Buffalo has 32,000 street lights. How many of them work? The city will know soon when a consultant reports.The city hired Troy & Banks last year after a review process. The contract requires the firm to check every single street light over the one-year length of the contract.
Buffalo Comptroller Mark Schroeder says that has been done and now the firm is trying to get information from National Grid before delivering the audit. The utility is in charge of street light maintenance and owns some of the poles and all of the actual lights.
Troy & Banks won't be paid directly, but rather will be paid from resulting city savings.
"This has been done before. The Common Council, in the 1990s, asked also for an audit. We've proceeded cautiously, but we've thought that this would be a very long, arduous, complicated audit," Schroeder told WBFO
The last time, the city received a rebate of $2 million and Schroeder says the current city budget anticipates similar savings this time. City Hall is concerned enough about dead street lights that it now has a smart phone app to report lights which don't work.
