Victims should not receive less because a fire is unusually destructive. California can preserve recovery rights while spreading truly catastrophic financing across utilities, insurance mechanisms and carefully conditioned public structures.

Any expanded backstop should reward measurable wildfire mitigation and penalize poor safety performance. Otherwise taxpayers or ratepayers absorb risk without changing the conduct that creates it.

California should be very cautious about changing legal rights after disasters specifically because large defendants find existing liability expensive. Accountability loses meaning if it disappears when damages become large.

Families who lose homes and communities should not become the financial shock absorber for a regulated utility. Liability creates a direct reason to maintain equipment and reduce preventable ignition risks.

A regulated monopoly cannot simply exit the market after a catastrophe. California needs a liability structure severe enough to enforce safety but survivable enough to maintain essential electric service.

Utilities finance enormous infrastructure programs in capital markets. If unpredictable wildfire liabilities make borrowing dramatically more expensive, customers eventually pay through rates and delayed grid investment.