Emergency management officials have compiled clean up information for those who have tree limbs to clean up following the ice storm. Limb pick up will not start until Monday at the earliest, so it as advised that residents stay inside until the weather warms up, which is likely Sunday afternoon.
In Winfield, limb pick up is set to start early in the week and city officials ask that residents take limbs to the curb. The limbs should remain on private property and should not be placed in a right of way. There is no need to cut the limbs up, just drag them to the curb, city manager Warren Porter said.
The city’s compost center – on Broad Street west of the fairground – will be open from noon to 6 p.m. Sunday and 8 a.m. to 5 p.m. each weekday for those who prefer to dump limbs on their own.
In Arkansas City, the rules for pick up are very much the same, officials said. Limbs should be kept off the right away and placed near the curb for pick up. A burn pit at 12th and Chestnut and one in the 400 block of N. F will also be open, though official hours have not been set.
Cowley County also has been included in a 62-county disaster declaration signed by Gov. Kathleen Sebelius. The declaration allows for public funds and resources to be used for storm clean up. Chautauqua, Elk, Sumner, Sedgwick and Butler counties are also included in the declaration.
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Roughly 150 to 200 Winfield electric utility customers are without power Saturday – most of them within the city limits, according to electric utility director Bob Porter. At the peak of outages late Friday and early Saturday, 500 customers were without electricity.
The outages also affected Udall, Burden and Dexter, because the city of Winfield supplies power for customers in those towns. Most of the outages in those outlying areas were fixed by making repairs to major supply lines connecting Winfield with the smaller towns. If you continue to have power issues you can call the city at 221-5600.
Utility crews are working to restore power to affected homes, but work will stop at night falls because troubleshooting becomes much trickier then, Porter said. Three crews from Clay Center and possibly crews from other cities will join in the repair effort Sunday as part of a mutual agreement the city has in place. A high-voltage line in Winfield will require repairs, Porter said.
"The nature of the storm was such that it caused a number of outages in a wide area," he said. "We’re working to fix problems as fast as we can. There are really no quick fixes in situations like this."
No plans for a shelter to open are in place at this time.
"I don’t know that there’s a demand for that right now," Porter said. "I think most people are hunkering down with family or firing up the fireplace."