“Cents for St. Susan’s” Campaign Kick Off Held (May 2, 2023)

The Jamestown Board of Public Utilities 24th annual “₵ents for St. Susan’s” campaign is now underway.

The campaign supports operating costs at the soup kitchen located at 31 Water Street.

St. Susan Center executive director Cherie Rowland said, “Only a few short months ago, we were averaging 120 meals served per day. Today we are averaging 180 meals served each day.”

BPU General Manager Dave Leathers said that the BPU “₵ents for St. Susan’s” drives have raised $307,611.54 over the past 23 years.

In addition to generous sponsors, the campaign is assisted by community members who drop coins, cash and checks into bright yellow “₵ents for St. Susan’s” coin canisters placed around the area to collect money to help the soup kitchen feed hungry people.

Residents also may donate redeemable cans and bottles at the BPU Customer Service Office, at Don’s Car Wash and at the Southside Redemption Center for St. Susan Center.

Gifts may be mailed to “₵ents for St. Susan’s,” c/o Jamestown BPU, P.O. Box 700, Jamestown, NY 14702-0700.

BPU customers who pay their bills online also may contribute online at www.jamestownbpu.com.

A hot dog sale for the cause will take place outside the BPU Customer Service Office from 10:30 a.m. to 2:00 p.m. Friday, June 2.

All gifts to the drive go directly to St. Susan Center.

For more information, contact Becky Robbins at (716) 661-1680 or brobbins@jamestownbpu.com.

Jamestown BPU, St. Susan Center, and Sponsors gather on the Jamestown Riverwalk to celebrate ‘Cents for St. Susan’s’ Campaign Results

The Jamestown Board of Public Utilities announced the 23rd Annual “Cents For St. Susan’s” campaign has raised $26,693.

BPU Communications Coordinator Becky Robbins said around 50 canisters were put out at local businesses as part of the donation drive, “Those brought in about $2,000, which was very, very generous. And we did urge people to collect bottles and cans, redeemable containers. We didn’t do as much in that this year, but still raised $200 for that.”

She added a hot dog sale at the BPU also raised over $700. Robbins said campaign sponsors, which included individuals and local businesses, raised the rest of the funds.

St. Susan Center Executive Director Cherie Rowland said the funding will go toward feeding over 30,000 people this year, “It will be used for operating expenses as well as buying food. And as everybody knows, right now expenses are higher than they were at this time a year or so ago. So it’s a lot. It really does help.”

Rowland added that St. Susan Center not only feeds those who need it but also provides community, “That’s almost just as important as having a nourishing meal, is having human contact. Because humans cannot do life alone. We have to have participation with the community, I mean, just as individuals.”

Rowland said St. Susan Center also offered this summer a storytime for kids and adult learning programs.

WRFA’s Julia Ciesla-Hanley spoke with Jamestown Board of Public Utilities Communication Coordinator Becky Robbins and Solid Waste Division Administrative Assistant Gloria Miranda about the new garbage container program being rolled out as well as Spring flushing and more.

Flushing begins in Falconer at 1 p.m. Friday, April 30th and continues until May 2nd. The remainder of flushing for the BPU Water Division system will begin Monday, May 3rd. Flushing will take place between 8:30am and 4:30pm, Monday through Friday on May 3rd through 7th and May 10th through 12th. On Wednesday, May 5th, flushing will take place from 5:30am-5pm to accommodate downtown and Fairmount Avenue businesses.

BPU Communications Coordinator Becky Robbins says flushing can discolor water and can discolor your laundry,

“We offer ‘Red Be Gone,’ which is a rust remover. And if your laundry turns rusty, don’t dry it, just re-wash it in this ‘Red Be Gone’ before you dry it and it’s very good at stripping it out. We offer it for free at City Hall, our Customer Service has it, and the different villages and towns.. we make sure they have it.”

The map of the flushing schedule is posted on jamestownbpu.com. Customers with questions about flushing and their flushing dates may call the Flushing Hotline at (716) 661-1688.

The High winds began moving into the area Sunday morning, and by 4 p.m. the winds reached the height of their power with strong gusts blowing over trees and knocking down limbs, creating widespread outages in various pockets across Chautauqua County.

The National Weather Service in Buffalo had issued a high wind warning over the weekend and said some wind gusts were expected to reach as high as 50 to 65 miles per hour throughout the day. The NWS reported Monday that the highest recorded wind gust in the region for Sunday was in Fredonia at 69 mph at 8 p.m.

In the Jamestown area, power was knocked out in several different areas of the city and nearby Celoron and Falconer, with crews and supervisors from the Jamestown Board of Public Utilities working through the night to return power. The BPU Water Division advises that water customers may notice widespread discolored water as a result of the outages.

By 10:30 a.m. Monday, the BPU noted that while the majority of its customers are back in power, it still had areas in which there was no electricity, mainly due to major tree damage on wires.

“As trees are cut and moved out of the way, our crews can continue to replace power lines in these sporadic areas,” explained BPU communications director Rebecca Robbins. “Each crew is working one situation at a time, and we have other employees out investigating. We hope customers who remain without electricity can be assured that we are at work and will be at work until everyone is restored.”

National Grid also reported widespread outages in nearly every service area of the county, with the largest number of people affected in the town of Ellery, Harmony, and North Harmony. But there were also smaller outages reported in the Frewsburg, Kiantone, Busti, and Gerry – along with nearly every other township in the county.

Crews with National Grid are expected to continue to work on restoring power to those areas Monday morning and afternoon.

In addition to the high wind, heavy rainfall also fell at times during the day on Sunday and the showers are expected to continue Monday as crews work to restore power.

The power outage took place Saturday Night shortly after 11 p.m. and continued into early Sunday morning.

According to the Jamestown Post-Journal, power to numerous substations was cut due to a “problem” at the Jamestown Board of Public Utilities power plant and on Monday morning BPU Spokesperson Rebecca Robbins said “failed equipment at the Power Plant caused the outage. No other details have yet been released.

Power was restored to most customers by 2:20 a.m. Sunday.

WRFA was affected by the outage and because our station was in automation over the weekend, we were not back on the air until early Sunday evening. We apologize for any inconvenience to our listeners.