Lingering Irene Effects Leave Montgomery County Schoolchildren in Limbo

For kids, the first day of school is a big deal. In the weeks before the big day, they fill their new backpacks with their new school supplies. Over and over, they speculate who their new teachers are going to be, which friends will be in their classes. They carefully choose their first day of school outfits and lay them out the night before school is to start. Every detail down to what to put in the lunch box is carefully orchestrated.

As a parent of three, I have been listening to first day of school excitement for weeks. But due to lingering power outages caused by Hurricane Irene, many kids in Montgomery County, Maryland may not know whether school will be open for that special first day Monday when they go to bed Sunday night.

When Montgomery County school children wake up Monday morning, it will either be the first day of school or it will be a day off from school before the school year has even started.

As of 8:00 p.m. Sunday, Montgomery County Public Schools' website says, "Montgomery County Public Schools staff is currently assessing storm damage and the power outage situation in school buildings. Numerous schools remain without power... MCPS will provide an update later this evening regarding operations for tomorrow." The message is time-stamped 3:19 p.m.

The linchpin, Pepco, reports 3527 active outages affecting 176,474 customers at this hour. More than 55,000 of those customers are in Montgomery County. Given Pepco's track record (and given how little change there's been in the outage numbers all day) prospects for the first day of school to go forward as planned aren't looking good.