Frasier Senior Living Resident in Boulder received insufficient notice of shutdown

My name is Jo Ferguson, and I'm 80 years old, widowed in February, and I live at Frasier in Boulder. We all heard the weather reports days before the Apr 6 event, and as we are 2 miles from the Marshall Fire area, were ready with our To-Go bags for an evacuation. Xcel informed Frasier on Apr 6 in the morning that we would NOT be impacted by the power shut-downs because of the expected high winds. But at 2:31 PM, we were alerted that the power would be turned off by 3 pm in our senior living complex of 500 people and would remain off, possibly for days. Continued announcements from Xcel were sporadic and inaccurate. And worst of all, we could see that the church across the street never lost power, even though it was empty; and many surrounding homes had power, but this facility of 500 residents was in the dark. Worst of all, driving through Boulder looked as if the shut-downs were random - not in any discernable pattern as to why certain areas were off and others weren't.

I personally lost an entire refrigerator and freezer of food, and lost an entire night's sleep because I was not able to connect my CPAP and O2 to the emergency generator near my apartment without having purchased a 30' foot cord. I should have thought of this while I was caring for my 100% disabled Vietnam vet husband who recently passed away (buying a new cord never made it to the top of my list while he needed my care). I also have 2 cats who require special refrigerated diets, so I lost all that was in my refrigerator, and now have an additional $200+ of food to replace.
Problems like this CAN be fixed, but we all knew that things like this and the Marshall Fire will continue to recur if we don't put the right people in charge. I strongly urge that the PUC and the State require external root cause analyses, systems analyses or other investigations conducted by experts in the national labs, in the nuclear industry, in the military, and with other entities skilled in disaster management. Please, don't assume that the state, the county, the city, or the utility company should lead this effort - please keep anyone who is involved in a profit motive out of the solution. Yes, it will cost money, but it is fixable.