Streetlights can cost a city millions of dollars each year. Municipalities pay a set fee for each light to the utility responsible for them because the lights are not metered. But on any given day, cities aren't getting what they pay for because of lights that are out, which are repaired only when citizens report them. Two Northeast Ohio city council members are on separate missions to hold their utility accountable.
Akron Councilmember Phil Lombardo represents Ward 2, which includes the North Hill and Chapel Hill neighborhoods. On a recent summer evening, we drove through the streets of his ward looking for streetlight outages. A seven-page document was spread out on his lap.
“So, this is my latest list of streetlight outages," Lombardo said. "Now, remember, FirstEnergy said they're all fixed.”
Lombardo said he's been doing these late-night tours since 2019, the year he was first elected to city council. During his campaign that year, the owner of a pizzeria near his home asked if he could get Ohio Edison to fix the darkened streetlight outside the shop. He promised the future constituent he’d look into it.
“I got my pizza, and I was coming home and I'm like, hey. Hey. Up and down Tallmadge Avenue, there was 20 lights. And I turned right on Main Street, there was 25 more,” Lombardo said. “I said, oh brother, we got a project.”
Lombardo is an accountant.
“I know the total number of lights [in Ward 2]. It’s 2,632 or something like that,” he said.
His first survey found 410 non-working streetlights.
He said he usually goes out for 90 minutes a night. At that pace, it takes him seven to 10 nights to go down every street in his ward.
When Lombardo finds a non-working streetlight, he jots down the pole number, if it’s available, the street address and the nearest landmark or cross street, and reports the outages to Ohio Edison, one of Akron-based FirstEnergy’s three Northeast Ohio subsidiaries. He also ties a strip of pink painter’s tape around the pole.
Lombardo said he’s worked out an arrangement with utility crews, who take the ribbon off when the pole is fixed and hang it from the lamp. If, on another tour, he finds the streetlight is still out, he’ll add another ribbon.
We pulled up to a darkened streetlight in front of 965 Main St.
“See? Look, there’s two – three – there’s three there, see?”
He said he’s getting weary of doing this work.
“I’ve taken upon this project to do it. And I’m tired, I’m kind of tired. Like, I can go on to different projects, right? I have other things to do,” said Lombardo.
Whose job is it?
Investor-owned utilities like FirstEnergy used to monitor streetlight outages. Most of them now depend on people like Lombardo to report problems.
“It is more cost effective to have the community help us report these lights,” said Hannah Catlett, a spokesperson for FirstEnergy. “If we were to patrol, it would cost manpower and that in turn goes into rates. We are efforting providing electric service at the most affordable rates for our customers.”
FirstEnergy is currently asking the Public Utilities Commission of Ohio for a base rate increase that would provide about $93.6 million in additional revenue. Streetlights are included in the proposed tariff before the PUCO. A tariff is the document governing rates, fees and services.
Catlett said of the approximately 24,000 streetlights Ohio Edison maintains in Akron, crews repaired 3,920 in 2024. About 94% of those repairs were completed within five days of receiving the streetlight outage report, she said.
Non-working streetlights can pose safety problems for drivers and pedestrians, but they also waste taxpayers’ money. Municipalities pay a nonrefundable rate per streetlight whether it’s working or not. It’s written into the tariff.
To the average consumer, it may seem unfair to pay something for nothing. But Jim Lang, an attorney who co-chairs the energy and utilities practice at Calfee Halter & Griswold in Cleveland, said it’s standard practice for utilities, which have invested tens of millions of dollars on energy infrastructure and seek to recoup that money.
“The reason their tariff says that is the costs that they have for providing that streetlight don't change based on whether the light is turned on or whether the light is turned off,” Lang said. “It makes sense from an Ohio Edison point of view that they don’t reimburse for lamp outages because their costs are their costs and they have to recover their costs.”
But Lang said utilities must provide adequate service for those fees or risk getting sued by the PUCO. The Illuminating Company, another of FirstEnergy's Northeast Ohio subsidiaries, is currently under such scrutiny because of frequent residential outages in Lakewood.
Beyond Akron
Since October, the PUCO has fielded streetlight complaints from Akron, three Toledo suburbs and Warren in Trumbull County. Warren Councilmember Greg Greathouse, who represents Ward 3 on the city's northeast side, said he presented an Ohio Edison representative with a list of 331 non-working streetlights in the fall of 2024 after he and several colleagues conducted a citywide tour.
“Here’s the hell of it. We found three lights out in front of their service building on West Market Street,” he said.
Greathouse said at an average fee of $10 per streetlight, those 331 outages could have cost the city $33,000 a month, if they were all out for that length of time.
Greathouse has poured his frustration over streetlight outages into a lawsuit against Ohio Edison seeking $875 for non-working lights in his ward between January and May. In a court filing, Greathouse said his ward is not bound by Ohio Edison’s tariff because the utility cannot produce the foundational franchise agreement with the City of Warren. A magistrate denied Ohio Edison’s motion to dismiss and has proposed a hearing for October.
Greathouse said his chances of succeeding are “slim to none,” but he said it’s not really about the money. It’s about prompting Ohio Edison to take more responsibility for outages.
“Bring back the streetlight patrols. Police your own system. It worked for years and years and years,” he said.
Greathouse said he also wants Ohio Edison to send the city "an accurate bill," referencing another potential sticking point with the utility.
Warren is considering converting its streetlights to LED lamps to save money and meet the city's goal of cutting carbon emissions by 30% by 2030. It hired a consultant, Tanko Lighting, to conduct a feasibility study, which included a cross-check between the city's streetlight inventory and Ohio Edison's billing statements. Tanko found 472 discrepancies, including 155 duplicates, parking lot flood lights that don't appear to be the city's responsibility, and dozens of streetlights with lamps that have been missing for nearly 20 years.
Greathouse said the city's cost for those alleged discrepancies are "significant." He said the city is considering next steps.
Ohio Edison’s Hannah Catlett declined to comment on anything regarding its service in Warren, citing the lawsuit. But she said she understands Greathouse’s and Akron Councilmember Phil Lombardo’s concerns.
“We know that streetlights are important to communities. We will do our very best to address issues when those reports come in,” she said.
If you live in a city served by FirstEnergy, you can report a streetlight outage by calling 1-888-LIGHTS and saying “streetlight” after the greeting. You can also report the outage on the utility’s website.
