Garden State Plaza Hot Spot for County Residents, School's Closed Rest of Week

As the only major location in town with power, Bergen County residents flocked to the Garden State Plaza to take a break from Hurricane Sandy's aftermath. The mall had opened on Tuesday to serve as a charging station for residents and longlines were also forming in the food court and mall restaurants.

Several people also took advantage of free water and bags of ice that PSE&G was distributing in one of the rear parking lots. By 12pm Wednesday the company announced that power had been restored to 30 percent of the 1.5 million PSE&G customers who lost electricity as a result of Hurricane Sandy.

“Bergen county was clearly the hardest hit in the area from an overhead standpoint - which will take the longest amount of time to make restorations,” Ralph A. LaRossa, president and chief operating officer of PSE&G said in a northjersey.com report. He also added that the majority of restoring power in Bergen County is due to extensive damage to overhead power lines.

And with the power still out, Paramus Public Schools and Paramus Catholic have cancelled classes for the rest of the week. All state tournament games have been postponed until next week as the NJSIAA agreed to delay the start of the football postseason and continuation for boys and girls soccer, cross-country, field hockey and volleyball.

Paramus Catholic AD Scott Langan told northjersey.com that power may be out in Paramus until Saturday.

All Halloween trick-or-treating has been pushed back as well due to the power outages and Gov. Chris Christie signed an executive order Wednesday morning rescheduling the holiday until Monday, Nov. 5.

“As governor, it is my responsibility to use all available resources of the state government to protect against the emergency created by Hurricane Sandy – postponing Halloween celebrations by five days is a commonsense and necessary step to accomplish that," Christie said in a statement.

Any residents that can make their way to the Community Blood Services building is encouraged to do so on Thursday as the facility is in need of blood donations. The facility is located at 970 Linwood Avenue West and will be open from 11:30 a.m. to 8 p.m. Walk-ins are welcome as the phone lines are down.

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