Lawmakers grill PSEG Long Island; food, medicine reimbursements approved

MELVILLE, N.Y. - In a back-and-forth for nearly two hours, the Nassau County Legislature's Sandy Review Committee formally questioned PSEG's management about how the public utility handled the more than 400,000 outages caused by Tropical Storm Isaias. 

"I think the purpose is to find out what happened, what can be done better," Committee Chair Denise Ford said.

PSEG President Dan Eichhorn called the company's performance an anomaly and blamed part of the problem on the company's computer system that was supposed to keep track of and manage outages. 

"Customers couldn't call us, they were getting busy signals, our digital channels didn't work," Eichhorn said. "Part of our after-action review is to understand why exactly that happened, what do we have to do better in the future to test these systems that we have."

PSEG faced serious backlash from state and local officials as well as customers, many of whom were without power for more than a week. 

On Monday, some customers who attended the meeting expressed frustration about not being able to get through to PSEG by phone or text. 

Many of the legislators argued for reimbursement for spoiled food and medicines. It was approved on Monday after the meeting. 

Customers whose service was out for at least 72 hours can be reimbursed up to $250 for spoiled food and up to $300 for wasted prescriptions due to lack of refrigeration. Claims can be submitted on the PSEGLINY website.