Pressure grows on Eversource

144k without power; lawmakers call on Eversource CEO to resign

As many Connecticut residents woke up to their sixth day without power Sunday, the state’s largest power supplier has said most of the state should see their power restored before midnight

Tuesday, a week after Tropical Storm Isaias pounded the Northeast.

As of Sunday afternoon, about 136,000 Eversource customers remain without power, according to outage data provided by the company.

“With more than 741,000 customers restored since the storm began, crews have made significant progress and we expect 90 percent of all of our customers will have power on Sunday evening,” the utility company said in a tweet Saturday.

Speaking during a segment on CBS’ Face the Nation Sunday, Gov. Ned Lamont said out-ofstate line crews had not been required to quarantine before coming to work in Connecticut.

“No, we’re not quarantining them, they’re essential workers, we’re getting them back up on the poles as fast as we can,” Lamont told host Margaret Brennan.

He said those workers are being tested for COVID-19.

“We were hit hard by this tropical storm. We lost almost half our power across the state. Then you realize that means water treatment centers and nursing homes and a whole variety of real emergencies that have to be put out,” Lamont said.

“But we’re getting people tested and we’re fixing the wires. Number one, safety, we gotta get the electricity back up,” he added.

United Illuminating, which provides electricity to 17 towns and cities in southern Fairfield and New Haven counties, said

about 7,400 of its customers still remain without power.

Danbury, a city of a little

under 85,000 residents in northern Fairfield county, tops the list for number of outages at 6,782, followed by the coastal town of Westport at 6,259 and the Hartford County town of Glastonbury at 5,900.

Danbury and Westport are expected to be “substantially restored” — meaning less than one percent of residents will be out of power — by midnight Tuesday, according to Eversource. Glastonbury is supposed to be restored by noon that day.

In Weston, Norfolk and Redding, more than 85 percent of Eversource’s customers still had no power as of Sunday morning, with nearly 95 percent out in Weston alone. (Fairfield, Shelton and North Branford had the highest percentage of outages by Eversource customers, but those communities are mostly served by UI, skewing the numbers).

Lamont said the expected restoration times “should act as deadlines,” for the utility company.

“I expect and demand that Eversource act with urgency over the coming days,” said Lamont, who has called for the state’s utilities regulatory agency to investigate Eversource’s handling of the storm.

On Saturday, the chairman of the state senate’s energy and technology committee called on Eversource CEO James Judge to resign over the company’s response to the damage from Isaias.

“As a business owner myself, I know accountability starts at the top, and Eversource CEO James J. Judge needs to be held accountable for his company's unacceptable preparation for, and reaction to, this storm. He should resign as CEO of Eversource.” said state Sen. Norm Needleman, a Democrat

whose district covers a dozen communities in southern central Connecticut.

U.S. Sen. Richard Blumenthal has also called for Judge to resign and for Eversource not to charge customers for storm cleanup costs.

Eversource’s spokesman did not address the charge that Judge should resign directly when reached for comment Sunday.

“We recognize the tremendous impact the storm and resulting outages have had on customers across the state,” Mitch Gross, a spokesman for the utility company said in a prepared statement.

“As with all storms, we will participate in an afteraction review with regulators and community stakeholders to evaluate our approach to emergency response efforts and storm restoration. But today we’re focused on one thing — doing everything we can do to restore power to our customers,” he said.

In New Haven, Mayor Justin Elicker said repairs have brought outages down from 12,000 at their peak to 769 as of Sunday morning. The work meant 98.7 percent of the city now has power, Elicker said in a prepared statement.

Eleven crews from UI are currently working in the city.

“We still have work to do and will continue until full restoration. Once all power is restored, we will transition to full debris removal from streets and sidewalks. I assure you, we will get back to normal,” Elicker said.