LI Officials Call On PSEG To Reimburse For Blackout, Perishables

NASSAU COUNTY, NY — In the wake of PSEG Long Island's heavily criticized response to Tropical Storm Isaias, government officials from the town all the way up to the federal level are calling on the utility to reimburse customers.

On Monday, multiple government officials, at multiple different events, called on PSEG to reimburse customers who were affected by the outage, and to also not raise rates to pay for the recovery efforts. The officials wanted PSEG to pay customers for the time their power was out, and to also reimburse the costs of food and medication they may have spoiled because of the outages.

"We experienced across Long Island more than 400,000 power outages, and Long Island suffered more outages than any other region in the state," said Nassau County Executive Laura Curran. "So it's clear that PSEG Long Island was not prepared to respond to a storm that was predicted to be much worse than it was, and they must be held accountable."

Curran was joined by state senators Kevin Thomas, Todd Kaminsky, Anna Kaplan and Jim Gaughran to call for the utility to reimburse customers. Curran also wrote a letter to PSEG Long Island with Congresswoman Kathleen Rice, and her sentiments were echoed by Town of Hempstead Supervisor Don Clavin, who held his own press conference in front of PSEG Long Island's offices.

The officials also said that not only should PSEG reimburse customers, but that it should not raise rates later on to cover those costs.

"When PSEG took over for LIPA in 2014, customers were promised better service, communication and accountability," said Thomas. "Here is your chance to show you can keep that promise, PSEG, by providing the relief that Long Islanders need and deserve. It's the right thing to do. But given that most corporations put money over people, I will be introducing legislation on this as well."

The officials all pointed to not only how slow PSEG is to getting power back (as of this writing, the PSEG website still says more than 40,000 Long Islanders are without power), but also the lack of communication on every level. Curran said the county had extreme difficulty communicating with PSEG to coordinate the removal of wires from downed trees. The utility had to remove the wires before the trees could be cleared from roads, Curran said, and the lack of communication delayed the work.

"This storm was almost a week ago," Kaplan said. "And tens of thousands of Long Islanders still have no power, no answers and no faith in the competency of the leadership of PSEG Long Island."

PSEG Long Island is facing intense scrutiny over its storm response from nearly every level of government. Heads of the utility will speak before the Nassau County Legislature and the New York State Senate. At a press conference on Monday, Gov. Andrew Cuomo said that PSEG Long Island did a "lousy job" preparing for the storm, and added that the state's Public Service Commission will be investigating the response.

"We were told after Sandy, things would be different. And now we know that they're not," Kaminsky said. "But one thing remains the same: Long Islanders know we are not ready for the next storm. So of course the least we can do is make sure people are reimbursed for the unnecessary hardships they endured this week."