CUYAHOGA COUNTY, Ohio — The start of this week has seen brutal temperatures, so now more than ever, people are heavily relying on air conditioning. Both Cleveland Public Power and FirstEnergy are experiencing outages, though, causing businesses to shut down early and residents fearing the heat.
In Lakewood, residents are no stranger to power outages, especially during the winter.
RELATED: Lakewood residents want to know why their power keeps going out
Now that summer has rolled around, residents like Cheyenne Burke were hoping for a seamless electrical experience.
"The last time actually was a couple of days ago right before this heat wave," Burke told me on Wednesday. "About 5:30 in the morning, for about an hour. It felt intentional like they were trying to wait before, you know, everybody was up and getting to work. It lasted for about an hour and just kind of, out of nowhere, woke me up, turned all my fans off."
She did not experience a power outage Tuesday or Wednesday.
That could very well change, though.
Cleveland Councilman Charles Slife posted to social media that FirstEnergy was working to install two new poles on Wednesday: one on Rocky River Drive near St. Joseph Academy and another in Lakewood.
The exact location in Lakewood was not shared to his social media.
When passing Edwards Avenue Wednesday afternoon, though, I saw what looked to be a new pole being installed.
Slife said because of the installations, there would be a temporary and intentional power outage at some point.
He said the outage may last up to an hour for those affected.
I reached out to FirstEnergy for an interview. A spokesperson provided a statement instead.
We understand how frustrating it is to be without power and do not take planned outages lightly, especially during extreme heat.
As a precaution, we are installing two new poles in Lakewood and Cleveland that will strengthen the local system and help reduce the risk of a longer or more widespread outage while electric demand is high.
To complete this work safely and switch customers to the new equipment, a temporary outage may be required.
We will inform customers who may be impacted by a temporary outage before it happens. We appreciate our customers’ patience as our crews work as quickly and safely as possible to complete this work.
I followed up asking for specifics on how long the outage could last and when it could happen, but FirstEnergy didn't say.
"The first thing going through my mind is why now? Why this moment? Why during a heat wave do you decide to intentionally turn what's saving a bunch of people's lives off, keeping us all cool? Even if it is only for an hour, which I don't know if that'll be the case, why now?" Burke said. "The fact that I don't know when it's going to happen, I don't know where it's going to happen. I wish that the Illuminating Company and FirstEnergy would communicate with us a little bit more. It'll give us a little bit more information to work with when we're dealing with our power going out."
With the number of outages she's experienced in her time as a Lakewood resident, she said she has started preparing by purchasing a backup generator and portable chargers.
"I wish you would plan better. I wish you would inform us of more. I wish we knew about these things way before they happened, especially if they're planned. It should have been fixed a long time ago. It should not be something that they up and fix during a heat wave," Burke said.
FirstEnergy wasn't the only one under a microscope Wednesday. Cleveland Public Power is also receiving backlash after a transformer near West 57th Street and Memphis Avenue appeared to have caught fire late in the afternoon.
The power outage impacted those surrounding the transformer, including Dina's Pizza and Pub.
Jill Carter, a longtime employee of the business, told me it was the second day in a row they've had to close early due to an outage.
Carter said the power went out at Dina's around 5 p.m. on Tuesday.
"(We) had a full bar. Half of the restaurant did not come back on after nine o'clock, so we had to close. We lost business yesterday, which was a very busy night," Carter said.
Twenty-four hours later, and the power went out again around 5:15 p.m., Carter said.
She said Wednesdays are busy nights as well as the business runs a two-hour-long game called "Name That Tune."
"We have a lot of reservations and regulars that come in for it, so unfortunately, we closed within a half hour of us getting here today," Carter said.
Carter said 12 large parties had to be notified of cancellation and closure.
"It impacts everything. People come every week for it. Literally had to call everybody and let them know that we are closing," Carter said.
Carter told me this week's outages are nothing new as the restaurant consistently has problems with Cleveland Public Power.
"We can't keep doing this. It's affecting Dina and everybody that works here. We have about 90 employees," Carter said.
We reached out to Cleveland Public Power for more information Wednesday afternoon, but have yet to hear back.
CPP did post to social media that electricity use is expected to remain "very high" across Greater Cleveland and the surrounding region.
Cleveland Public Power asked that customers conserve energy between 4 p.m. and 7 p.m.
"Small changes across our community can make a big difference during periods of high electricity demand. Thank you for doing your part to help keep power reliable for everyone," Cleveland Public Power said on social media.
If CPP provides information regarding the outage near West 57th Street and Memphis Avenue, we'll share that here.
