DTE Reposses Highland Park Street Lights

[misstjohn1]

Watchin the news this morning and saw this story. Just wow.....

[Dexlin]

It's in the News, too. Yeah, wow was my first thought, too. How do you continue running a city when you're losing the most basic city services? With the continuous drop in property values, which even put strain on much larger communities with more taxable value, how in the world does Highland Park survive? It doesn't need another emergency financial manager, anymore. This isn't about misspent money; this is literally about there not being any money for city-wide lighting, anymore.

BTW, it kind of blows my mind that a city that was wealthy as Highland Park was at one time doesn't even own the light poles. The article makes mention that that is pretty unique. Some city leader way back dropped the ball. lol

[rjk]

http://detnews.com/article/20111011/...-Highland-Park

[Zacha341]

Goodness! Another reason to stay out of HP after dark! This is CRAZY! What is to become of this city?

http://detnews.com/article/20111011/...-Highland-Park

[1953]

Don't worry. The mayor says crime happens during the day, so fewer street lights won't be a problem [[ha!).

Its time for Highland Park to revert to Highland Park Twp. or to merge with either Detroit or Hamtramck.

1953

[cman710]

Its time for Highland Park to revert to Highland Park Twp. or to merge with either Detroit or Hamtramck.

1953

I had the same thought. If the city cannot provide the most basic city services, it needs to be combined with another city that can - not that Detroit does great in the services department, either.

[Trumpeteer]

[QUOTE=Dexlin;277360BTW, it kind of blows my mind that a city that was wealthy as Highland Park was at one time doesn't even own the light poles. The article makes mention that that is pretty unique. Some city leader way back dropped the ball. lol[/QUOTE]

It's actually very common for the utility to retain ownership of both pole and light and simply charge a fee for them plus a flat charge for energy used.

[Goose]

thye guy that turned in the cop asking for protection money might need more than a streetlight now...... but $650 every two weeks is steep... a window AC only cost around $300...

[Dexlin]

Political corruption is a sideshow, at best, though it makes for great scapegoating. Even the most liberal estimate would probably put the cost of corruption on a city to its revenues in the single digit percents. Highland Park's problems are far less sexy and far less a conspiracy. You've got a city that lost a larger percentage of its population over the last decade than Detroit [[33.3% of its population, to 25% of Detroits), and a city that had an official poverty rate of 38% in 2000 [[probably officially pushing 50%, now) and a median household income of about $18,000. If income tax was minimal, before, it must be nearly non-existent, now. Couple that with a city with low property values to begin with [[and can you imagine what the recession did to what little was left), and you could have the most competent treasurer and finance department in the state and it still wouldn't make HP a viable city. You've got much healthier cities with stablizied populations and property values, or at least those with lower digits losses, that have had a hard time budgeting. Try budgeting for a city losing a full 3% of its population every single year.

You look across the proverbial street to physically vibrant Hamtramck, and arguably better run, and it was staring receivership in the face just a few months ago even after its years-long state takeover.

Wouldn't it be so easy if we could boil down all of these fiscal emergencies to mismanagement and corruption? Fiscal mismanagement and corruption are problems, but we're lying to ourselves if we think these are the central things killing these cities. They aren't.

[Dexlin]

BTW, decided I'd actually go an look up the budget numbers for HP. The latest numbers are from the 2009-2010 fiscal year. It looks like total tax revenues were down a whopping 28% from the previous fiscal year, and that that was slightly offset by the fact that state revenue sharing to HP "only" declined 9% over the same period. Federal government revenue was down 76%, but surprisingly, federal government money makes up less than 1% of the total revenue coming into HP, that year. Overall, total revenue was down 11% from the previous year.

Expenditures wise, it seems for 2009-2010 HP spent a full 27% of its funds on debt service alone, and that was increased debt service spending from the previous year. That's nearly as much as spent on general government [[~29%). The third biggest expenditure was police and fire [[22%)

Overall, total revenues for that year were $14,392,016 [[down 11%) and total expenditures $16,896,951 [[down ~1.3%). The only thing that would make this more clear to me is where exactly does lighting count in all of this "general government" spending or the "other public works" category?

[sycloneman]

The only thing I don't get is that I have never heard of an energy provider coming out to remove poles, lights, etc. So am I to assume now that if I don't pay my electric bill and get shut off, DTE will run out and rip out the wiring to my house as well as the meter right off the side of my house? Just because services are shut off doesn't mean there won't be an ability to purchase said service in the future.

[Trumpeteer]

The only thing I don't get is that I have never heard of an energy provider coming out to remove poles, lights, etc. So am I to assume now that if I don't pay my electric bill and get shut off, DTE will run out and rip out the wiring to my house as well as the meter right off the side of my house? Just because services are shut off doesn't mean there won't be an ability to purchase said service in the future.

The poles have copper or aluminum wire in them that scrappers love. It's also impossible to determine which light isn't burning due to a simple blown fixture vs one that's cut for non-payment. For a home, running a service drop and placing a meter back into the meter can is not a difficult nor costly exercise. You pay the bill it doesn't happen.

[Detroitej72]

The only thing I don't get is that I have never heard of an energy provider coming out to remove poles, lights, etc.

In the article DTE said it didn't want the liability from leaving the poles up, therefore it was decided that removal was the best option.

[SWMAP]

DTE will cut your lines at the pole & possibly remove the meter. Meters get swapped out often in Detroit anyway, and put in other houses. Not sure of the value of that scam to the scanners, but it happens.
All is replaceable when the bill gets paid.

