Who’s Minding Switch? : Effort to Douse Lights Founders on Bureaucracy

Like the street lights in his Sepulveda neighborhood, Lester Fishman is burning--full time.

Fishman figures he’s made at least 14 phone calls to as many as seven different telephone numbers for nearly a month in an unsuccessful attempt to have somebody turn off the lights on streets around his home. The lights are on 24 hours a day.

“I’ve been calling for two or three weeks,” a frustrated Fishman said Thursday. “Each time I’d call one number they’d give me a different one. It’s well into the third week now and the lights are still on. Nobody seems to want to turn them off.”

Fishman, 60, who is retired, said he first noticed that the street lights around his home near Hayvenhurst Avenue and Nordhoff Street were burning during daylight hours about Dec. 13. He said he decided to report the problem immediately because he considers the continuously lighted bulbs a waste of money and energy.

Government Guide

Not knowing just where to call to report the burning lights, Fishman said he first consulted a government guide given to constituents by Rep. Howard L. Berman (D-Panorama City). He said he found the number 213-456-5661 listed under City of Los Angeles, Street Light Maintenance.

But when he tried that number, he said, he was given another number, the Department of Water and Power’s Valley office at 818-989-8393. Then, Fishman said, he was told to try 800-821-5279, a 24-hour number residents can call toll free to report electric trouble, and then, 213-481-4366, a DWP division downtown.

At one point, Fishman said, he was given 818-572-1212, the main number for the Southern California Edison Co. in Rosemead, which serves unincorporated county areas and many suburban Los Angeles County cities but has no connection with the City of Los Angeles.

“I even called Congressman Berman’s office,” Fishman said, “but nothing was done. I tried to call Councilman (Hal) Bernson’s office before the holidays. It’s either a case of negligence or that they (city workers) just don’t care. Someone at one of the numbers I called told me not to worry about the lights burning all day because they weren’t hurting anything.”

Fishman’s frustration at reaching the right person perhaps reflects the average citizen’s uncertainty about who does what in the city’s far-flung maintenance departments.

The Bureau of Street Maintenance in the city’s Public Works Department, 213-456-5661, is responsible for replacing burned out or damaged lights but the DWP 213-481-4366--maintains the street-light system itself.

Any malfunction in the system’s automatic switches is a water and power problem, a city worker at 213-481-4366 said, and is repaired by workers from the DWP’s Valley Division.

Michael Brodie, an assistant foreman in the Valley office 989-8393--said city authorities are aware of the street light situation in Sepulveda. However, he said, the department has other priorities to tend to before it can send the two “very experienced” workers needed to correct the problem--a burned out switch.

With 70,000 street lights to maintain in the Valley, Brodie said, the two or three available circuit crews have been busy repairing lights damaged in accidents and during the December storms.

“It’s a matter of priorities,” Brodie said. “It’s not that we don’t care about the money and energy being wasted. But our No. 1 priority has to be public safety and getting the lights that are off back on.”

No public safety problem is involved with street lights that burn both day and night, Brodie said. He said he does not know who in his department talked to Fishman or when the department would get around to repairing the burned-out switch.

Brodie said the department lacks the personnel to send someone to turn the lights on and off manually each day.

Fishman said he is not concerned about the DWP’s priorities.

“The point is that somebody’s got to pay for the power that’s being wasted,” he said. “Those lights are burning 12 hours longer every day. I don’t care if it’s costing me a few cents or a few dollars. It’s costing me something. If the switch is broken, they should hire someone to go and turn them on and off manually. I’m sure they could do that with the money that’s being wasted.”

DWP officials said they had no estimate of how much power is being used by the street lights.