merelygifted:

…  Edith Lee-Payne spoke early and stuck around until the very end. She says power lines near her home were overgrown with vegetation. She told DTE and little was done. Then one day a tree fell onto the electrical wires and set her home on fire. “They didn’t keep me safe,” Lee-Payne said of DTE. “They didn’t do the protective measures. They had a line clearance program that’s ineffective.”Her complaint dates back to 2008.

“And I’m not giving up on this because it’s still happening.”Lee-Payne said her concerns go beyond her property. She said people’s lives are at stake. She brought up a list on her phone and spoke of 14-year-old Malik Shelton, who died after encountering a downed power line in 2013.

“DTE knew. They knew about the line. K’Brianna Griffin, 12 years old. She was electrocuted. DTE knew and they did nothing.”

Environmental groups like Souladarity in Highland Park say DTE fails its poor, Black and Brown customers and that the rate increase will do little to improve service for them.

Carlton Clyburn, the City Council President of Highland Park, said DTE does not have a plan to upgrade the city’s power grid in the next 10 years.

“We have fires in the alley. The overgrowth. It’s just not maintained. Poles leaning, poles attached to buildings,” said Clyburn. “And when you talk about taking up the rates, what does that do to someone on fixed income?”

Dorothy White said she used to have government assistance to pay her DTE bills. But that stopped and she got a shutoff notice.

“I got a few people that’s going to help me, so it won’t get cut off … Our lights shouldn’t be able to get cut off for $124.”

It’s not just her bills. White says her mother is facing steep charges, too.

“Her light bill [is] $500 and she is by herself. And she’s bedridden.”  …