ESSENTIAL energy has received a “please explain” from Armidale Dumaresq Council over its decision to stop paying for night lighting of the city’s key icons.
Subscribe now for unlimited access.
$0/
(min cost $0)
or signup to continue reading
Officers are compiling a report on the energy provider’s decision to introduce a user-pays system after an article in The Express.
“Council staff will be investigating with Essential Energy why the building owners are required to meet the cost of the public lighting from poles owned by Essential Energy,” a Council spokeswoman said yesterday.
Jim Maher said features such as the spire on St Mary and Joseph’s Cathedral, St Paul’s Presbyterian and Armidale District Baptist churches had been lit up at night since the 1960s.
“They have helped shape the identity of Armidale; their night illumination has been a community service,” Cr Maher said.
He told how the decision to light up the features at night was initially made by New England County Council chairman Ken Jones.
Over the years, the council dissolved into North Power, which became Country Eenergy and now, Essential Energy.
“At the time, the ratepayers paid for these community assets, such as the poles and wires,” Cr Maher said.
“But these have been lost over time.
“I believe Essential Energy has a duty to the ratepayers to continue to pay for the lighting of these assets.”
But Essential Energy disagreed and remains unmoved by latest moves from Council to reverse its decision.
Regional manager Ben Williams said the user-pays system remained the fairest way to invoice customers and the provider had not accepted new applications for night vision lights for several years.
“Essential Energy wrote to ... customers giving them the option of either paying the future operational costs associated with the service or cancelling it,” Mr Williams said.
One of those customers, St Mary and St Joseph’s cathedral administrator Richard Gleeson, has decided to cancel two of the three night lights illuminating the spire.
He told how he started receiving monthly bills, amounting to an average $77 for each light, “out of the blue” about a year ago.
An audit of the church’s accounts showed it could not pay for all three lights and would cut the lighting to just one illuminating the front of the spire.
