Homer, Nebraska’s motto is “Little But Lively.”
Situated near the Iowa border, and not too far from South Dakota, roughly 500 residents proudly call Homer home.
On October 2, 2020, pressure monitoring systems detected an issue at the regulator station providing service to the community. A safe restoration began with 15 determined technicians going door-to-door to turn off the 198 meters in town. After repairs to the station, techs re-pressurized gas lines, then went door-to-door again to relight pilot lights.
“The city allowed us to use its offices for a command center, which was a big help,” recalled Supervisor Danny Willets. “Our crews were great and worked well together. Technicians Dan Brown and Andrew Brabec were a tremendous help in locating people for access. And once most of the relights were done, Dan stayed in Homer through the weekend to make sure all of our customers were taken care of.”
Homer Community School – which serves pre-kindergarten through 12th grade students – was one of the customers affected. The day of the outage, staff had planned to serve a warm meal, but after the loss of natural gas, that wasn’t possible. They quickly pivoted and provided a cold lunch to students instead.
Black Hills Energy’s Customer Experience Program Manager in Nebraska, Tiffany Pusateri, wanted to show Homer Knights’ teachers and staff that their agility and understanding were appreciated. She arranged for the delivery of 70 meals from Chick-fil-A.
Unlike the mysterious poet Homer, for whom the village was named, there is no mystery in how well Black Hills Energy’s decisive response to the outage - and the extra-mile gesture - were received!
“We can't thank you enough. What a great treat,” said longtime district secretary Amy Brand.
Positive Energy
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