La Grange Officials Blast ComEd's Performance

LA GRANGE, IL — La Grange officials this week criticized ComEd's handling of its communications after a storm caused power outages throughout northern Illinois more than two weeks ago. Thousands were without power in La Grange. One village official called ComEd's performance unacceptable, while another labeled the utility "keystone cops."

According to ComEd, less than 50 percent of its 7,000 La Grange customers lost their power and 80 percent were restored within two days.

The discussion occurred Monday during a Village Board meeting after a letter was read from Rosanne Welenc, who lives in the 600 block of Ninth Avenue. She said power was out on her block for more than a day, while the outage for those east and south of her lasted more than three days.

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"I do not have specific numbers on how often my neighborhood has lost power in the last two decades, but suffice it to say, it feels like an annual event," Welenc said.

In previous instances, she said, surges destroyed her refrigerator and stove. She asked for ComEd to provide answers about her neighborhood's situation, a request that officials said they had forwarded to the utility.

The officials said Village Hall took hundreds of calls about the outages because of ComEd's communications problems, which the utility has acknowledged.

Village President Mark Kuchler criticized ComEd for telling most customers the day after the storm that their power would be restored that Saturday, five days after the storm.

"We expressed — and the executives knew — that this was unacceptable, telling somebody their power is going to be off for five days when they didn't really think that was true," Kuchler said.

After that, ComEd gave wrong information several times on how many customers had their power restored, Kuchler said. At one point, he said, the utility said everyone was restored locally, yet hundreds were still without power.

He said it was a tough storm and that ComEd has committed to La Grange, which he said the community deserved.

Village Trustee Bill Holder said ComEd upgraded its automated response system in the last year, but it failed on a "wholesale basis." The bad communications, he said, hampered the utility's field crews.

"It was keystone cops," Holder said. "I knew it was bad, but, wow, I was in awe at how bad ComEd performed."

Village Manager Andrianna Peterson said the village's public works staff were the "eyes and ears" for the community about the outages.

"Because of ComEd's communications issues, some of that information (from public works) was important because ComEd wouldn't have known about the outages that were occurring," she said.

In an interview, Rich Negrin, ComEd's vice president of external affairs, said it was an "extraordinary storm" that hit the utility's entire service area, with 100 mph-plus winds and 13 tornadoes.

As for the Saturday estimated time of restoration, he said, ComEd must strike a "delicate balance"and be realistic. He said the company wants to avoid giving times that are too early.

The online system slowed down some because of the heavy volume, Negrin said. While "sophisticated users" such as village officials who more frequently use the website noticed the issue, he said, most people do not.

Over the last several years, the ComEd system has seen improvements such as smart meters that have reduced the number of customers affected by outages, Negrin said. Without those upgrades, ComEd would have seen double the number of customers out of power across the region after the latest storm, he said.

"We did this remarkable multi-day restoration in a pandemic environment," Negrin said. "Our system is more resilient that it's ever been in the past."