Hacienda Heights residents say they haven't had landline service in months due to copper wire thefts

HACIENDA HEIGHTS, Calif. (KABC) -- Residents in Hacienda Heights and Whittier say they haven't had landline service in months due to copper wire thefts in their neighborhoods, and they're demanding answers.

The Hacienda Heights Improvement Association held a community meeting Monday night to address the issue, which was filled with frustrated residents. Some residents said they've been without landline service for about seven months.

They say cellphone service is unreliable in the area, making landlines vital to their safety.

"We live in an area that's prone to wildfires. What if we can't use our phones?" said longtime Hacienda Heights resident Diana Arnold. "That's really, really important. We've had a wildfire in the past. That's our lifeline; it's not just a landline."

Many also expressed frustration with how Frontier Communications has handled the outages. Some residents have had trouble contacting a representative, saying they simply "want to talk to a real person."

"I've spent hours on the phone and you usually get a chatbot or you get somebody out of the country," said Arnold's husband, Larry Arnold.

Other residents said Frontier has still been charging them, even with the lack of service.

Douglas McAllister, Frontier's vice president of external affairs in California, attended Monday's meeting to address the concerns. He, too, shared his frustration with the copper wire thefts, describing the situation as a game of "Whac-A-Mole."

"We'll get them dealt with here, and they pop up over here," he said.

"The outages are caused by that cable theft and it's difficult to stop it," he added.

McAllister assured residents that Frontier is working to repair serivce "as quickly as possible" but there are some factors that could cause delays. He talked about supply-chain issues, saying due to the thefts, Frontier has to get its copper wire shipped from out of state.

"What happens is we get it shipped to us, we get it put up, we turn our backs, and the next day, it's gone again," he said. "So we're having those kinds of issues. That kind of slows us down."'

He took time to praise the Los Angeles County Sheriff's Department for their work and also discussed switching to fiber optic service, which McAllister said would help residents immensely.

"If the copper's not there, they can't steal it," he said. "Therefore, if it's just fiber ... fiber's just glass so there's no money in that. So the idea here is just to provision fiber optic cabling from our wire center all the way to your home ... it's a lot cheaper too and a lot more reliable."

But apparently, it's not that simple.

"Per the safety of the city, Frontier isn't allowed to, what we call, 'force migrate' and tell you, 'You're on copper, you now have to go to fiber.' We're not allowed to do that. So the copper has to stay as long as we have customers."

"Once everyone has done that, we can pull the copper out and this no longer becomes an issue," he added.

McAllister also said the company is making sure that vehicles are clearly marked with a Frontier logo so residents know when crews are working on site. He also said a $5,000 reward is being offered to help catch copper thieves.

"If you see something, please say something," said McAllister.