Gov. Andrew Cuomo is responding to criticism about not touring damaged areas in Mamaroneck, Larchmont, New Rochelle and other towns in Westchester after two recent Nor’easters.
Outside of a campaign event for state Senate Democratic candidate Shelley Mayer in Larchmont, Cuomo told reporters, “I was there. I’m a Westchester resident. All I have to do is look in my yard.”
But residents who have been without power since March 2 might disagree.
Cuomo, like Westchester County Executive George Latimer and other local lawmakers, blame utility companies for restoring service fast enough.
“I pay you to provide power 24 hours a day, seven days a week, and I pay you to be prepared when there’s an emergency and a storm,” the Governor said.
Con Edison says the last few thousand customers still without power should have it restored by Monday night or in some cases, Tuesday night.
Dear Editor:
As reported in the March 12 Journal News, Gov. Cuomo deflected criticism about not viewing storm damage by saying that he knows “what a tree down looks like”. Yet that night’s television news showed him touring New York City Housing Authority apartments for a big photo op. I guess he did not know what mold and roaches looked like.
As a Larchmont resident, I suggest that either Gov. Cuomo just doesn’t get it or he is taking our votes for granted. His constituents want to see him to know that someone is seeing their pain and looking to hold Con Ed and others accountable for their disorganized response to the storms. On March 4, I stood with a Con Ed supervisor in front of a downed utility poll and he asked me what town we were in. On March 10, I stood on that same street with four utility crews from Michigan. They were standing around talking with nothing to do while they waited for Con Ed to deliver new poles. Granted things were not as dire as they were in Puerto Rico, but that is not a contest I want to win. It was cold and dark in a lot of houses, and if the Governor could visit Puerto Rico to make “a statement on behalf of the state of New York”, perhaps he could have driven five minutes from his Larchmont campaign rally and made a statement to the people of New York that he would try to make things better.