Cleanup After Blizzard of 2013 Continues in Norton

The blizzard of 2013 hit Norton hard over the weekend, and town officials say the cleanup is continuing.

Norton town manager Michael Yunits said as of Monday the primary concern is clearing out Norton’s catch basins to reduce the chance of flooding.

“Right now, they’re concentrating to uncover some of the catch basins unfortunately because of the rain,” he said. “That’ll put off some of the sidewalks until [Tuesday].”

He added that the DPW is actively looking at the low areas in town that have been known to flood in the past.

“They’re targeting the low areas, the areas that have had flooding before,” he said.

Yunits said that the town responded well to the storm. Only minor roads were impassable immediately following the blizzard.

“It did take some time to get to some of the minor roads,” he said. “I think overall the highway department did a great job with keeping all the main roads clear. With this amount of snow we had it took them a while to get to some of the minor roads."

He added he didn't receive many complaints from residents.

“I’ve had two calls from people concerned about their streets being plowed,” he said. “Other than that, I haven’t had any complaints.“

Yunits said that as of Monday, every resident who suffered outages from the blizzard should have their power back online. He said National Grid had many representatives in the town and worked with officials to coordinate restoration efforts.

“As far as the power, everyone should be on that we know of,” he said. “It was a good response this time from National Grid.”

He added that the one complaint he did receive regarding power problems was resolved very quickly.

“I had one of the businesses in town that had one of the phases on but one of their phases of electricity wasn’t on,” he said. “I called National Grid and within two or three hours the guy called me back to let me know that they had come out and had his power fully restored.”