Connection between Winchester, Merriman homes is no mystery

Building a legacy

Winchester Mystery House historian Janan Boehmewill discuss parallels between Sarah Winchester’s famed San Jose estate and her sister Isabel Merriman’s Los Altos home at the Los Altos History Museum on Sept. 17, 5:30-7 p.m.

Boehme began leading tours of the Mystery House in the late 1970s. In 2017, she created a new tour highlighting never-before-seen areas, including the north wing where a seven-story tower once stood before being demolished after the 1906 earthquake along with the fifth through seventh floors.

“When I toured the Winchester-Merriman house in Los Altos, I was very excited to see a number of features identical to those in Sarah’s home, both inside and out,” Boehme said in a release.

Admission to the program is $15 general and free for museum members. Registration is required to losaltoshistory.org/SarahIsDreamHouses.

Credit is due

Silicon Valley Clean Energy (SVCE), a Sunnyvale-based clean electricity provider, is issuing at total of $33 million to its customers through a one-time automatic bill credit.

Residential customers in Los Altos, Los Altos Hills, Mountain View and other South Bay cities will receive a credit of approximately $50. Nonresidential customers will also receive a credit, which will be determined by the customers’ historic energy use. Credits will be automatically applied to upcoming PG&E bills for electricity used in August.

The SVCE Board of Directors identified affordable energy as a top issue for the agency and found the funding for the bill credits during its midyear budget review.

“We board members are here representing our communities, and we know that increasing costs have impacted our residents and businesses,” said SVCE Board Chair and Los Altos Hills Councilmember George Tyson in a release.

SVCE generation services comprise approximately one-third of electricity bills, with the remainder coming from PG&E.