Victims of the McKinney Fire that destroyed homes and killed four people in Siskiyou County have sued the Oregon-based utility company providing power in far Northern California, claiming PacifiCorp powerlines sparked the fire.

While fire investigators with the United States Forest Service remain tight-lipped about what caused the blaze, the lawsuit argues power equipment is to blame. The fire ignited July 29 at a time of dangerous fire weather in a rural area by McKinney Creek near Klamath River, an unincorporated community on Highway 96 in Siskiyou County.

Tom Gauntt, a spokesperson for PacifiCorp, declined to answer questions about the McKinney Fire and said the lawsuit prevented the company from discussing the matter.

PacifiCorp, which operates as Pacific Power in California, filed a report with the California Public Utilities Commission six days after the fire started, alerting regulators that its equipment was in the area of ​​a fire. The company did not report any problems with its equipment to state regulators. Drew Hanson, another spokesman for PacifiCorp, told the Chronicle on Aug. 3 that “we are not aware of any equipment being collected for an investigation related to the McKinney Fire.”

Attorney Gerald Singleton said his firm’s investigator reported that overhead power lines were the only human infrastructure in the remote forested area where the fire started — no roads, structures or campsites. His San Diego-based firm, Singleton Schreiber, is representing about 25 property owners with losses from the fire.

“There’s nothing anyone has seen that would lead us to believe that the McKinney Fire started with anything other than power lines,” Singleton said.

A 911 caller reported the first flames of the McKinney Fire just before 2:15 pm on July 29. Emergency dispatch audio from some of the first fire units on scene describe the early flames. “About a quarter acre …. right now putting water on it … it is underneath the power line right-of-way,” a firefighter reported over the radio at about 2:30 pm

Singleton said his firm’s investigator was informed that the Forest Service collected power equipment from the origin site as evidence. He said they will request access to inspect the equipment in the course of civil litigation proceedings.

Adrienne Freeman, a spokesperson for the Forest Service, said the agency’s investigators were still determining how the fire started and were working with assistance from the Siskiyou County Sheriff’s Office. Freeman declined to say whether any power equipment had been collected as potential evidence.

The lawsuit alleges PacifiCorp was negligent in its maintenance, operation and inspection of its power lines and names another 2020 wildfire in California that spurred a lawsuit blaming PacifiCorp for the destruction: the Slater Fire that burned 157,229 acres and killed two people in the Klamath National Forest . The cause of that fire is still under investigation. PacifiCorp did not immediately respond to a request for comment on the Slater Fire.

The McKinney Fire has burned 60,392 acres and is 95% contained. The blaze destroyed at least 196 structures. Those killed include longtime US Forest Service fire lookout Kathy Shoopman.

Julie Johnson (she/her) is a San Francisco Chronicle staff writer. Email: julie.johnson@sfchronicle.com. Twitter: @juliejohnson

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SAN FRANCISCO (KGO) — With two kids attending school from home, Simonia Clifton saw her energy bill skyrocket during the pandemic.

Clifton said her bill was “Between $75 and $100 more than usual and that just kind of made it difficult to budget, especially having lost my job from COVID and being on unemployment at the same time.”

She began cutting back elsewhere in order to cover her family’s growing energy costs, including on running heat.

RELATED: PG&E customers could be hit with rate hike of more than $760 over 2 years

Clifton isn’t alone, according to the Census Bureau’s Household Pulse Survey from last July through this August, which measures the pandemic’s social and economic impact.

The ABC7 News data team analyzed the survey’s findings for San Francisco, Oakland and Berkeley and found that one-fifth of households reduced or forwent basic necessities, such as food or medicine, to pay an energy bill.

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These struggles didn’t fall equally on all residents. Race and ethnicity, education level, income, and households with children all played a factor in higher percentages.

Forty-seven percent of those who identified as Hispanic or Latino reduced or forwent basic necessities, such as food or medicine, to pay an energy bill. Thirty-seven percent of individuals surveyed who identified as Black also forwent basic necessities to pay an energy bill. More than half of those who have less than a high school education faced the same circumstances, along with almost a third of households with children under 18.

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Dennis Osmer, the executive director of the Central Coast and San Francisco Peninsula Energy Services, said the situation could become worse with the moratorium on power shutoffs ending.

“I think it adds numbers to those numbers, this is a lot worse in its effect,” he said.

Help exists. Arthur Higgins receives assistance from the low income home energy assistance program.

“The program made all of the difference in the world. It kept the power on. They made my house more energy efficient,” Higgins said.

Households with a member who lost employment income in the previous month were more than three times as likely to be unable to pay their energy bills as those without income loss.

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Gabriela Sandoval, the director of Race & Equity Policy with The Utility Reform Network (TURN) said, “We went into the pandemic with customers owing in California about $500 million and we know that right now the big four utility company customers owe about $2 billion .”

The big four includes PG&E customers here in the Bay Area, making up approximately $900 million of that debt, according to Sandoval.

By email, a PG&E Spokesperson told ABC7 News customers who are having difficulty paying their bills can be put on a payment plan or possibly qualify for the CARE program which offers a monthly discount of 20% or more on gas and electricity. The Family Electric Rate Assistance Program offers a monthly discount of 18% on electricity only.

“It’s stunning to look at how these costs have increased and the impact on the people who can least afford it is really heartbreaking,” Osmer said.

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