More CUC customers express frustrations

The public comment portion of a board meeting usually takes place near the end but that got turned around during yesterday’s meeting of the Commonwealth Utilities Corp. board, which got started with group of residents kicking off the meeting by venting their frustrations with the agency.

Originally, opening the floor to public comments was set to be the sixth item on the agenda, but the board quickly motioned to move the “public comments” portion of its meeting to the top of the agenda so they could listen to the complaints of a group of residents.

First up was Del Benson, a Saipan resident for almost 30 years, who reiterated the complaints he raised during a CUC board meeting last week, which Saipan Tribune had already reported.

Next was small business owner Gus Noble, who has lived on Saipan for six years now. Noble leased a plot of land last year in order to get a business venture going, and required electricity to be delivered to the lot. Noble shared with the board that he contacted CUC in July 2020 to begin discussion on how to get electricity delivered to his lot, and was met with the response that a power pedestal needed to be built first before CUC would send a team to do land surveys and subsequently put in power poles. Noble paid for a pedestal to be built at a certain point that CUC identified, and was then told by staff at the Power Division that the pedestal was in the wrong place. Noble paid for another pedestal to be built.

“I’m a small business owner. These types of delays cost money. I had to pay $6,000 to get the power connected. I had to pay for the poles! I am paying for you guys to increase your power grid, and I can’t get that done in a timely way? That’s just not acceptable,” said Noble.

Next was Vincent Seman Aldan, who presented to the board a binder filled with paperwork showing that CUC has supposedly been overcharging him on electricity for three years, and showed “threatening letters” from CUC saying that it will disconnect his utility. He also expressed his frustration with customer service.

“Every time I call customer service, [they say] we’re looking into it. We’re talking to the supervisor. We’re talking to the manager. …We’re going on three years and I’m still messing around with this issue,” said Aldan.

CUC board chair Miranda V. Manglona said all public comments and complaints were acknowledged, and that “we will definitely sit down and discuss this with management.”
The meeting was held at CUC’s main office’s conference room at the Joeten Dandan Building.