Letcher County Com-monwealth’s Attorney Edi-son G. Banks II told The Mountain Eagle of Whites-burg that he is responding to complaints from local residents who contend Kentucky Power isn’t doing enough to keep electrical line rights of way cleared of trees.
A winter storm that blanketed far eastern Kentucky with 8 to 12 inches of heavy snow toppled trees, causing many to knock out power lines.
More than 100,000 customers lost power, including 7,000 in Letcher County. At least 16 counties declared a state of emergency, and National Guard troops were sent to the region to remove fallen trees.
Banks told the newspaper in a story published Wednesday that he intends to turn the complaints over to grand jurors when they convene on Jan. 7.
Many residents, Banks said, are questioning whet-her Kentucky Power is spending the money necessary to maintain electrical lines and to keep trees from growing into them.
Kentucky Power spokes-man Ronn Robinson said the outages were the result of the winter storm and nothing else.
“We spend millions of dollars every year maintaining rights of ways,” Robinson said. “We do our best to maintain the right of ways the best we can. Most of the trees that fell weren’t in the rights of way.”
A similar Letcher County grand jury investigation in 1996 caught the attention of the Kentucky Public Service Commis-sion, which began its own probe. Banks said he intends to ask the PSC to hold hearings on the issue in eastern Kentucky.
Letcher County Judge-Executive Jim Ward was among the people calling for improvements.
“They are going to have to do a better job of cutting the right of ways to keep the trees from falling on the power lines,” Ward said. “I don’t know that all of it could have been prevented, but the majority of it could have been prevented.”
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