Thanks to better maintenance of ComEd’s distribution system and a greater focus on getting customers’ electrical service back on line, Commonwealth Edison officials on Wednesday night reported improved performance in the past year.
Speaking at a meeting of the Northwest Municipal Conference, Joseph D. Trexler, regional community relations director for ComEd, said power interruptions in the service area that includes northwest Cook County declined by 15 percent and the duration of those interruptions was cut by 34 percent during the 12-month period ending in April.
Tree trimming and more frequent inspections of the electrical system helped cut the number of interruptions, Trexler said. The duration of the outages has been reduced by putting a greater priority on restoring electrical power first and permanently fixing the problems later, he added.
Nevertheless, conference President Mark Damisch, village president of Northbrook, ripped the utility for failing to provide a detailed breakdown of capital expenditures in individual suburbs over the past five years and projected capital expenditures over the next five years. The conference has been requesting such data since 1998, Damisch said.
Trexler said ComEd could not do a meaningful comparison of capital spending projects because improvements to parts of a distribution system in one community could actually benefit several communities.
In other business, the conference named Palatine Mayor Rita Mullins as president of the organization for fiscal 2000-01. Edward Rotchford, mayor of Prospect Heights, was named vice president. Clarine C. Hall, New Trier Township supervisor, will serve as secretary, and Larry N. Arft, village administrator of Morton Grove, was named treasurer.
