Why was reverse 911 down in our town but not in other towns? I am not sure how true this statement is. We received 2 calls thru the reverse 911 after the storm hit.

Mayor, your lack of communication was unacceptable! You have no excuse whatsoever. HPD did a great job! Their systems were up and running so why couldn't through them!? You need to be held accountable along with JCP&L management! Shame on you!

OK? There were unforeseen problems and they are being addressed. No practice or drills could have covered all the problems that came up. This was the ultimate drill and we learned. Note that the mayor is looking for solutions, not blame. Seems as though placing the blame, especially on her, is the order of the day. That’s not going to solve anything. Sure, I imagine that Mayor Petillo is evaluating her own performance and adjusting accordingly. Much has been said about her appearance at the High School, serving lunch. Anyone who has taken any kind of training in Incident Command knows that the Incident Commander does not get “hands on.” It is his/ her job to stand back, receive and assimilate information and delegate accordingly. We have, in the Police, Fire and DPS, competent leadership and as Incident Commander (After all, her position kind of makes her that by default.) I am sure Mayor Petillo leaned heavily on them, as she should. So, in that respect, the lunch line might not have been the place for a leader to be. However; Ms. Petillo is also the Mayor of the town and as such, people want to hear from and see their political leaders in a disaster such as this. So, Mayor Petillo faced a conflict of obligations. Lead from afar or be in the public. I think she did a good job of both. Now that things are coming back together, she is looking to improve our ability to deal with whatever comes up next. OK? Let's get on with it.

I would like to thank The Hopatcong Police Department for keep us so well informed during this crisis. I would also like to thank our DPW, Fire Department Volunteers, CERT Volunteers, Dispatchers, Ambulance Squad, School Officials, Teachers, and many other volunteers for their exceptional service to our community! Regarding the mayor & the council, your lack of leadership, lack of communication, and excuses throughout this crisis have been inexcusable & demand accountability not a press release for publicity purposes!

Borough internet and website down for 10 days? You can invest in a hot spot for 50 bucks and a nomial monthly fee with verizon or another carrier giving you internet access 24 hours a day 7 days a week .Mayor, are you actually implying that the website server resides in town? As an IT professional I find that to be absurd and extremely poor planning. The website needs to be housed on a server that is remote, so that when disasters occur it is unharmed, and readily available for updates. Yet another reason why the current administration is inept - there are books available for DISASTER RECOVERY and PLANNING, I suggest you invest in one.

I can't decide what is worse, the fact that you, the so called Mayor did NOTHING during the storm or the fact that now you are releasing this statement and passing the blame off. Give me a break! You had choices, to stand up and fight and give it your all, or hide behind the cookies at the shelter... we all know what you chose to do. I am sure when you took this job you never thought you would have to work in the face of a disaster, but guess what you did and you FAILED. Other Mayors stepped up their game and lead their towns through this disaster. I will however say thanks, thank god there wasn't more damage in this town because with your lack of leadership lives could have been lost. I hope people remember this when its time for reelection, that is unless you leave office because you know the public now knows you are not qualified to lead this town or any other.

Well said Rich

Regarding communications in a Emergency/Disaster situation, it is essential to locate critical infrastructure offsite (or in a harden, highly redundant local site - an expensive option). This is Emergency/Disaster Management "101".

So for instance the emergency notification/reverse 911 system would typically be located offsite with a hosting company, which provides data center redundancy as part of its service (i.e., redundant power, redundant hardware, etc). I am not sure the type of solution the Borough currently has, but it clearly needs to be re-assessed.

I am a middle aged male, so I have no use for "Social Media". The only way ANYONE could get online was with a smartphone, I doubt that a majority of the households in town have a smartphone, especially the elderly.

Why couldn't town use the schools reverse 911 system. That worked fine the entire 13 days MOST of the town was out of power. Even though I was unable to receive the calls at home, I used my cell to log into my voicemail to get messages from the schools.

In a previous article in the Patch, they mayor stated that the Fire Department was going around town, knocking on doors to check on people. Either myself or my wife were home for the duration of the outage, and no one came to either my house, my neighbors' houses, or anyone that I spoke to. I would love to hear from others to see if they received a visit from the FD, or if that claim is more "less than accurate" information.

Now that almost everyone has power, it is amazing how much information the mayor is NOW able to disseminate through the Patch. Active Crisis = No Information... Crisis Over = Information Overload

one more thing... the mayor NOW states that they are "demanding action", I appreciate the hollow gesture, but the time to "demand action" is during the crisis, not after.

I know the Borough Building had Communication with the people as did PD with listing of roads open. Does she know her way to that building?
Very Sad attempt at reaching out to her people. There should never be a "Conflict of Obligations" when People Vote You in a Position. Your Obligation is to find out what All Your People Need! Including the ones at their homes Braving the Cold with No Power.

I read a lot of "we", blame shifting and excuses. I'd have more respect if she acknowledged "she" dropped tha ball instead of trying to deflect. Simply not good enough.

