66°
Hurricane Sandy struck northern Westchester on Oct. 29 and wreaked havoc throughout Lewisboro, causing extensive power outages and knocking down trees that blocked roads throughout the community.
But town officials found NYSEG’s response to the storm was less than what they had hoped.
“We have not been assigned a [NYSEG] crew to out with our highway department and start clearing trees,” Deputy Supervisor Peter DeLucia said after the storm. “It’s frustrating.”
Andy Weingarten, a Lower Salem Road resident, went to the Town House two days after the storm to pick up dry ice and expressed his disappointment with the response times.
“I could hardly get out of my road,” he said. “We wouldn’t be able to get emergency vehicles in if we needed to. God forbid that something happens; then we are really in trouble. I’m not worried about the power. We just need to be able to get in and out.”
State Sen. Greg Ball (R-Patterson) was helping to distribute dry ice and bottled water at the Town House. He also said he was frustrated with NYSEG’s handling of the crisis.
“It’s evident that this place is a mess,” he said. “We have seniors who are trapped in their homes without power. [NYSEG] has to be more responsive. They’ve brought in crews from Texas, but they don’t know their way around here. This [crisis] cannot be a matter of weeks; it has to be a matter of days. We are going to have a very bad situation if we can’t take care of this in a couple of days.”
To cope with the storm's aftermath, town officials collaborated with school officials, who were forced to close schools for a week due to power outages.
Businesses were forced to deal with the extended power outages and find ways to keep inventories from spoiling.
Click here to follow Daily Voice Lewisboro and receive free news updates.
