Orlando Real Estate News

FPL is the target of a lawsuit in Palm Beach County alleging that the utility could have avoided the blackout last weekend that left thousands without power during near-freezing temperatures.

The complaint, filed this week for Anthony Stampone, an FPL customer in Parkland, alleges FPL was negligent in ensuring its grid could handle unusual but foreseeable weather. FPL Spokesman Mark Bubriski said the lawsuit is frivolous and "utterly without merit."

Attorney Scott Gelfand in Coral Springs, one of Stampone's attorneys, said they want class action status and money for the 25,000 Broward and Palm Beach County customers he says were affected.

The complaint says FPL's "band-aid" fixes -- restarting transformers or replacing fuses in them insteading of replacing transformers -- is to blame for transformers that "routinely shut down again in a matter of hours or even minutes."

Bubriski said FPL deployed 1,300 workers to restore power as soon as possible and replaced 1,300 of its 800,00 transformers. He said the transformers are designed for Florida's normal climate but held up well even in the record-setting weather.

FPL's electricity demand hit an all-time high of 24,354 megawatt-hours on Monday and almost as much on Sunday, Bubriski said. That's more than the record summer demand of 22,361 megawatt-hours on Aug. 17, 2005. "Through it all, FPL maintained power to an average of more than 99 percent of our customers while operating at near-maximum capacity," Bubriski said. "No system is perfect."

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A Fort Lauderdale couple with a lot of stuff in their yard said they are "prepared to die'' to keep the city's code enforcers from stepping on their property again.

Bill and Helen Dunsford, 74 and 65 respectively, laid down the threat in a letter to City Hall this week (read it on the jump). They have a whole lot of stuff in their yard and the city wants it gone.

A crew showed up to the property, in the 900 block of Northwest 47th Court in the Twin Lakes neighborhood, on Monday. Helen Dunsford said they scooped up baby Jesus and the three Wise Men of her Nativity scene and dumped them in with the rest of the stuff, breaking them.

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