Community Corner

With Power Restored in Southington, Efforts Turn to Clean-Up

The town is awaiting approval of a presidential declaration that would allow for curbside pick-up of storm debris and help provide financial relief for Southington.

There are still more than 20,000 Connecticut Light & Power customers statewide without power, but they no longer reside in Southington.

There were just three CL&P customers left without power at 10 p.m. Monday night and CL&P officials said they were on pace to meet their deadline of having power restored to everybody by the company's self-imposed deadline of midnight. Southington Town Manager Garry Brumback said the work isn't done just yet, however.

"Things are prgressing well now, but there are still a few issues with the storm that we need to address to wrap it up," Brumback said.

Across the state, some communities were still reeling from problems caused by the storm, including residents in Farmington, Simsbury and Somers. All three towns still had more than 25 percent of their respective communities in the dark late Monday night.

The extended outages led to frustration at the state level where Gov. Dannel P. Malloy said Monday evening that in missing their deadlines to hit a 99 percent restoration on Sunday and again on Monday, CL&P had let it's customers down and had "failed Connecticut."

For more information including a wrap-up of Monday's press conferences, .

Brumback said Southington's success could be attributed to a team effort that included not only around the clock work from 17 line crews, but dedicated efforts from town staff including Deputy Town Manager Mark Sciota, Community Services Director Janet Mellon, Police Chief Jack Daly and the Southington Police Department and both Highway Superintendent Steve Wlodkowski and the highway department staff.

"Our officers were offered to CL&P every step of the way to help lead the process and our highway staff worked around the clock to get debris out of the way so the line crews could get to work," Brumback said.

With the primary restoration efforts now complete in Southington, Brumback said it's now time to focus on debris removal and the final stages of clean-up.

The town is currently planning for a curbside pick-up that could begin as early as next week and allow for residents to leave their storm-related debris by the road. The town is awaiting a declaratin that would assist in funding, however.

"We still don’t have the presidential declaration but we have been told (by Congressman John Larson) that it is imminent," Brumback said. "FEMA officials were in the state today for public assistance assessment and based upon that, they will determine the best decision to make."

which allows for state municipalities to receive a 75 percent reimbursement for storm-related costs including personnel overtime and other associated costs with clean-up. The reimbursement is for a 72-hour period only, however, and the latest declaration would waive that time period and extend the reimbursement to other costs including debris removal, Brumback said.

If approved - a decision that could come Tuesday or Wednesday - Brumback said the town would move forward in hiring a contractor to conduct the curbside clean-up, which could begin as early as next week.

The town would use the following guidelines if approved, according to Brumback:

Three collection passes are scheduled to be made:

From the 1st to the 14th day after commencement, a first pass will be made in your neighborhood.

Find out what's happening in Southingtonwith free, real-time updates from Patch.

The debris collected will include vegetative debris only.

A second pass will be made from the 14th to the 30th day after commencement. The debris collected will include large and small vegetative debris only. This pass will be more thorough.

Find out what's happening in Southingtonwith free, real-time updates from Patch.

A third pass will take place between the 30th and the 45th day after commencement. All eligible material will be collected for final inspection by Town representatives.

As you are preparing to place your debris for pick up, please adhere to the following guidelines:

  • Do not place any debris on top of utilities (cable, phone, electrical, or storm drain boxes).
  • Please do not block your mail box with the debris.
  • Please try not to block the roadways with debris piles, emergency vehicles may need to enter and exit your area.
  • Please drive carefully and slowly in areas with large debris piles.
  • Please do not dump any debris into storm drains or ditches as this will cause flooding.
  • Tree lengths should not exceed 10 feet.
  • Please help by sweeping up loose debris from the road in front of your house and bagging the debris for collection.
  • Report damages that occur during collections to AshBritt hotline, to be provided upon execution.
  • Report drainage problems to the town by calling (860) 276-6231.

Brumback warns that these are just preliminary guidelines as the program has not been approved yet.

In the meantime, residents are welcomed and encouraged to use the Bulky Waste Transfer Station on Old Turnpike Road. The station is open daily this week, including Saturday, from 8 a.m. - 3:30 p.m. and has already taken in over 2,000 vehicle loads of debris.


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