BEAVER BANK: Two local HRM councillors said they have heard plenty from constituents in the areas they represent regarding storm cleanup both from the more recent storm that left some in their areas without power for almost 40-hours, but also the storm before it.
During a sit-down interview with The Laker News for the Councillors Corner column, Upper/Middle Sackville-Lucasville-Beaver Bank councillor Lisa Blackburn and Waverley-Fall River-Musquodoboit Valley representative Cathy Deagle Gammon both concurred most of the concerns they’ve heard surrounds the length of time it took to get the power back on.
“That said our city crews were out doing patrols of broken trees, fallen trees,” she said. “That seems to be the biggest issue that we are going to be facing.
“As far as storm clean up is concerned, a lot of broken limbs and hopefully the winds will stay light for as long as possible because we need give that ice a chance to melt.”
Blackburn said if that doesn’t happen, more damaged trees could be seen over the next few days.
Deagle Gammon said outside some of the concerns she’s heard about the power, the bulk of the phone and email messages were centered on the cleanup—or lack thereof—from the previous storm.
“The majority of the issues that I have heard were on around the previous storm was insufficient in terms of the snow clearing and so when the ice storm came on top of it, it just made things worse,” she said. “For those areas that were okay they just felt that there was no preventative work being done, knowing the ice storm was coming.”
She said residents told her there should have been more preventative measures taken,
Deagle Gammon said as the ice storm dragged on and people went into hour 12, 18, 24, and so on without power, that became a significant concern.
“It was pointed out that previously Nova Scotia Power used to have a company do tree trimming and so that was dropped,” she said. “Residents feel that the situation was made worse by not having preventative work being done around tree trimming around power lines.
“Those are the issues that were shared with me and of course, with the recent request from Nova Scotia Power to increase rates just made it all that more sensitive an issue at the moment.”
