An Edison director has soul.

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Original version written for Southern California Edison in 2004. To learn more about Penny Lane or donate, visit pennylane.org.

For Gil Tam, life is more than hefty bonuses and climbing the corporate ladder.

Southern California Edison Director Gil Tam is known for being highly disciplined at work and at home. While he and his wife raised their two kids into capable young adults, he learned a tough-love lesson one day from his daughter: that he needed to back off and let his kids grow up.

So Tam sought ways to increase his patience.

That, along with his compassion for at-risk youth, led Tam to the Penny Lane organization—a residential group home that helps kids between the ages of 12 and 18. These children have either been removed from violent homes or been in trouble with the law. Penny Lane works with the Dept. of Social Services and Children and Family Services to ensure each child has a social worker.

The organization is named after the cheerful Beatles song depicting an idyllic street in the memory of a child. In October, Penny Lane will honor Tam with the "Blue Skies" award for bringing promise to two teenage boys "Larry" and "John," whose names have been changed to protect their privacy.

Right now, Tam is helping John recover from his rough upbringing, after being matched with him two and a half years ago when John was 16.

The corporate director describes John's childhood as being tumultuous at best. John's father left at an early age, with John his last memory of him being a fight with his mother. Before walking out the door, his father turned around and threw John a dime. The child was only about six.

With his mom being in and out of jail, John went through several foster homes before winding up at Penny Lane. By the time he was paired up with Tam, he was dealing with major trust issues.

"It took John a while to open up to my wife and me," says Tam. "He admitted to me one day that for a long time he saw no point in our relationship because the world he comes from is one where the kids don't see themselves living past 18."

But broken promises and feelings of hopelessness weren't the only reasons he held back from Tam.

While John is a determined individual—to the point of finding a way to play varsity football at Monroe High School—he remembers the fate of Tam's first Penny Lane child Larry, who went back out on the streets after turning 18. Larry chose that route over going through Penny Lane's transitional program, which teaches young adults how to function in the real world.

Larry's life after that only got harder. He wound up back in jail, where he even ran into his father one day.

So John was skeptical, "worried he'd wind up like Larry," says Tam, behind tearful eyes.

Regardless of any heartache, working with Penny Lane is rewarding for Tam. He's still hopeful for Larry, and now that the young adult is out of jail, Tam still sees and encourages him. "He's not just a program to me," Tam says.

As for John, his skepticism and lack of trust eventually faded. Now he's on his way to a new life.

"My wife and I used to attend John's football games," continues Tam. "But the most amazing experience was seeing him in his cap and gown. Our next milestone is still in progress. My wife and I are coaching him and telling him he needs a college education. That’s our next project—to encourage him to get through college."

Given all of this, Tam will receive the "Blue Skies" honor by an organization heavily supported by the cast of "CSI" and other notable film stars.

"Gil has brought so much to the lives of our children," says Julia Robinson Shimizu of Penny Lane. "No matter how difficult it is to influence how children from troubled backgrounds view life, Gil doesn't give up."

So is Tam more patient now? He thinks so.

"This program has been beneficial to me as well," says Tam. "My heart tells me to do it and it's taught me patience. My kids still need mentoring and I’m learning to transition myself from being a father to being a coach to my kids. I'm learning to 'back off' as my daughter put it."

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SCE catches pot growers in the act.

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Original version written for Southern California Edison in 2004.

How Edison field workers discovered an electricity heist.

What does $17,765.71 mean to SCE? That’s how much it cost the company to provide about a year’s worth of 24-hour lighting to a Rialto resident’s marijuana patch. And the customer didn’t pay a dime.

How did he do it? By illegally tapping into SCE’s distribution system. This incident represents a fraction of what SCE rebills every year to residents who illegally connect to our electrical grid.

Thanks to SCE ’s Revenue Protection department, the company is able to find these residents and collect the millions of dollars every year it costs SCE to provide this power.

“In 2003 alone, we rebilled about $2,900,000 to residents who illegally set up bypasses to our system,” says Revenue Protection Investigator Supervisor John Giles. “We collected $2,139,000, a total that includes rebills from previous years.”

Some residents go for years using unauthorized bypasses before SCE and law enforcement officials catch up with them. One of SCE’s biggest cases reached its breaking point in January. In 1996, after a Foothill resident was delinquent on his electricity bill, SCE cut his power. But that didn’t stop him from turning on his lights.

“We’d never seen anything like it,” says Revenue Protection Investigator Terry Terkelsen. “We went through a series of investigations on this resident. And after each one, he still hadn’t let up.” The first investigation was in 1998.

Terkelsen checked up on him periodically because he knew the resident’s account had been idle since 1996. He noticed the resident’s Malibu lights were on. He approached the resident and asked if he could check his meter.

The resident went into his house to “put the dogs away,” the Malibu lights went off and Terkelsen didn’t see the customer again. The following investigation happened in 1999. Terkelsen discovered the same resident had full power using a 240-volt extension cord, which was buried four inches underground and plugged into an outlet in the neighbor’s back porch.

Terkelsen again approached the resident and had him remove it. The final investigation started in April 2003, when Revenue Protection received an external tip that this same resident was using “free” power.

Two weeks later, Terkelsen was reassigned to the case. It came to a head in January, when the Rialto Police Department granted Terkelsen and Giles a search warrant to investigate the same home—with the help of T&D.

“John (Giles) and I went out there on Jan. 29 with the Rialto Police Department. We determined the customer was again engaging in unauthorized use of power but could not immediately determine the source of it,” recounts Terkelsen. “That’s when we dispatched Troublemen Greg Davis and Frank Felix.”

Davis, Felix and two contractor crews eventually located the source of the Foothill resident’s electrical connection. But it was no easy task. When Davis and Felix appeared on the scene, they examined the resident’s backyard until they discovered wires coming out of one of the breakers, going through a pipe on the wall and plugged into a generator.

But the generator wasn’t on. The troublemen lifted covers to see where the wires were going and saw they went right through the bottom of the generator and into the ground. At this point, they called the Distribution Operations Center (DOC), who dispatched Underground (Upgraded) Foreman Ralph Mesa. Mesa called out two contractors, Weissker Inc. and UTI, who are equipped to detect underground electricity connections. UTI found the underground conductors right away and used spray paint to mark the trail of the wires. Then the group started digging.

After locating the wires, they found two 10-gauge wires connected to each one of SCE’s secondary conductors. These were buried about five feet underground. The wires were connected to a homemade junction box, wrapped in plastic and stuffed in a large bucket. Mesa removed the bypass and repaired the secondary conductor. Revenue Protection has since rebilled this customer for more than $12,000. And this doesn’t include the associated costs of about $2,000 to conduct the investigation.

Revenue Protection relies on internal and external sources to find customers who are engaging in unauthorized use of electricity. All tips are anonymous.

“A majority of our tips come from our employees,” explains Giles. “If an employee suspects energy theft, they can complete a tip card or call our toll free hotline. Then we’ll start investigating.” If the Revenue Protection investigators determine there is a need, they’ll ask the troublemen to install surveillance meters near the suspects’homes. These meters register the amount of electricity the residents use versus what is being billed.

If you suspect anyone of energy theft, contact the tip hotline at 800-227-3901.

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