Village Aims To Improve Communication With ComEd

Frustrated by a lack of information from ComEd during , many Buffalo Grove residents turned to for help.

But village officials — some of whose homes were also without electricity — say they, too, were in the dark when it came to information about affected neighborhoods and timelines for power restoration.

“I think ComEd was very overwhelmed by the magnitude of the storm,” Village Manager Dane Bragg said.

Officials are inviting representatives from ComEd, Comcast and AT&T, whose customers experienced degrees of service interruption as a result of the recent storms, to attend the Aug. 8 Village Board meeting. They will be asked to address their response efforts, what might be done to improve reliability and ways in which the village and service providers can communicate during future outages.

While such invitations were sent last week to all three companies, ComEd remained at the center of discussion Monday night. Even with a ComEd representative stationed at Village Hall during the outage that affected nearly half of the village, officials said minimal information was available.

“I’m interested to find out what they are going to do in the future and how [ComEd can] better communicate with the village,” Village President Jeff Braiman said. “We want to be able to give our residents as much information as we can to make their lives easier.”

“They need to be prepared to tell us how they are going to be better prepared to provide accurate, meaningful information to residents and the media directly,” Trustee Jeff Berman said.

“I don’t think I’m alone in thinking that they let us down” during the outages, he said.

As the discussion continued, the overhead lights in the council room intermittently — and inexplicably — faded and brightened.

A couple tried to hide smiles, in apparent recognition of the appropriate timing. Others appeared not to notice or simply refused to let the situation faze them; after all, it wouldn’t have been the first time Buffalo Grove fell into darkness.