voters will have an opportunity to give that exemption to the Palisades. If you've lived here and you sold your house, you didn't choose for it to be destroyed. There's no reason why you should have to pay that fee. So, uh, I think our history of collaboration has been long and, uh, and consistent. And you know, Matt, I would just say, and you and I have known each other for quite a while, my love for this city transcends politics. And I'm going to stand behind people that are doing right
for the city, uh, doing right for the people of the city, and doing right for the people of the city that need the help the most. And, uh, that's why I'm standing here today. So, it's uh it's a love for the city. And as the mayor said during CO, she asked me to be on a task force with her, which I was. And we did Zoom calls with fellow members of Congress. And then she called me and said, "I'm thinking about running for mayor." And I said, "What the heck you doing that for?" But anyway, that's a whole another conversation. Sure. Well, let me I'm going to answer that in general and then I also had released a statement and I will call on our uh board commission president, our interim general manager to answer in the
specifics. So, uh, because people are experiencing extremely high rates all over the city. And so, to address the outrageous rates, I'm calling on the DWP board to look into lowering the expense. I encourage every customer now to pay whatever they can afford right now. With outrageous gasoline prices and inflation affecting everyone's grocery bills and the cost of living, we don't want anyone overwhelmed by their utility bills. I've requested the uh DWP board to pause shut offs through the end of the year for customers who are facing higher bills following the record heat and higher electricity usage that LA has experienced. No Angelino unable to pay their residential bill will have their
electricity or water turned off because they are unable to pay their bill for the remainder of this year. Does that mean the rates are wrong? No, you can. So, uh, good morning everybody. Dave Hansen, interim general manager seem to have misplaced my suit. Um, so it's not a question of rates as much as it is usage. So, if we've got somebody like in the case of your friend where you're talking about an empty lot, we might have a metering error. So, we encourage those folks to give us a call at 1800 dialed EWP and we'll send some folks out there to come and uh review and see what's going on. Uh we have been going
through a heat wave for uh the last uh three or four months. I'm sure everybody's felt it. Uh and so it's important to remember that our billing is still by monthly. It comes out twice a month and it's electricity, it's water, uh it's sanitation and sewer as well as a utility tax. Uh when those bills come out, if they're more than what our customers can deal with at the time, we encourage that you enter into Level Pay, uh which is not income uh qualified. Uh it's not a lowinccome program. We actually like people uh to sign up for level pay. that allows you to take your utility bill usage for the entire year, split it into 12 months, and how we normally do a bimonthly bill, when you're on level pay, you get to pay
monthly. So, we highly encourage that. Uh, it kind of takes the sting out of some of the heavy usage months. Uh if anyone has a very large bill that we wanted to resolve an individual amount, again, we encourage you to give us a call and we can work it out with you over the a period of several months to just enter into a zero percentage repayment. For your palisades person and for palisades, I do want to thank you for reminding me my favorite thing, the Pipsy, our uh permanent inspection center is right here by Marquez Elementary School. So they can walk right in there and talk to a living, breathing human being. We have uh LABS folks in there. We have other city family in there. We have DWP in there
during normal working hours. We even come in on the weekend if folks need to interface with us. Uh we're talking to customers. We're talking to the building community. If you went to the permit and inspection center a few months ago, I ask you to visit it again because now we have a full theater commander out there that has 100% authority over everything at the Department of Water and Power. That person doesn't have to ask me for anything. They just tell me what they did. And we're hearing great feedback on the new leadership at the permit center. So, please go visit them and take your utility bills.
It's not so much the rates. We get a slow growth every year in rates. I think last year it was 7%. It's really usage. People are asking us about rates all the time. And it's because when we had a few weeks ago, the state declared an emergency because they didn't have enough uh power. They were worried they were going to have to start doing rolling blackouts. Uh and they were calling us asking us to fire up all our generation assets. We had a line out for maintenance. They were asking us to clear off of it and bring it back because the state needed it. So, we were within 300 megawws of having to do shut offs. It got pretty uh scary there for a little while. Uh just as far as load uh
demand goes. And when we have high load like that, it's a burden on the customers unfortunately. We ask everybody to uh dial your thermostats up a little bit, 778 degrees, uh that'll cut down on some of your air conditioning usage. Craig, I guess my question is for Rick, if you don't mind. Uh so you've said a lot of glowing things about the mayor and I'm curious for people who are and there are many undecided voters. Is there going to come a time and time is of the essence now where you plan on making an endorsement? Is an endorsement at some point from your company? Well, I can't answer that tonight or today. Uh I'll let you know. Believe me, I'm sure if I decide to do that, it'll show up and I'll be able to tell you
about it. But again, I think at this point in time, and again, we have not always agreed on everything and I've been critical of some of the things uh that the mayor has done. Um, but I know what I've seen in the last year and a half and the help she's leaned in and given to this community. And this community was so destroyed, it's like a nuclear bomb went off. And listen, remember folks, the bathtubs melted and nobody knew what was going on. Everybody was standing here trying to figure out what was going on. And so we did get together because it has to transcend politics and we have to do the right thing. I just want the mayor to do the right thing for this great city and we have been struggling but there's a
way out and this executive order is a good start of helping this city move forward and we tested it here in the village and we're testing it here in the palisades. So I've been impressed with her. I've been impressed with her team and how quickly they work. Three blocks away, we've got a brand new park being built, $50 million, not one taxpayer dime. That would not have happened without the support of Mayor Bass. And uh and we broke the mold on that because it had never been done before. And that's the kind of leadership I think people need to think about. Is there leadership that is willing to break some of the old rules that have held us back to have a brighter future in this city?
