Cleveland residents, city leaders share concerns over slow city storm clean-up response

By Joe Pagonakis

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    CLEVELAND (WEWS) — Ahmed Salem is a Cleveland Glenville homeowner who reports the three families living in his double home have been dealing with a nightmare ever since heavy storms hit Northeast Ohio late last week.

Salem told News 5 the families and their six children were left trapped inside his house after a huge tree from the lot next door fell in the front yard, blocking all doorways and trapping everyone inside. Salem said when he and the families called the City of Cleveland and Cleveland Public Power to free themselves and to get an update on when power would be restored, they weren’t given any answers.

“It’s been a disaster, waiting for the city to come out here; we had to call 911 multiple times,” Salem said. “Cleveland Public Power told us that you are not our priority, we have to first get to the many streets, we don’t have a crew in the area. Three families trapped inside a house with six kids is not a priority?”

Ward 8 Cleveland Councilman Michael Polensek told News 5 he’s also concerned about Cleveland Public Power repair response time, after he said he received 86 voicemail calls from homeowners who were still without CPP electric service for more than four days and couldn’t get any answers.

“You’ve had people who have had to leave their homes, they’re on breathing devices, they had to move in with family members, they had to go into motels, they’ve lost everything in their freezer, and all they’re asking for is some expectation on when is the power going to come on,” Polnesek said. “Here we are four days later, and the people on this street do not know when their power is going to be restored, and as you’re standing out here, and as you ride around, you ask yourself…where are the crews?”

Both Polensek and Ward 9 Cleveland Councilman Kevin Conwell are asking that the council utilities committee review CPP staffing and call center protocol in the coming weeks to determine how repair response time can be improved.

“We’re going to have to sit down and get to the table and find out what is a reasonable response, what type of crews, how many crews do we need,” Polensek said. “I became the call center for Cleveland Public Power because they couldn’t get through on the line.”

Cleveland Public Power defended its electric service repair response in a statement to News 5:

“Cleveland Public Power crews have been working 24/7 since the storm hit Cleveland at midnight Friday morning, with many on rotating 16-hour shifts. CPP currently has fewer than 500 customers without power across 9 neighborhoods, down from approximately 11,200 at the start of the storm.

We have a full complement of personnel investigating reports of wires down and restoring power to our residents, including 12 crews and additional support staff. When damage is this widespread, each time power is restored to an area there is a good chance that a smaller outage will then be revealed, which requires further investigation and restoration.”

Still, Conwell said he is hoping to get an evaluation on how CPP reacted to the heavy storms and power outages.

Conwell was on the scene at Ahmed Salem’s home as clean-up crews from Cleveland’s Department of Urban Forestry were working diligently to remove tons of fallen limbs.

“The young man told me the kids could not go to school today because they were trapped in and their electricity is off,” Conwell said. “It’s very, very important, staffing levels, we also need to look at health and safety, so that if people don’t have electricity, that we have systems in place.”

News 5 is committed to following through on this developing story.

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