When the Village of Hilton made its final payment for street lights on November 15 there were two reasons to celebrate. Not only is the Village now debt free, but a project that was 14 years in the making had finally come to fruition.
“I first began investigating the possibility of municipality-owned gas and electric (services) after attending a mayors conference in late 2000,” said Bill Carter, former Hilton mayor. The potential savings for village residents prompted Carter to contact RG&E about purchasing the street lights. At the time, taxpayers were paying $127,000 a year to RG&E for street lighting in the village. By purchasing the system taxpayers would save up to $50,000 annually in lighting tariff fees set by the state.
Tom Tilebein, Department of Public Works superintendent at the time, began looking into the steps involved. “It’s a big task having to separate from the grid,” he said. In addition to feasibility studies, Tilebein was in negotiations when RG&E split from Energy East. “It took two years for a new contract to be negotiated with RG&E,” said Tilebein.
In order to negotiate a fair contract, Tilebein had the tedious task of separating the system into “service parts” to ensure that he knew exactly what the village was being charged. “I had to educate myself on the tariff system,” he said. “Each component of the pole has a tariff and we already owned certain components.” So off he went with his paper and pencil to count every light and determine if, in fact, it would be cheaper for the village to own the lighting system.
“Our goal was to pay no more than $110,000 per year for the system and maintenance over the course of no more than 10 years,” said Carter. The village ended up going with a seven-year bond and was able to save enough over the course of the seven years to repay the bond.
“It took us seven to eight years to do the deal and another six months for RG&E to separate the system, but it’s definitely been worth it,” said Tilebein. “It’s something any municipality could do.”
Now that the bond is repaid, the cost of maintaining the 600 lights in the village is $25,000 per year. Savings could possibly be used for improvements to the system, such as LED lights, and for purchasing a bucket truck that could make maintenance, tree trimming, putting up banners and decorations, and repairs easier, according to Tilebein.