And everybody should think about that and really do their research on the two people that are running and then make their own decision. Jillian, I want to go back to electricity. I mean, we've been hearing about these highs for weeks, even months now. wondering why now? Why are we deciding to implement these shut offs and these measures now when you've been hearing from people and fussing for so long to get so many answers? So, uh again with our bimonthly billing system, if you're getting a bill right now, it's probably for the electricity that you used in July and August. So, uh we are working towards AMI, that's that
automated metering infrastructure, smart meters. Once we have smart meters out there, we can take a different look at our billing and we can go to monthly so that folks will have a monthly bill. We can also develop uh apps so that people can see what their bill is going to be and then you can modify your behaviors. You can stand guard in front of the thermostat. Uh but until we have AMI, we can't do those type of things. So that's why it's such an important initiative for us. So I think you're looking at the time delay. It's about 3 months from the time you use the electricity to the time that you're seeing it on your bill. And again, level pay, level pay, level pay. That's the key to getting through
climate change and when we have heat waves like this. Uh years ago, it was the Fourth of July weekend was the hot weekend that we did all of our summer planning for. That's what we prepped the power grid for and we canled all the work and we watched to see what was going to happen for those high heat weekends. Now it's September, October. So, uh, climate change, if you don't believe it's a real thing, I think it is. We can see it definitely on our load graphs at DWP. So, please take advantage of level pay and if you have a one-time large bill, call us. We'll work with you. We'll split it up over several months and allow you to pay that off. And are you guys doing anything to
address like the underlying issues here? Obviously, there's a bunch of stuff like whether it's the rate increase or the usage, but just in terms of in the future, let's say it does get hot again. Is there anything being done to try to address this? We don't have to deal with these high bills again. That's a great question. So, you're going to see something coming from us in uh coming soon for rate reform. And as soon as we can get some meaningful low-income rates for some of the less affluent communities that have a hard time paying these bills, right now we only are able to give like an eight or $20 discount for low income. It's it's really meaningless. And we're tied
to very restrictive because of lawsuits and Prop 26 issues. We can't just forgive a bill because if we forgive it, then the other 1.6 million customers have to pay it. It's just how the system works. So once we get into true rate reform and we have AMI, we're going to be able to work with folks and take the sting out of this. Last question, Amber. Two questions for the mayor. First, um we've been hearing about these bills for youamilies and separately on a whole other topic.
Um this morning, one of the city council members as city attorney ordinance related to property. Yes. Can you comment on that? Yes. Absolutely. But before I do, let me just acknowledge uh the folks that are here. Um Jason Randu, chief operating officer for the power system of DWP. Vince Bertani, general manager of the city's bu planning department. John Wait, interim general manager of building and safety. and Ruben Gonzalez from Vikica, the Valley Industry and Commerce Association. In terms of the uh Nuisance Properties, you all know we've had that problem in the city forever. I
had put $2 million in the budget for the lots to be at least cordoned off. The biggest problem, of course, is private property. the owners. Sometimes the owners are overseas chasing them around to get them to clean up the properties, but I don't want to wait because that causes fires and all sorts of problems, safety problems related in neighborhoods. And so I uh ordered the department to go ahead and start moving forward with the lots. But I will tell you that I put it in the budget and unfortunately just like the budget for police hiring, the council took the money out, the $2 million out. I think because of a few notorious cases that have happened over the last couple of months, I know the council will put it
back in and will move forward with the $2 million, but I have instructed um building and safety to go ahead. I know it's going to be approved. We don't need to sit and wait for the bureaucratic process to uh to finish. And we're always working with customers and complaints uh about the high bill. So this is not new what we're doing today. Thanks everyone. Thank you.
