Couple puts out extension cord to share power after severe storms
A Milwaukee County couple placed an extension chord on their fence for neighbors who needed a little power after losing it during August 10's storms.
By Kim Shine
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WAUWATOSA, Wisconsin (WDJT) — As cleanup continues across southeastern Wisconsin, many in Milwaukee County remain without power.
Neighbors and city leaders in Wauwatosa are trying to help out however they can.
Gretchen Prescott and her husband, Scott, never lost their power in Tuesday’s storms. So they decided to share it with others who did. They put a yellow extension cord on their fence for anyone who needs a quick charge.
“For the people that had no families that couldn’t just go to somebody else’s house, didn’t have any friends, didn’t know anybody, I wanted to definitely offer them help and know that this is a nice community,” said Gretchen. “This is a neighborly community, and everyone’s always here to help.”
They also have some room in their refrigerator or freezer for neighbors with baby food, pet food or something needing to be chilled.
Their kindness comes as We-Energies crews continue their work across the area.
They reported 225,000 customers were initially without power.
As of Thursday morning, Aug. 12, they told CBS 58 that 150,000 customers had power again.
They also have more than 1,000 people working on restoration, including crews from out-of-state.
“That said it’s still going to take some time because we’re going from large power outages, that we were able to restore, to now these small ‘ones and twos’ types of power outages which take the same amount of people. If we restore power for 1,000 or 2,000, it still takes a crew or sometimes two crews. And so the restoration effort doesn’t speed up, if anything it gets more intense but we’re in it for the long haul regardless,” said Brendan Conway with We-Energies.
For those in Wauwatosa who need water, snacks or a place to cool off, they can go to City Hall.
The City of Wauwatosa is opening up City Hall today until 8 p.m., and tomorrow, Aug. 13, until 5 p.m.
“It’s in the lower civic center area,” said Wauwatosa Police Captain Gary Gabrish. “It is air-conditioned. We have a charging station for cell phones and power outlets.”
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