Storm Update: Election Day

Some progress was made on November 5th in restoring power to Scarsdale homes and schools. All seven schools are powered up and open and Con Edison reports that they restored power to 912 customers in Scarsdale. However the counts from the utility are suspect as I know from personal experience that many homes were removed from the outage list last night – even though no power was restored. If your power is still out, go to the Con Ed site and make sure your complaint remains active – if not, re-enter your address. http://www.coned.com/

According to Con Ed, as of Tuesday morning, 49% of Scarsdale customers remain without power. Scarsdale10583 received a list of outages for all of the 45 towns and villages in Westchester County served by Con Edison. What’s remarkable is that Scarsdale’s percentage of restored customers is third from the bottom of the list of the 45 locations shown. Only New Castle with 55% out of power and North Castle with 50% out trail Scarsdale’s 49%. Why our service is so abysmal will undoubtedly be a subject for discussion in the months and years to come.

As far as we know, Con Edison is promising that most customers will be restored by Friday night November 9 – with everyone back on line by Sunday November 11. Except for those two deadlines, they have supplied little information about how the work will be staged and what areas will come back sooner.

To add insult to injury, a Scarsdale10583 reader sent it the following about Con Edison: “Con Edison released a quarterly earnings report Monday night at 8:30 pm. tonight at 8:30 Monday night. "Consolidated Edison Inc.'s (ED) third-quarter earnings jumped 15% as the utility company increased its rates, though electric sales slipped.”

If you’re mad as hell and can’t take it anymore, file a complaint with the New York State Public Service Commission:

If you have access to a printer use the following text to draft a letter to the Public Service Commission and send it to the address below or send you complaint via email:

Dear Secretary Brilling,:

I write as a resident of New York State, Westchester County, and the Village of Scarsdale. In every sense of the word, I am powerless.

I am not only without electrical power, but without any power to change the horrific treatment Con Ed has given to the Village of Scarsdale and other Westchester residents following Hurricane Sandy. Just from what I saw on the streets of my community, it is clear that Con Ed was not adequately prepared for the storm, did not allocate sufficient resources to the Village of Scarsdale, assigned Scarsdale a lower priority than other municipalities, did not begin assessing damage in the Village until many days after the storm, and did not communicate accurately any restoration information. The Con Ed outage map was inaccurate. The "Check Status" portion of the Con Ed website provided either no restoration time or a default time over ten days after the storm and over a week after New York City power was restored. Eight days after the storm, 50% of residents remain without power.

These are just a few of the glaring deficiencies obvious to consumers and residents of the Village of Scarsdale. Presumably, other deficiencies are more apparent to your offices or will be determined after investigation. I request that your office begin a full investigation of Con Ed's deficient service to Scarsdale residents and report the results publicly and to me. In those results, please indicate what changes will be made so that Scarsdale residents will receive appropriate priority and service from Con Edison in the future, and what penalties or other disciplinary action will be imposed upon Con Ed.

Respectfully submitted,

[Name]

Secretary to the Commission
Hon. Jaclyn A. Brilling
Secretary to the Commission
New York State Public Service Commission
Empire State Plaza
Agency Building 3Albany, NY 12223-1350
Phone: (518) 474-6530
Fax: (518) 486-6081
Email: secretary@dps.ny.gov

Or use the following link to file your complaint online:

http://www.dps.ny.gov/complaints.html