Gary residents turn to prayer as power outage stretches into third week

Key Points:

• Nearly 5,000 homes in Northwest Indiana, including Gary, were approaching their third week without power following severe storms on August 11, with residents expressing growing frustration over the slow restoration efforts by utility provider NIPSCO.
• Community leaders and Mayor Eddie Melton gathered at the Tree of Life Missionary Baptist Church to pray, discuss the crisis, and call for greater transparency and urgency from NIPSCO, emphasizing the need for better infrastructure maintenance, particularly tree management.
• NIPSCO projected power restoration for Munster and Lake Station by Monday and for Gary and Portage by Tuesday, but local officials remain concerned about preparedness for future severe weather events.
• Mayor Melton highlighted ongoing struggles such as food insecurity due to power outages, urging increased SNAP benefits and calling attention to recent state and federal cuts to food assistance programs amid the crisis.
• Governor Mike Braun has requested major disaster relief from FEMA, provided state aid and housing vouchers to displaced families, and asked the state utility watchdog to investigate NIPSCO’s handling of the outages.