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Ocean County director says utility pressure has yielded infrastructure attention after repeated outages
Summary
Director Sadeghi criticized JCP&L/FirstEnergy for power outages, said the county threatened a large lawsuit and reported that utility executives committed to capital improvements; county officials and the sheriff’s office also noted operational concerns.
Director Frank Sadeghi used his organization meeting remarks to criticize JCP&L/FirstEnergy for recurring power outages and to say the county had forced executive attention by threatening litigation on behalf of ratepayers. He said the initial threatened figure of $1 billion has grown as the county pursued accountability and that the utility is now working with the county on infrastructure upgrades.
Sadeghi cautioned that outages continue in places such as Manchester Township, but said county and utility officials were coordinating on substation work to reduce future outages. He exchanged a brief on-stage back-and-forth with county official Bob Brice about the timing of a substation improvement.
Commissioners later reiterated concerns about power for seniors and vulnerable residents, and Arace said the county expects results rather than rhetoric if outages persist over the winter holidays.
