Should wildfire victims get a break from solar mandate?

A bill would exempt low-income and middle-income victims from panel requirements on rebuilt homes

Hundreds of homes in Joe Patterson’s Northern California Assembly district burned to the ground in the Caldor fire.

In the three years since that devastating summer, many of those rebuilding homeowners have ended up on the hook for tens of thousands of dollars, thanks to state laws that require solar panels on new homes — even on those that didn’t have them before they burned down.

“Trust me when I say this: $25,000 to build solar onto a house where people do not have solar is 100% an impediment to rebuilding,” Patterson, a Republican from Rocklin, told the Assembly Natural Resources Committee last week.

Patterson’s Assembly Bill 2787, which passed the committee unanimously, would give some of those poorly insured, low- and middle-income homeowners rebuilding after a natural disaster a break from the state’s solar-panel building requirement.

The bill would exempt homeowners at or below the median income for their county from the state’s building codes that require new solar on homes if they’re damaged or destroyed in a natural disaster. The legislation, which would expire in 2028, also would limit the benefit to those who don’t have an insurance plan that would cover the costs of the upgrade to new solar.

The bill now moves to the Assembly Appropriations Committee, where it faces an uncertain future. Last year, that committee killed a similar bill by Republican Assemblymember Jim Patterson of Fresno.

Joe Patterson, no relation, told Calmatters he expects his bill, which is coauthored by the Fresno Republican, to make it through the committee this time because it doesn’t contain funding for a study like last year’s bill.

It’s another matter whether Gov. Gavin Newsom will sign it if the bill is also approved in the Senate and reaches his desk. In 2022, Newsom vetoed a similar bill, citing the need for solar power to reduce greenhouse gases that are a contributing factor for wildfires.

Solar power is a critical part of the state’s ambi