Congressman Adam Schiff (D-Altadena) looks at a destroyed home on the 100 block of W. Cedar during tour of Pasadena to survey wind damage on Tuesday, December 27, 2011. (Raul Roa/Pasadena Sun)
Pasadena Sun
Southern California Edison was hammered Thursday for being underprepared and “tone deaf” in its response to a fierce windstorm on Nov. 30 and Dec. 1 that knocked out power to hundreds of thousands of area residents.
Edison leaders joined an array of local, state and federal officials at a hearing at the 9th Circuit Court of Appeals building in Pasadena Thursday. Representatives of publicly-owned utilities in Pasadena and Glendale spoke at the meeting, which was called by Rep. Adam Schiff (D-Burbank).
Denise Tyrrell, a representative for the California Public Utilities Commission, said Edison and other agencies failed to provide adequate information to residents who asked about repair times in their neighborhoods.
“The utilities’ response was to say to the public, ‘We can’t tell you because we’re fixing the problem first,’ and that is not acceptable,” Tyrrell said. “Informing the public is just as important as fixing the problem.”
Related: Pasadena Star-News reports that one third of the Southern California Edison power poles that fell in the storm were overloaded.
