Why Is Finished Housing Sitting in the Dark? | Utility Grid Delays & Housing Delivery in Los Angeles

Why are completed, entitled apartment buildings in Los Angeles sitting empty for months just waiting to get plugged into the power grid? On October 6, 2026, Abundant Housing LA hosted "Powering Up LA: ED 19, Utility Reforms & Housing Delivery" at HGA Euclid Gallery in Santa Monica to address one of the quietest and most expensive bottlenecks in the housing crisis: utility energization delays. Moderated by Scott Epstein (Policy Director, Abundant Housing LA), land-use attorney Dave Rand (Rand Paster Nelson) and architect Brian Wickersham (AUX Architecture) dive into what developers and architects are experiencing on active job sites, evaluate new municipal utility rules under Executive Directive 19 (ED 19), and outline the legislative and cultural accountability needed to fix the grid queue. TIMESTAMPS / CHAPTERS: 0:00 Welcome & Speaker Introductions 1:18 Framing the Problem: Utility Delays as a Housing Bottleneck (Degen Shaw) 3:07 AHLA Developer Survey Results & Why We're Prioritizing Utility Reform (Scott Epstein) 13:45 Architect’s Reality: How Delays and Staging Cost Housing Units (Brian Wickersham) 15:49 The Legal & Entitlement Shift: Bureaucracy Downstream vs. Frontend Zoning (Dave Rand) 18:16 Real Site Horror Stories & Transparency Issues with Utility Rulebooks 25:53 Executive Directive 19 (ED 19) & The Power Up Symposium: What Has It Changed? 31:10 Deep Dive: Utility Staging Area Requirements & Streetscape Impacts 37:31 Evaluating Utility Concierge Services & Customer Portals 42:38 Municipal vs. Investor-Owned Utilities & CPUC Oversight 47:34 Accountability Solutions: Delay Cost Recovery & State Legislation 57:08 The "First-Mover" Problem & Fair-Share Grid Upgrades 1:03:09 Cultural Shift: Treating Builders as Customers (The San Diego Model) 1:06:03 Audience Q&A: Solar, EV Capacity, and Equipment Placement Alternatives 1:25:10 Wrap-Up & Closing SPEAKERS: • Moderator: Scott Epstein – Policy Director, Abundant Housing LA • Dave Rand – Partner, Rand Paster Nelson • Brian Wickersham – Founding Partner, AUX Architecture (Special shoutout to Jesse Zwick of Housing Action Coalition) LEARN MORE & GET INVOLVED: Stay tuned for Abundant Housing LA’s upcoming research report on utility queue reforms • Website: https://abundanthousingla.org • Follow AHLA on Instagram: @AbundantHousing