The settlements are for far less than jury verdicts but bring some closure for damages suffered five years ago — and beat a federal tax penalty.
OREGON — PacifiCorp, the Portland utility that faces crushing financial liability for a wave of destructive wildfires that killed five, injured many others, and caused widespread damage, has reached another big settlement — $150 million to 1,434 people in the 2020 Labor Day wildfires.
Major fires fueled by strong east winds broke out all over the state during that holiday weekend. Subsequent lawsuits against PacifiCorp center on blazes in the Santiam River canyon, the hills inland from Lincoln City, in Southern Oregon and Chiloquin.
Lawyers for the plaintiffs have focused on PacifiCorp, rather than other utilities, because the company chose not to deenergize its power lines. As the wind and resulting falling trees hit power lines, they started fires.
Today’s settlement marks the largest single disposition of cases since litigation began.
“We are gratified to resolve these claims to provide the plaintiffs some closure,” said Ryan Flynn, president of PacifiCorp subsidiary Pacific Power. “The process that led to this settlement represents the fairest and most efficient way to resolve wildfire litigation.”
The new settlement, announced Nov. 19, brings some certainty for victims, but provides markedly lower payouts than the multimillion-dollar verdicts jurors awarded some wildfire plaintiffs in Multnomah County Circuit Court in 2023.
The mass settlement also offers a look at the high-stakes, high-reward world of big-time litigation. The three law firms that represented the plaintiffs in this case would normally divvy up one-third — $50 million — of the total reward as their fee. The lawyers’ cut will be slightly less in this case.
The case also reveals friction among the competing law firms representing the plaintiffs. More than 300 plaintiffs in this recent settlement originally joined a large class action lawsuit organized by the Stoll Berne firm in Portland. But they defected from the class in hopes of getting a quicker resolution.
“It’s been five years since the fire,” said George McCoy, a lawyer with Warren Allen, the Northeast Portland firm that helped negotiate the $150 million PacifiCorp settlement. “People need resolution, they need to rebuild their lives.”
PacifiCorp will pay the plaintiffs an average of $107,142 each. Juries in the class action case awarded the first round of plaintiffs between $3 million and $5 million each. But PacifiCorp is appealing those verdicts, and it will take years for the class action to wind its way through the courts. Half a decade after the blazes, some plaintiffs have plainly run out of patience.
Although far less than the court awards, the settlements will at least be tax free. The 2024 Oregon Legislature and Congress made wildfire settlements exempt from state and federal income taxes. The federal exemption expires Dec. 31 — another reason for plaintiffs to settle now.
Foundation, Fishermen's Bend Recreation Site, Mill City.
Brian Burk photo
Wednesday’s deal marks the latest in a steady drumbeat of out-of-court settlements that the embattled utility, Oregon’s second largest, has reached. In October, the company announced it would pay $175 million to Oregon vineyards and wineries that claimed smoke from the fires had ruined their 2020 vintage.
In June 2024, PacifiCorp agreed to pay $178 million to 403 people. In filings with the federal Securities and Exchange Commission, PacifiCorp, part of Warren Buffett’s Berkshire Hathaway Energy, revealed on Wednesday that it had paid out $1.7 billion to settle nearly 4,200 individual wildfire claims, about 70% of the total. It has said it will settle any reasonable claim.
The latest settlement comes just days after PacifiCorp disclosed that wildfire liabilities had put the company in a financial pinch. As the Oregon Journalism Project reported, the major bond rating companies recently downgraded the company’s debt, citing wildfire liabilities.
PacifiCorp itself warned investors in a Nov. 3 SEC filing that the wave of lawsuits “could have a material adverse effect on PacifiCorp's financial condition and could limit PacifiCorp’s ability to access capital and could impact PacifiCorp's liquidity, cash flows and capital expenditure plans.”
State leaders have struggled to formulate a wildfire policy that would protect rural Oregonians and still allow the survival of the state’s electric utilities. That leaves the issue to the courts and ambitious lawyers.
The new settlement may ease the pain for some plaintiffs but not others whose attorneys chose a different strategy. It will also do little to lessen tensions among their lawyers.
The Warren Allen firm, located near Portland International Airport, has until now been a relatively low-profile personal injury firm. But McCoy has led his colleagues into a new business. As firefighters worked to tamp out the embers, he and his team drove to the fire zones, cruising for clients.
Stoll Berne did the same, led by partner Cody Berne. In concert with two other firms skilled at large-scale lawsuits, it filed a class action just weeks after the fires.
Stoll Berne is one of the best-known firms in Portland. It is based in downtown Portland in a refurbished former Portland police headquarters.
Even as plaintiffs itched for a resolution to their cases, competition among the law firms morphed into bad blood.
Stoll Berne filed an ethics complaint with the Oregon State Bar against McCoy and several other lawyers in 2024, claiming McCoy and his associates inappropriately solicited clients.
The firm took to calling McCoy’s team the “casino lawyers” after learning they had staged client events at the Chinook Winds Casino in Lincoln City. Most of McCoy’s wildfire clients lived east of Lincoln City near the tiny town of Otis. The area was hard hit by the Echo Mountain Complex Fire.
Warren Allen officials deny any wrongdoing and, in turn, produced documents showing the Stoll Berne firm had filed liens against several former clients in a bid to recover legal fees the firm said it was owed.
Stoll Berne confirmed it has filed liens against 28 individuals in all. The liens offer a path for law firms to recover costs they incurred investigating and building cases for clients who later left and hired different lawyers.
Cody Berne declined comment.
McCoy said he would prefer to focus on his clients: “I don’t have a relationship with Cody Berne.”
In a written statement, McCoy lauded PacifiCorp for being willing to negotiate, and he echoed its talking points. “These settlements reflect a shared commitment with PacifiCorp to resolve disputes,” he said. “Claims for the plaintiffs will not be resolved through targeted or punitive legislation. They will not be resolved in a timely or fair manner through a drawn-out trial process.”
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