LETTERS

Regarding the storm response

Posted

To the Editor:

The residents of Johnston, particularly the Scenic View Drive, East and West, have to be thankful for Mayor Polisena’s response to the storm of October 29.

While most areas suffered some damage East and West Scenic View Drive got hammered. According to National Grid and Verizon workers this neighborhood was the worst they had seen throughout the storm cleanup. It is a neighborhood with about 40 homes and it is a dead end street, and about a dozen large oak trees and 6 poles were blocking most of the road from travel. The residents from about six or seven homes near Hartford Ave could actually drive out of the street, and Emergency Vehicles could only reach those six or seven homes, leaving about 35 homes without Fire and Rescue protection.

By Monday a National Grid truck was positioned on the street and told residents that he was waiting for a crew to remove the trees blocking the road. By Tuesday Mayor Polisena found out that virtually nothing positive had happened. The mayor drove to the neighborhood to make his assessment, only to find out that workers couldn’t remove the trees due to wires being tangled in the downed trees, with no guarantee that there was no electricity flowing either from the grid or from emergency generators that might not have been properly wired in blocking the transfer from the generators to those downed wires.

So we had trees down, which meant National Grid couldn’t get started and the DPW couldn’t remove the trees because the wires were down. Here comes the Mayor. I witnessed his phone call to National Grid, where he very succinctly explained the situation to the management of the situation and he demanded that we get action immediately. Within one hour a National Grid technician arrived to secure the wires and within one hour after that the Town DPW arrived and began removing the trees blocking the road, by the way the DPW did a fantastic job, safely and efficiently. Three hours later the entire road was open to traffic and Emergency vehicles.

That isn’t the end; the next day the poles went in and the wires were hung on the poles and eventually power was restored, the DPW then removed the downed trees and cleaned the street, today little evidence of the violent storm remains.

Thank you Mayor Polisena, Johnston DPW and National Grid line workers, the National Grid administration needs some help though.

Thank you all from the residents of East and West Scenic View Drive. 

Alfred Masciarelli

Johnston

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