This week, Southlake Mayor Shawn McCaskill mailed a letter addressed to the Public Utility Commission of Texas, filing a formal complaint against Tri-County Electric Cooperative. The letter, filed on behalf of the Mayor’s office and the Carroll ISD board president, lists eight days when outage s have occurred between April and August. The letter indicates concerns were brought to TCEC, but outages persist. The letter said outages during high temperatures seen during the summer months “risks the health and safety of our residents, especially those in school and healthcare facilities.” In response, TCEC told NBC5 in a statement: “Tri-County Electric Cooperative recognizes that the recent level of power outages experienced by members in Southlake is unacceptable. Substantial additional resources have been committed to the area, including accelerated tree trimming, vegetation clearing, and system inspections. Southlake reliability improvements will be finalized in the coming weeks. Our immediate focus remains on improving reliability for members.” One important piece of context: while the letter was mailed to the PUCT on Aug. 11, it has not yet been received. Typically, the PUCT has 15 days to investigate complaints. But for business owners, power problems can create challenges. Rupesh Neupane at 33 Peaks Cafe described when power outages recently derailed service, “It is very hard,” he explained,”people love hanging out over here and, and they have the money; we just can’t take it.” Neupane hopes elevating the issue with state regulators will help keep the lights on and the coffee brewing. “You need power to run the machine. You can’t make coffee without an espresso machine,” he said. The PUCT told NBC5 it has not received the complaint, and so far this year no other complaints have been filed against TCEC. The PUCT’s consumer protection division handles issues involving utility providers. Click the link to learn more about how to file a complaint. ...read more read less