An Oregon timber company is seeking nearly $70 million in compensation for wildfire damages allegedly caused by several energy utilities in 2020.

The Giustina Land and Timber Co. and several affiliated entities have filed negligence, trespass and nuisance claims in a lawsuit against the Eugene Water & Electric Board, the Lane Electric Cooperative and the Bonneville Power Administration.

According to the federal complaint, the defendants failed to “pre-emptively de-energize their power lines” despite warnings of high wildfire risk in early September 2020, causing about 17,000 acres owned by the Giustina companies to be burned in the Holiday Farm Fire.

Representatives of the Lane Electric Cooperative and EWEB said the organizations don’t comment on litigation, while the Bonneville Power Administration did not respond to requests for comment.

The lawsuit alleges strong winds knocked trees onto electrical lines during extremely dry conditions, igniting the Holiday Farm Fire, which ended up burning a total of 174,000 acres, near a “crossover point” between EWEB and Lane Electric’s lines in eastern Lane County.

The plaintiffs claim the two utilities and the Bonneville Power Administration failed to do a timely shut down of their power lines or to “implement and maintain proper vegetation and tree management tactics and procedures,” among other problems.

The defendants were “well aware of the risk” of power lines causing wildfires, a hazard highlighted in a state government report nearly a year before the 2020 wildfires, when the National Weather Service issued a “red flag warning” about fire danger in early September, the complaint said.

Apart from destroying merchantable timber, growing trees and bare land, the Holiday Farm Fire saddled the Giustina companies with additional costs for reforestation and road repairs, collectively resulting in damages of $68.9 million, according to the lawsuit.

The lawsuit recently filed by the Giustina companies is among several cases related to the 2020 Labor Day wildfires, which burned more than a million acres in Oregon, including litigation against the PacifiCorp power utility filed by landowners and wineries.