ABC15 is following up on frequent power outages in extreme heat, impacting thousands of customers who rely on a federal utility provider.
Customers of the San Carlos Irrigation Project (SCIP), run by the Bureau of Indian Affairs, say they’ve been dealing with power outages and an aging grid for years.
“We want to love where we live and we can’t because of the power outages,” Pinal County resident Sarah Serpa said. “Because of the power outages, we really want to leave.”
Serpa said back-to-back outages in extreme heat over the weekend led to milk spoiling for her grandbabies, even with the fridge closed.
“Saturday was like six hours, Sunday was seven and a half hours,” Serpa said. “What are we supposed to do?”
She’s not alone.
Within hours, ABC15 received more than two dozen emails from customers writing:
“The cool part of my home is 90 and the other side has to be well over 105…”
“…my power went on and off eight times within an hour. There was no notice from SCIP that this would be going on, I could’ve made arrangements and not risked frying my modem. Last summer we had to stay in our RV multiple times because it had AC but we had to buy a generator for it.
The fear and anxiety of never knowing if you’ll have power to keep your food safe, your AC on, your well running to get water to your livestock or even just to do your job to pay for the electricity you don’t get is exhausting...”
“If the wind blows, the electric goes out. It's insane. We literally bought a travel Trailer, so when this happens each year, we can stay in that…”
“Local lawmakers claim there is nothing they can do, state and federal lawmakers won’t return calls and the forgotten residents this impacts, we are left to suffer on this island all alone, hot, frustrated, mad, and wondering when will it ever end...”
“We are paying for a service we are not receiving. It is unacceptable and it is a very real health risk for the elderly, babies, people on oxygen and many others…”
ABC15 investigators have been looking into this issue for nearly a year, taking concerns to public officials, uncovering dilapidated infrastructure and shedding light on the ongoing impacts to people.
“Is it going to take somebody dying, you know, for you to do something?” resident Stacey Cohen asked of the utility service in an interview with ABC15. “It’s horrific.”
The issue is complex. SCIP has said for the past year that they are working on studies, but it will take lawmakers to pass legislation to divest the BIA of the San Carlos Irrigation Project
ABC15 reached out to SCIP multiple times about the latest round of outages. They told ABC15 the following:
"At this time, the Bureau of Indian Affairs does not have a public website that tracks or displays outage numbers in real time. The San Carlos Irrigation Project does not currently have the capability to publish outage maps."
Officials said a total of 33 poles were downed during recent storms and while these were located in two different sections of their system, they were still part of the same circuit.
"The outages were caused by severe weather events, including microbursts with high winds and heavy rain. The system was impacted over the course of two days when storm activity was most intense.
BIA cannot comment on divestiture at this time, as the matter falls outside the agency’s authority and control," they said.
