The city of Presque Isle is seeking to save thousands of dollars a year by simply changing out the old street lights with new LED street lights very soon.

According to Martin Puckett, Deputy City Manager for Presque Isle, the city is looking at redoing the old street lights with new, LED street lights as the older lights use a higher amount of electricity, which costs the city annually about $170,000 to operate.

LED's use much less electricity, provide a better lighting source, which Puckett estimates will bring a 40 to 60-percent savings for Presque Isle.

Here's what the city must do first.

The first step of the conversion process is that the city needs to conduct an audit. This means you may see personnel with cameras on your street.

Cameron Spencer, Getty Images
Cameron Spencer, Getty Images
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Should you see crews in your neighborhood, or on main thoroughfares throughout the city, Puckett assures us that there is no need to be alarmed.

He explains,

"They'll actually go out to every street light in the whole community and start taking pictures, marking down with GPS, and seeing what type of light would best fit in each application. So, it's a heavy work input item to start this off."

They hope to get started sooner than later.

Puckett added that beginning in March of this year, the city is looking to send out crews who will take 3-4 weeks to survey the street lights by marking where they are located, what wattage the street lights use and what type of light they will replace the existing lights with.

How does the city plan to pay for the LED conversion?

Puckett said one of the options to make this project a reality will be a 'lease to own' agreement. He explains what that is.

"One option is a 'lease to own' agreement which is over the course of 10-years. We still get to reduce the price of street lights and at the end of 10-years, they are completely ours and no more payments except for electricity."

"The sooner we get this done, the savings start rolling in. We have to order the lights, we have to determine what type of lights we want. This does take awhile to order and get those from the manufacturer", he said.

 

 

 

 

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