By Mike Tony, Charleston Gazette-Mail
CHARLESTON, W.Va. — Nineteen.
That’s how many homes near Johnson Road, in Kanawha County, Eric Hanson said lose their power several times a year, though not from storms. What follows, Hanson said, are long outages to which he is especially vulnerable as the user of a sleep apnea treatment machine and a survivor of multiple recent ministrokes.
“It’s tough,” Hanson said.
Food that cost thousands of dollars had to be thrown out after those 19 homes went a week and a half longer without power than neighbors last year, Hanson said. Hanson’s grim reports came toward the end of a litany of consumer complaints and protests heard by West Virginia Public Service Commission members during a hearing it held Tuesday evening to take public comments on a pending $250.5 million rate increase request from Appalachian Power and Wheeling Power.
