Lorain, Ohio — Mayor Jack Bradley is prioritizing streetlight repairs as part of his administration’s efforts to reduce violent crime, connecting darkened areas of the city to areas with higher rates of offense.
Bradley stated at last week’s Lorain City Council Meeting that the city recently discovered that approximately 500 of Lorain’s 6,000 streetlights were inoperable, many of which were in high-crime neighborhoods.
“We contacted First Energy and said, ‘Hey, we’re paying you a lot of money each month. Bradley said, “We can’t have these street lights out.”
Bradley stated that the utility company began repairs last week and has addressed over 100 outages thus far, with plans to continue this week. The city also plans to replace some existing streetlights with LED streetlights, which provide brighter and more efficient lighting.
“It may cost us a little bit more money, but we think it’s worth it to put the higher intensity lights in these high crime areas,” Bradley told me.
Councilman Angel Arroyo reported that 102 lights were out.
“Some of those poles had multiple ribbons,” Arroyo explained. “We were informed with those poles with multiple ribbons that that’s multiple years of those poles being out of service with the city still paying.”
Arroyo questioned whether Lorain would receive reimbursement or discounts from First Energy for years of payments on nonfunctioning streetlights. He also inquired whether the city would receive any cost savings on the new LED fixtures.
