BUFFALO, N.Y. — New York's two U.S. senators sent a letter Tuesday to the president of NYSEG and RG&E in response to widespread outages after a windstorm last week.

"We had a long conversation with them about things that needed to be done after the last set of storms and they didn't do it. They didn't do any of the things they could have done. They could've checked the lines. They could have trimmed trees. They could have prepared," Sen. Kirsten Gillibrand, D-NY, said.

Some customers were out of power for up to three days, a concern in its own right, but Gillibrand said local officials and constituents also complained about a lack of communication and in some cases miscommunication from the companies.

"They're still giving excuses and dragging their feet so that's what the letter is for, to try to urge them to be more responsive to customers across New York," she said.

Erie County Executive Mark Poloncarz was among NYSEG's critics last week and a spokesperson said he remains unhappy about the response.

"As in, unfortunately, years past. We are seeing in some ways, not a delayed response from NYSEG, but just not as much accurate information as I'd like. This isn't the first time," Poloncarz said during a press conference Thursday.

He spoke with the New York State Public Service Commission which said it was pressing utility companies to communicate accurate restoration times last week. The commission also continues to investigate the response to winter storms last month. A separate investigation found the companies violated their own emergency response plan during a storm last year.

"My biggest concern is that they've been dragging their feet and we've had numerous storms over the past year, two very significant wind storms," Gillibrand said.

The PSC said if it finds any repeated, systemic problems, it will take them into consideration moving forward.

"I don't know if there's a way to make them do their job but I can keep elevating it so the customers can begin to hold them accountable," Gillibrand said.

NYSEG and RG&E, which share a parent company, did not immediately return a request for comment.