MANCHESTER – Nine representatives from Jersey Central Power & Light (JCP&L) came out to the clubhouse of Crestwood Village 5 to assure residents of the township that the FirstEnergy Company wanted to regain their trust following a major outage that occurred in Whiting around the one-year anniversary of a similar power loss in that vicinity.
The forum, organized by Judy Noonan, the confidential aide to Mayor Joseph Hankins, featured Mayor Hankins, Council Vice President James Vaccaro, Councilwoman Sandy Drake, Police Chief Antonio Ellis and members of the police department, Office of Emergency Management Coordinator Robert Sharry and approximately 30 residents.
“This was set up because we had a power outage again almost a year to the day and I had been assured as your mayor, having attended meetings with JCP&L that new equipment would be at the Whiting sub-station and as to what happened, I’ll let them explain it but we know it is unacceptable,” Hankins said.
“JCP&L has said that they are committed to working with the town and letting the town know that they are here for you. This is not about bills today; this is about equipment – as it was equipment failure – so you can listen in and hear why this equipment broke,” he said.
He added, “I know everybody has problems with their bills. I have the same bills; the town has the same bills. They don’t sell the energy they just deliver it.”
Among the JCP&L representatives were Pat Mullin who serves as vice president, New Jersey operations, Bob Bryce, Regional External Affairs Representative, Christopher Hoenig, senior communication representative, Kiernan Tintle, Customer and Government Affairs representative, Robert Walton, manager customer accounts and Barry Bostick Jr. customer account specialist II. Also present were Dennis Pavagadhi who serves as Jersey Central Power & Light’s director of operations (Substations), Harry Papademas, the director of Engineering and Michelle Santarseri, manager, Operations (Substation). Not all of the representatives spoke during the forum but were available if a question arose within their area of expertise.
Bryce said, “I am assigned to Ocean County and Manchester. I am the point of contact for Ocean County officials and emergency management. We are here to address your questions about the outages but we will touch on billing because there are also questions tying billing into the overall reliability.”
Mullin told the audience, “there is never a good time to have outages especially during the holidays. I’m here to tell you I am committed that we are here to fix it and fix it right. We are committed to this project (of sub-station upgrades) so we can provide safe and reliable service.”
Tintle said that the firm was committed to Manchester and “you our customers and we understand right now you probably don’t trust us. You heard from us a year ago and here you are again and, in your minds, we failed you.”
“I don’t blame you for that but we want your trust. We aren’t going to wait another year to come back. We will be working with the Manchester Coordinating Council and attending their meetings on a quarterly basis to be as transparent as possible with all of you as our customers,” he added.
There were technical issues involved in the failure at the sub-station which were weather related caused by the cold weather and ice. It was noted that approximately 3,000 Whiting area residents were impacted by that outage and that the matter needed to be addressed meticulously or there would be a risk that in restoring power, other customers who were not affected could lose power if the adjustments weren’t handled precisely. Representatives stressed the restoration efforts required time.
Bryce noted that other areas of the country face the same problems and other companies experience the same challenges. It was also noted that the increase of data centers draw a tremendous amount of power resulting in a drain on the power grid.
Whiting resident Paula Evan said “this is the same problem we had last year and you are back again with the same problem and you don’t seem to have a clear-cut answer to having this not happening again. You can have brand new equipment and it could fail. You have mobile stations, bring them in and get these people heat.”
Sharry urged residents to make sure they provide current contact information with the company as part of JCP&L’s program to update customers with alerts during an outage. JCP&L officials noted that some customers haven’t updated their phone numbers from land line house phone numbers that are no longer in use.
The mayor added that Ocean County Commissioners Robert Arace and Frank Sadeghi “had discussed possible solutions and one of them was a major lawsuit.” Last August, the Ocean County Board of Commissioners called for urgent reforms at JCP&L, citing repeated service failures, rising utility rates, and a lack of accountability to the community.
In June, JCP&L customers saw their average monthly bills increase by $23, roughly 20 percent, from $112.25 up to as much as $134.92. Commissioner Sadeghi warned that such increases would force some families to make impossible choices.
Officials pointed to JCP&L’s troubling history of frequent and prolonged outages, noting that the company has often refused to reimburse customers for spoiled food and other losses caused by power failures.
The Board also emphasized the need for JCP&L to complete long-delayed upgrades to its power grid, warning that without meaningful improvements, the region could face disaster in the event of a major storm.
“Utility companies must be held accountable,” Sadeghi remarked at the time. “Ocean County residents deserve better than broken promises and rising bills. JCP&L must step up, strengthen its system, and put its customers first.”
More coverage of JCP&L will be in a future article.
