Southern Columbia Area SD presses PPL on outage prioritization after multi‑day blackouts

Southern Columbia Area School District officials confronted PPL representatives on how the utility prioritizes storm restoration after multiple outages this winter left the district without power for many students and families.

At a facilities meeting, Jacob, a PPL representative, reviewed five years of outage data and confirmed two recent long outages: Jan. 10 (about 15 hours) and Feb. 13 (about 30 hours). District speakers said the outages’ duration and impacts were severe because the campus serves roughly 1,300 people but is counted by PPL as six customer accounts. "Your website says that schools are gonna be prioritized," a district speaker said, "We're not." The comment echoed broader frustration that PPL’s account‑count metric does not reflect the school’s community role.

Jacob said PPL’s storm‑restoration priorities give precedence to 9‑1‑1 calls and vital facilities such as hospitals and nursing homes, and that the utility reports customer counts to the regulator by account (meter). He acknowledged the district’s concerns and said PPL’s forestry and reliability teams were reviewing identified hazard trees and outage locations. "We absolutely follow guidelines, and sometimes they break," Jacob said, adding he would investigate whether designation as an official community shelter changes restoration priority.

District staff urged PPL to explain why a large campus serving many people is treated as a small account cluster. "Counting us as six customers underestimates the community impact," one official said, noting that dismissing school has knock‑on effects for working parents and children who rely on school meals and mandated reporting. PPL responded that its investment decisions use metrics such as customer interruptions (CI) and customer‑minutes interrupted (CMI) and that repeated outages on a line improve that line’s project ranking for potential reliability work.

Speakers described repeated tree failures in the two‑mile span between the district and the nearby substation and asked whether targeted trimming, tree removal funding or line rerouting could reduce outage risk. Jacob said forestry staff were creating a hazard list and that certain projects—such as redundancy or partial undergrounding—would be evaluated on cost‑effectiveness.

The district assigned follow‑up tasks: PPL was asked to investigate whether the district could be prioritized as a warming station or otherwise flagged on maps and to return with answers within a week; district facilities staff (Scott and Jim) were asked to provide estimates for targeted measures. Officials said they would consider filing a complaint with the state Public Utility Commission if PPL does not provide satisfactory answers.

The meeting closed with an agreement to reconvene next Monday to review PPL’s response and district cost estimates. The district said it will weigh regulatory and public steps if the utility’s policies remain unchanged.