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WARREN -- City Councilman Greg Greathouse has been addressing Warren city street lighting issues since at least 2019 when he first won a seat on City Council.
Greathouse, who knows a bit about Ohio Edison because he worked for the company in the past, last week filed a complaint with the Public Utilities Commission of Ohio after trying unsuccessfully to resolve an issue regarding streetlights with Ohio Edison.
Greathouse explained that when Ohio Edison comes out to replace burned-out high-pressure sodium streetlight bulbs in Warren, it replaces them with LED lights. But despite there being lots of LED light bulbs being used in city streetlights, the bill the city pays still does not tell officials how many are of the lights are LED based, Greathouse said.
When asked which type of light costs the city more, Greathouse said he does not know.
"I want to know how much (the city) is paying," Greathouse said. "They have admitted there is an error."
He said when he asks Ohio Edison why the bill does not indicate how many of the city's streetlights are LED, he has been told "They are working on it."
He added, "You expect us to pay (the bill). You've admitted it's incorrect, and you have a problem. But you refuse, to date, to fix it," Greathouse said. "What are you charging us for these? We've asked 14 times in the last 30 days."
He said, "All we asked for is a correct bill. Show us on the bill where you are billing us for the new LEDs. They won't do it."
Greathouse said Warren officials proposed in the past to Ohio Edison buying and maintaining the city streetlighting system from Ohio Edison and converting the system to LED lights. The reason is because LED lights use two-thirds less energy than high-pressure sodium lights, Greathouse said.
The city can prove that the energy savings to the city will pay for the purchase price and conversion in five to eight years.
Greathouse said he is now "shopping around trying to find $4.5 million to accomplish that. Ohio Edison told the city, "'Our streetlights are not for sale,'" but Greathouse is not giving up. "It's going to be nine rounds of bareknuckle boxing before it's all over with," Greathouse said.
As for the complaint Greathouse filed with the PUCO, the process is to contact the PUCO by phone and make the complaint, he said. A PUCO representative passes it on to Ohio Edison, which responds to the PUCO, which relays the response back to Greathouse. No investigation takes place.
But if Greathouse is not satisfied with the response, he can file a formal complaint, which would be set for a hearing before an administrative law judge in Columbus, "and it gets real serious after that," Greathouse said.
Greathouse said that "years back," Ohio Edison said it could convert Warren’s streetlighting system to LEDs. Greathouse asked if that would result in a two-thirds reduction in the city's streetlighting bill, and he was told no.
"They said the bill goes up," Greathouse said. "I said, 'Who in the hell signs up for that?'”
Ohio Edison said it had not had a lot of success getting cities to sign up, Greathouse said.
When Greathouse was asked why the specific detail of how much of the bill is for LED lights matters, he said he thinks that would be a requirement of any public utility billing for its service, to provide a "true and accurate bill."
Greathouse provided a copy of the PUCO complaint to the Tribune Chronicle.
It states that Greathouse contacted the PUCO "regarding the billing for the new installation of LED lights by Ohio Edison. He states that since OE began repairing streetlights for the city, all new installations are LED lights and not high-pressure sodium lights that were previously used."
It continues, "He contacted (Ohio Edison) regarding the billing of the lights due to them not being identified as LED lights on the bills. He states he was told there is an error in the system and the correct billing could not be provided."
It states that Greathouse told the PUCO that "there are dozens, if not hundreds, of LED lights that have been installed in the city, and he would like the billing corrected to reflect the changes. He states that there are no LED lights being billed on the account currently."