School Is Back, Power Is Not For Many Families After Irma
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MIAMI (CBSMiami) -- School is back but for many families, power is not.
As of Monday, 46,610 homes in Miami-Dade County and 11,760 in Broward County had gone more than a week without power.
Florida Power & Light had promised to get all the power back up by the end of the weekend but the company said due to unforeseen issues that's been delayed.
"A promise to me is a promise. They shouldn't have promised if they thought they couldn't deliver," said Kittie Dzimidas who is still without power in her Coral Gables home.
Running on a generator is not enough for a breathing machine. It's been a tough week.
"We're not sure what to believe," said Dzimidas.
At Sunset and 67th Avenue, the traffic lights are still out.
Others are trying to be more understanding.
"They say Friday and it turns out to be Monday. You know, they're working at it," said Steve Yenzer.
On Monday, FPL said that 95 percent of the 1.8 million in Miami-Dade, Broward and Monroe counties now have power. They said about 24,000 employees and contractors are on the job trying to bring power back.
FPL says the areas where crews are having the most access issues are Coral Gables and Pinecrest because of the heavy vegetation in those areas.
"As we got into the neighborhoods, we found out that there was a lot of vegetation impacting both access, and actually impacting the lines themselves," said FPL spokesman Richard Gibbs over the weekend.
The company set up customer service walk-up stations in Pinecrest and Homestead, equipped with free wifi and charging stations.
