The repeated series of rain and wind storms that have battered the North Warren area for the past six days are expected to ease up Tuesday, but the cleanup continues.
Patience among residents of North Warren has been growing thin with some going without power since Thursday. Hardwick Township Mayor Chris Jacksic had harsh words for the response of power utility Jersey Central Power & Light.
“JCP&L has failed the township and every area of coverage they supply power to,” Jacksic said. “I’ve elevated my complaints to BPU who are now actively involved on our behalf.”
As of Monday afternoon, all township and county roadways have been reopened, Jacksic said, but he urged caution as a great deal of debris remains to be removed.
While he remains dissatisfied with the official response of JCP&L, a utility owned by national conglomerate First Energy Corp., he had high praise for the people on the ground working to restore the power.
“I want to thank the incredible linemen connecting us back to power,” Jacksic said. “All of these fine men and women live in our communities and are our neighbors.”
Frelinghuysen Township Mayor Kirk Perez said he was part of a teleconference with area mayors and Jersey Central officials followed by a call specifically about Frelinghuysen Monday night.
“During both conversations, I made it clear that Frelinghuysen and several of our neighboring communities were among the areas hit hardest by these recent storms,” Perez said. “I strongly emphasized my concerns for the safety and well-being of our residents and stressed the urgency of restoring power and accessibility of our roads to our community.”
Rob Moorhead, mayor of Blairstown, echoed his colleagues’ opinions.
“I was on a very heated conference call with JCP&L Operations last night, who received a verbal beating from many elected officials from four northern counties,” Moorhead said. “They listened but could not offer immediate answers.”
Moorhead said Blairstown has not experienced this level of infrastructure damage since Superstorm Sandy in 2012. As of Monday, about 20 percent of the township was still without power.
In Knowlton Township, however, where keeping the power on is a challenge for the utility even on a good day, Mayor Debra Shipps was happy with the response of JCP&L.
“We’ve been very happy with the response,” Shipps said.
As of Monday, fewer than 10 customers remained without power, she said.
Shipps said she was in contact throughout the outages with Amy Overman, local engagement specialist with JCP&L, who represents the North Warren area.
“Amy was fabulous,” Shipps said.
Overman appeared before a Knowlton Township Committee meeting in March to answer questions from long-suffering customers of the utility, particularly from the Columbia neighborhood, which lost power at least 14 times in 2025, with outages lasting as long as 48 hours.
While some failures have been attributed to storms, residents have long complained of lengthy outages during perfectly fine weather.
Overman said in March the Columbia area will benefit from major upgrades to the transmission line from Metropolitan Edison on the Pennsylvania side of the Delaware River.
More than 300,000 Jersey Central Power & Light customers were without electricity after severe thunderstorms swept through the utility’s service area at the peak of the outages.
According to the utility, 44,000 customers remained without electricity Monday, down from 67,000 reported Sunday. Of those outages, 1,900 remain in Warren as crews continued restoring service following severe thunderstorms and extreme heat that caused widespread damage across the utility’s service area.
Initially 4,500 customers lost power. The term “customer” refers to individual residences and businesses, not the number of people affected by the outages, which is usually much higher than customer total.
“More than 1,700 workers are engaged in storm response efforts, and additional line, transmission and forestry crews have been requested,” the utility company said. “Our teams will continue working 24/7 … to restore power as quickly and safely as possible.”
Joe brings decades of journalism experience to the Ridge View Echo, covering everything from local school boards to the U.S. Supreme Court. A former National Law Journal editor and Columbia Law School press officer, he now enjoys telling community stories in Blairstown, where he lives with his wife, Rose, and their two dachshunds.
- Joe Phalon, Contributing Writerhttps://ridgeviewecho.com/author/joe-phalon-contributing-writer/
- Joe Phalon, Contributing Writerhttps://ridgeviewecho.com/author/joe-phalon-contributing-writer/
- Joe Phalon, Contributing Writerhttps://ridgeviewecho.com/author/joe-phalon-contributing-writer/
- Joe Phalon, Contributing Writerhttps://ridgeviewecho.com/author/joe-phalon-contributing-writer/
