In Hinds county, local outreach groups opened stations offering residents who had spent consecutive days without power a respite from the heat.
Four different cooling and charging stations were set up across the capitol city to assist those affected by weekend storms. The Mississippi Rapid Response Coalition and their partners have been distributing ice and hot meals to residents that are still experiencing power outages.
Jarita Frazier-King, a state community organizer with the Southern Poverty Law Center, says that those living in Jackson have enough to worry about, and her personal mission to ease the stress caused by the recent severe weather.
“Jackson is already, you know, filled with a place with a lot of challenges,” she said. “So we're just here to try to ease and give some comfort to this very hot situation.
Mississippi Public Service Commissioner Brent Bailey issued a statement Monday saying he was "disappointed" in Entergy Mississippi, one of the state's largest electricity providers, for how the outages have been handled.
Bailey says the utility providers' website usually has a tool to let customers know when outages will be resolved, but that tool was down for most of the storms. He also expressed concern for the people affected by the outages.
“Many of them are under high temperatures, high humidity,” he said. “The lack of power is impacting the ability for folks to stay cool, to keep their food and medicine, medicines fresh and from spoiling. And when you go days without access to modern services, frustration really begins to boil over.”
Entergy responded in a statement, saying, “The only focus of our 2,300-person workforce is restoring their power as quickly and safely as possible. … Six other states have sent crews to stand shoulder to shoulder with us to help get the lights back on.”
Multiple homes have still been without power for days as temperatures are expected to reach the nineties. As of Tuesday, Entergy released an update stating 16,372 customers around the state remain without power, but they expected all customers to have power restored by Wednesday night.
According to the National Weather Service in Jackson, the storm damage is over for now. But Senior Meteorologist Eric Carpenter says heat advisories and dangerous temperatures will remain.
“We definitely strongly encourage those folks to try to take as many breaks as possible and stay hydrated as much as much as you can while you're dealing with this,” he said. “It is still quite hot and a little more humid than usual. These heat values… are gonna be pretty rough on those folks.”
Over the weekend, the Red Cross offered an overnight shelter to those in need. A representative of the Red Cross said that over 30 people stayed in the shelter Monday night, which has since been packed up after many residents regained power. Rakia Lumumba, co-founder of the Mississippi Rapid Response Coalition, says Jackson residents of all ages have sought out the stations' services.
"We've seen a few [of the same people] a few days in a row because their power is still out. We're seeing a lot of elderly folks.” she said. “We had one family… the mother brought her son and he has to go through three feedings a day and they were without power and those feedings require electricity. So being able to be open to provide that each time that he needs, it was really important.”
The cooling stations remain open today, Wednesday June 21st, from 1-7. Locations include 1720 Bailey Ave in Jackson, 100 Main St in Edwards, and 110 White Oak St in Utica.
The Coalition has a crisis hotline, 844-435-7601, to request delivery for those that cannot travel.
Editor’s note, 6/21/23: This story has been updated with Entergy’s latest outage numbers and coverage from cooling stations and shelters in Hinds County.
