'We're Trapped!' Danbury Residents Struggle In The Dark

DANBURY, CT — As of Tuesday afternoon, 4,285 Danbury residents are still without power following Tropical Storm Isaias, which blew through the region over a week ago.

One of those residents is former Danbury City Councilman-At-Large Andrew Wetmore, who reached the end of his rope on social media early Tuesday:

@EversourceCT Okay, it’s Day 7 in Danbury, no power, three toddlers, can’t work from home, heat wave. Enough is enough, send the damn trucks already! — Andrew Wetmore (@ARWetmore) August 11, 2020

Wetmore is director of Student Activities at Northwestern Connecticut Community College, and August is typically a busy month preparing for student orientation. First the coronavirus turned that huge event into a virtual student orientation, and now the power outage has turned that into a brick. With no way to upload materials for the event, all Wetmore can do is watch the hours tick down to deadline, on a battery-powered clock.

With three very young daughters, even basic parenting chores have become "a complete nightmare," he said.

"We can't take them anywhere we would feel comfortable, everything is hot for the most part, I can't keep a mask on them, so I can't even take them to the mall," Wetmore said. "We're trapped!"

Wetmore called Eversource's post-Isaias efforts "the most disorganized response I have ever seen." He says he doesn't understand "why they just don't send a tree truck up with a power truck and send them out together."

In its most recent (and only) update on power restoration times following the outage on Aug. 4, Eversource officials said that the lights would be back on throughout Danbury by 11:59 p.m. on Tuesday, Aug. 11. Wetmore does not see that happening.

"I will be quite surprised if we get it back tonight (Tuesday)," he said. "I don't think the rest of Danbury will get it back until the end of the week."

Danbury Mayor Mark Boughton's not buying it, either.

"They don't have enough line crews — not enough boots on the ground — and not enough of what I call 'assessors,' people out there looking at the damage, understanding how the grid works, prioritizing the damage itself, and then dispatching the crews," Boughton said.

The mayor, his municipal boss colleagues throughout southwestern Connecticut, and legislators in Hartford have been highly critical of the utility, and of what Boughton faults as a "fundamental lack of organization" in the execution of power restoration plans.

Giving Eversource hell today about their poor planning and lack of resources regarding the recent storm. Thank you Gov Lamont and Sen Blumenthal. #Danbury https://t.co/BdhLUZcPc8 pic.twitter.com/jq2YECGO6U
— Mayor Mark Boughton (@MayorMark) August 7, 2020

"There's nobody telling all these out-of-state crews where to go. In fact, I have watched them, have talked to them, sitting for hours at a time, without being dispatched anywhere," Boughton said. "It's frustrating for Danbury residents. We still have the highest amount of customers who are out, and they are just sitting there."

Power restoration after an outage in Danbury hasn't always been as hit-or-miss as it appears to be after Tropical Storm Isaias, Boughton said. Before its rebranding as Eversource Energy, Northeast Utilities would have someone "drive throughout the community, record the pole numbers, and get back to their crews and tell them where to go."

Today: "The crews of those trucks are saying, 'Well, we don't have any orders, we don't know where to go,'" Boughton said.

With Eversource's current workflow, Boughton says that by the time the crews get their orders, it's 11 a.m.; by the time they get what they need to fix the problems, it's 5 p.m.; and then it's "time to go back to the hotel."

The mayor has a solution for the state's largest power utility.

"If they have four or five crews in Danbury, release them to us, and our emergency management director can point them to the streets that are hardest hit, and put them to work. At least you'd get something done for the day."

After careful reflection, the residents of Danbury and Connecticut have not been well served by the current electrical delivery system. A monopoly only works as a board game. Time to break up #Eversource #neversource #competitionisgood
— Mayor Mark Boughton (@MayorMark) August 10, 2020

"There have been five storms since I have been mayor, that I would consider major storms, and each one has gotten progressively worse," Boughton told Patch. "Clearly the current system of monopoly is not working."

Boughton has a solution for that, as well.

"If we have to, if I reach a consensus with my fellow mayors and selectmen, we're going to get together and we're going to sue them," Boughton said. "There are some really horrible stories out there, and it's not going to be pretty for Eversource."