[sycloneman]

I stand corrected...lol thanks.

[DetroitPole]

Poor Highland Park. Street lighting is the first step toward public safety. I wonder what will become of this sad place. It makes Detroit look like a bustling metropolis.

Porch lights are a good point. We push very heavily in my neighborhood to have porchlights on. It makes a huge difference. However some blocks are nearly pitch dark. Almost always the rattiest homes, occupied by the front-porch grillers who like to make everyone listen to their bumpin' music and profound conversations. You just can't make some people care.

It is a poor substitute for streetlights, but the blocks of HP need to organize and push heavily to have people turn their porchlights on. Start knocking on doors. We do it. They can do.

[Islandman]

http://detnews.com/article/20111012/...g-streetlights

[Occurrence]

Yes. If it was in the commercial than it must be true. They wouldn't dare give the illusion that they care about people, would they?

[313WX]

Yes. If it was in the commercial than it must be true. They wouldn't dare give the illusion that they care about people, would they?

If it meant better PR for them then yes.

Better PR usually leads to bigger profits for them.

[Occurrence]

I don't know about that. Removing much needed streetlights in a deeply troubled and impoverished city such as Highland Park can't be good PR for the company.

I understand the whole "pay your bills" concept some people are spouting off here, but lighten up. Highland Park isn't that big of a city, let them have their lights. I'm sure whoever runs the company isn't starving.

[313WX]

I don't know about that. Removing much needed streetlights in a deeply troubled and impoverished city such as Highland Park can't be good PR for the company.

Well if they create enough of an illusion, as you say, that tehy care about people, then it can be.

The keyword there is illusion.

[detroitsgwenivere]

When I was contracted with DTE on the NESO Project [[Neighborhood Energy Savings Outreach), we made education the primary objective for reducing consumption of energy and saving people money on their utility bills. It was a relatively expensive project that hired certified weatherization specialists to assess homes for energy loss, install energy saving measures, and educate people about their energy bills. At one point, we had over 20 crews going into 7-8 homes a day in Detroit, Highland Park, and Hamtramck 4 days a week. We managed to perform evaluations in over 35,000 homes in less than one year. Was it intended for PR? Absolutely. Detroit and DTE has the worst rated relationship between a city populace and it's utility provider in the entire country.

This education was necessary to help people understand that, without changing their behavior, the CFL's and water saving devices we would install would not be enough to lower the bills in the long run. The cost of energy is not going to go down. As demand increases, as well as the need for new green infrastructure, so will the cost. You guys would be surprised just how uneducated most people are about consumption and what it takes to bring power to their homes.

One of my pet peeves was installing lightbulbs in porch, backdoor, and flood fixtures just for the very issues that this thread has brought up. In some neighborhoods where our program had heavy influence, especially ones whos utility poles never seem to have working lights, the difference in outdoor light production was visible immediately and the best part was it cost a fraction of what it would have had people used incandecent bulbs. Some people had lived in their house for years and had never had a bulb in their porch's perfectly working fixture.

I don't condone all of DTE's practices. Danny speaks some truth to his reference of their being a corporation, and it is indisputable that the nature of corporations is to make a profit, sometimes at the expense of the society they operate in. And I have serious gripes about their lack of investment and upgrade to Detroit's power infrastructure, considering how much we pay into it. But it seems to me that too many people [[and cities) feel that their energy usage is an entitlement, and make no connection to conserving and investing in long term energy- efficiency as a means to keep their bills down and the lights on. People who leave their lights on day and night and keep the heat on 80F in November tend to be the same people in city government who think DTE should just give away power for the greater good. They fail to realize that the power system still belongs to all of us, if we didn't pay for it it wouldn't exist, and when people don't pay for their usage, the rest of us do. Should they have taken away the poles in HP and turned off the streetlights? I wouldn't have, but I also choose not to vote for politicians who condone monopolizing and corporatizing our basic needs.

LEDs are expensive upfront, but they burn almost 80% less electricity than high pressure sodium bulbs and give off almost no heat, preventing several expensive fixture issues that plague the current ones. HP could have applied for a grant to pay for these lights years ago, but apparently this non-rocket-science type of logic is escaping the managers who run that city.

Hell, I'd fill out the paperwork for 'em.

[Dexlin]

Yeah, because porch lights illuminate sidewalks. lol These folks aren't living on some farm road. Anyway, as is typical Metro Detroit, this is literally a case of the last person out the door turning the lights off only, now, they won't even have to turn the lights out, themselves.

I got mine, now go get your own, indeed.

[Scottathew]

Yeah, because porch lights illuminate sidewalks.

My 20-watt CFL porchlight most certainly does. In fact, it even illuminates the street as well. My porch light combined with the porch lights of my neighbors keeps our neighborhood lit rather well.

If it's so cheap and not a big deal to provide this service, then Highland Park should just choose to raise their taxes to cover it.

Also, if we start forcing utilities to provide services for free, then who's going to be the next city, and the next city, and the next city until the point that your electric rates start going up.

Usage should be paid for by the people using it.

[Detroitnerd]

Usage should be paid for by the people using it.

I agree. I think it's outrageous that my tax dollars are paying for roads in the state of Michigan, 99 percent of which I DO NOT USE. Why should the costs of all these roads be stretched across all of these people who do not use them? I never go north of Mackinac, and seldom north of Saginaw. What the f*ck are my tax dollars doing paying for roads I will never, ever use? That's socialism, pure and simple!