Why Our Family Dislikes ComEd

On Wednesday, a really strong summer storm came through our area. In fact, it was a supercell, which produced very high winds, but was gone nearly as quickly as it came. As a result, the power went out for many people. As many as 125,000 ComEd customers were without power. And of course, we were part of that number. Our power went out sometime after 5:00 p.m. that day. Of all the power outages that we’ve had, this one was especially wrong. Why? Because nearly everyone around us still had their power. Our neighbors across the street had power. The streetlights were still on and the stoplights continued to work normally. In fact, our house was part of a four-block area that lost power...the only part to lose power in our vicinity. However, this is just one of a string of incidents that makes us dislike our power company, ComEd.

Whenever a major storm occurs, it’s very likely that we will lose power. During the summer this is especially a big problem because of all the rain. We use a sump pump to pump waste water (from water used in the house to rain water) away from the house. If the power goes out, then the sump pump cannot run which will make the water back up through the drain and begin to flood our basement. In my lifetime, this has happened at least five or six times. We all end up having to go downstairs and move various things to keep them from getting ruined. After the water gets pumped away (when the power eventually returns), my mom often has to mop the floor with bleach water to disinfect it in addition to washing clothes that got wet and throwing away things that couldn’t escape the water.

As long as I’ve lived, our area has been the first to lose power and the last to get it back. It’s very clear to us that restoring power to our area is never a priority. Whenever a major, far-reaching power outage occurs, we are normally some of the last customers to get our power back on. The worst example of this happened about six or seven years ago, while I was still in high school. An ice storm produced a very nasty and wide-ranging power outage. Temperatures were extremely cold and schools were closed for more than one day. Of course, our power went out during this storm. In total, the power was out at our house for three straight days. We were able to make it through the first night in the house, but we couldn’t stay there because it was too cold inside. We spent the next couple of days with my grandmother and with our next door neighbor (who did not lose power). It wasn’t as bad an experience as it could’ve been, but it was not a good one. It frustrated all of us to see our family and friends have power when we didn’t. It was even more frustrating when their power would go out and return very quickly. It also didn’t help that ComEd told residents at a city hall meeting (during the summer when all of the Chicago area had power problems) that they may cut off our power to ensure that the nearby hospital had power.

So, it was deja vu in terms of what happened with this most recent power outage. Dad, Samone, and I (my mom is still with my aunt in Gary) toughed it out in our warm house on Wednesday night. My dad continually called ComEd for updates on the situation. The supposed time that our power was supposed to come back became bleaker and bleaker over the course of that night and the following day. The time they estimated progressively went up from 11:00 p.m. Wednesday night to early Friday morning. We were able to salvage some food from the refrigerator by putting the most perishable stuff in a cooler with the ice that hadn’t melted. However, we ended up throwing away two pounds of ground beef, a package of unopened bratwursts, leftover White Castles and McDonald’s hamburgers and cheeseburgers, lunchmeat, eggs, milk, orange juice, ice cream and other food items. Since Thursday was such a hot and muggy day, my sister and I spent the day with our grandmothers. We went to our grandmother Ella’s house for the early portion of the day (and helped her out by waiting for the telephone repairperson to come). Afterwards, we went to our grandmother Hattie’s house and got Chinese food to eat for dinner (which we had there).

Our power came back on sometime after 7:00 p.m. on Thursday night, over a day after it went out. We found this out by calling our house and looking for the answering machine to pick up. We have voice mail, so our answering machine would normally be off. However, it would turn back on if the power returned.

While I’m happy the power has returned, I’m mad that it always takes so long for our power to return. It has only returned from an outage quickly once...and that was because our area was the only one affected by it. Our experiences show the politics involved in the way ComEd handles crisis situations. ComEd would be incurring the wrath of Mayor Daley if Chicago wasn’t a top priority for their crews. Then there are the suburbs with affluent populations or large amounts of businesses...places that include Naperville, Rosemont, Schaumburg, Orland Park and others. Undoubtedly, because of their status, these places would be high up on the list of places to send crews. And there are other places that genuinely deserve higher priority. If I were to choose between having my power back quickly or depriving a hospital of power, I’d suffer to make sure that all those patients are okay. However, I don’t think it’s a coincidence that our area, the southern suburbs, is consistently put towards the bottom when outages happen. Most of these suburbs are either filled with working class people or are economically depressed. Also, quite a few of these suburbs have predominantly black populations such as my hometown of Markham, Harvey, Hazel Crest, Country Club Hills, Robbins, Dolton, and more. I’m not naive enough to think that our area will become a higher priority in the future, but it would be nice if we didn’t lose power for twice as long as our family and friends. It would be nice if our area was treated with a little respect by our friendly power company or let alone by EVERYONE ELSE. I’m sick of seeing every other place make gains where our area can barely get any economic development. And I’m sick of politics being more important than what’s right. It's a damn shame when something as important as electrical power succumbs to political crap.