Mayor you blew it!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!! HPD is on a generator it is located in back of town hall building so reverse 911 and everything should be working or your employees never check to see if system is working (which should be done monthly).

Funny how the superintendent of schools, PATCH, and our police department were able to reach out to us regardless of all the communication obstacles. No reason why you couldn't have done this too mayor. Shame, shame!

And another thing.... You were able to get us an update on BED BUGS.... Why couldn't you use the same line of communication to update us on the power outage???

Posted on the Landing PathMark bulletin board I found a typed hard copy 2 page update letter from the Roxbury Twp. mayor to the residents. I'm sure it was posted in many other frequented locations throughout the township. Low tech, but highly effective in the absence of other methods of communication. Mayor Petillo.....this was something simple that could have been done in Hopatcong, BUT wasn't. The HPD web site was the only reliable source of local information, BUT ONLY TO THOSE who had smart phones with a reliable carrier. The mayor/council failed the residents with their extremely poor communication efforts.

Thank You Rich!

Are you kidding? A leader is one who takes charge of the matter in ones own hands, give out the proper commands to be carried out, and continue to do so, NOT SIT BACK ! If such can not do so, they should be pulled from such a holding position, and mext in line take over. So, in short, cant handle the job, then STEP DOWN NOW!!!

Shoyld have used JCP&L's payoff of $400,000 last year, for a better communication system !!!!!!

Your right Rich Smith...The Mayor should be looking for ways to improve her ability to deal with the next incident that heads her way. Might I suggest she purchase an air card for her laptop, an IPad with 3G, or a hotspot device from Verizon. Then she wont be able to blame her lack of communication on the fact that the Borough internet was down...We probably need a Mayor that is a bit more technologically savvy in addition to one who is a bit more on the ball.

Well put on FAILED, Graig !

Ways to IMPROVE? She has had the past 5 years to do that ! FAILURE !!!!!!

Maybe IMPROVE, her income, that about it! Jcp&l must go along with her as mayor. This town cant take a hit like this again !

Not sure how many Hopatcong residents use Optimum for their phone service, however they have an option for free call forwarding during power or cable outages. For the 2 weeks our power was out calls to my home phone automatically transferred to my cell.

You have to remember the Mayor of these small towns are jokes they are part time people who take on the job for the power. A MAYOR is a person like in New York Bloomburg who is in action 24/7/365 that's a Mayor not someone who has a full time job and moon lights as a mayor so with that said that answers any question on WHERE WAS THE MAYOR for the storm?

I’ve just read some very harsh comments about mayor Petillo’s handling of hurricane sandy. All I can say is MING!
The storm uprooted some tough critics; it saddens me that with all her hard work and love she displayed during this disaster, there are folks that just want to focus on the negatives.
With a disaster of this magnitude, and the amount of people involved with the clean up, restoration of services, and the caring of our residence, there is bound to be glitches. I personally think she did a great job and I would like to take this opportunity to thank her.
What I witnessed was a mayor working hard, being in the midst of the disaster, being very visible and accessible and very concerned about our comfort and well being.
Constructive comments are always welcome, if someone has a suggestion to bring improvements for the future, great, but attacking a person with insults that gave us her all, is just plan wrong.
Again may I say thank you Mayor Petillo.

I'm with you John Pezzino....I felt great about the Mayor's communication via local radio stations...I spent hours sitting in my car to keep warm and listen to the radio station from Hackettstown, 1015, and also 103.7 from Newton I think....Our Mayor gave thorough, concise daily reports...There was no comparing her reports to the reports of the few mayors who came on the radio...I just don't know what else could have been done to update the people...We had no power, which means no tv, no internet, and in some cases, no phone....Short of the Mayor visiting each household on a daily basis, there was no other way to communicate...So get over it people, and move on....I applaud your efforts Mayor Petillo...I say, "Well done."

Police/EMT/Fire personnel are highly trained in disaster/emergency procedure and deal with it on varying degrees every day. This was simply new territory for an untrained mayor and council. All the technology in the world wouldn't help those residents in town who are not technically savvy or those who choose not to complicate their lives with a lot of technical gadgetry. This was a learning experience for Ms. Petillo and the council that they will hopefully take advantage of. When technology fails, a printed communication flier posted regularly at open local merchants, the shelter and other public buildings would have worked for the short term.

This storm didn't uproot tough critics, it made us realize that our mayor was not ready to deal with this kind of disaster. She should have been more proactive from the very beginning of this. Instead she fed us the same fiction that JCP&L was telling her. As all the towns around us were restored, we were still in the dark, and having a hard time getting any information. Our mayor should have listened to us when we were calling her and telling her that no one was working in Hopatcong. She could have had someone come out to check on what we were telling her instead she just kept giving us the same old story about how JCP&L was working around the clock to restore our power. She failed us when we needed her the most, she did not step up and seek the truth until over a week after the storm hit. She should have been on top of this situation from the very beginning, that is what as good elected official would and should have done. Yes, I do feel that Mayor Petillo failed us!

am sure many of us have good suggestions for improvemnt of handling any future similar situations, where may these suggestions be sent?