Hundreds of people who are frequently losing their electricity and have nowhere to turn called us for help.
We’re taking action after people who live in Wixom contacted us saying their power goes out many times a month for no apparent reason.
The most recent incident was yesterday.
DTE Energy Service Center Director Sandeev Sarna confirms there is a frequent problem and says, “First off, we recognize that the quality of service here in the Wixom area is not at the standard we strive for at DTE.”
Lenny Williams has lived in his house in the Trails of Loon Lake for ten years and says the outages have been happening for seven years.
“It could be out as little as an hour or as much as 24 hours. After a while it gets frustrating. It really does,” he says.
This is a newer, upscale subdivision and the utilities are all underground. So they know the outages are not caused by storms.
Dan Geminick has live in his house for five years and says it is happening too much, “As of late, it’s been almost 2 or 3 times a week.”
Sarna says yesterday’s outage was caused by a squirrel getting into the equipment. Another outage was caused by a raccoon in May.
They will also step up trimming trees that cause outages to distribution lines affecting a regional area.
Longterm they will upgrade substations next year. He says that means the cause of most of the outages will be fixed by next summer.
People say it’s about time.
Geminick says, “They’re the first to complain if you’re a day late with a payment to them. And the last to come on board when there’s an issue to be addressed at the house.”
Williams says laughing, “I wish I could do something about it. I do have candles.”
