Saugus officials upset over street light outages

SAUGUS – Town Meeting member Jean Bartolo said she?s been bothered lately by the amount of street lights she has noticed out around Saugus.So she and former Town Meeting member Rick Smith decided one night in late February to hop in the car and count for themselves. The result: 44 street lights out just along the main roads like Lincoln Avenue, Walnut Street and Main Street.?We did the main drags ? and sure enough we were dumbfounded,” said Bartolo. “We didn?t do the side streets, so if you?re going with what we did and got 44, I?d imagine it would be in the hundreds grand total.”Bartolo said she and Smith counted the lights just for fun, but once Department of Public Works Director Joe Attubato got a hold of the list, he made a call to Wilmington Wiring, a Wilmington-based electrical company contracted by the town three years ago to maintain all of the street lights in Saugus.Wilmington Wiring fixed the lights last week, but Attubato said he?s still not happy with the company.?Sometimes it can be very trying to get things done,” said Attubato. “They finally got done in the end, but it shouldn?t be where you get upset over it. We shouldn?t have to be going through this. Part of their job also is to come in quarterly and check the town at night to make sure everything is going OK. I don?t even know if that is being done.”Selectman Stephen Horlick has also taken issue with Wilmington Wiring, saying workers don?t respond promptly.?There?s some kind of logistics problem between making the call to the company and then getting the crews out to do it,” said Horlick. “They do a tour through the town every three or four months. To me that?s unacceptable. They should be going through this town every 30 days and seeing which street lights are out and making their own list to repair them. I?m happy it?s all done, but it was like pulling teeth.”When Wilmington Wiring completed the work, they sent the town invoices totaling more than $14,000, six times more than its usual monthly maintenance fee of $2,600.Horlick said he wants to review the contract, which expires in August, to see if the town is saving any money.?I?d like to sit down and see if we?re getting the best we can get for the residents of the town,” said Horlick. “If this company is actually saving us money ? as the previous Town Manager billed it ? I haven?t seen any reports generated in the last four years that this has saved us one dime. What is that savings, and why is it taking so long sometimes to get these lights done?”Matt Tempesta can be reached at [email protected].