Kitchener councillor looks to give residents more clarity around streetlight outages

City of Kitchener Councillor Paul Singh is shining a light on an issue affecting people in his ward and across the city.

At a council meeting on Monday, Singh put forward a notice of motion that would have city staff engage with Enova Power Corp. to strengthen communication when streetlight power outages occur.

“This was a necessary impetus on my part where an area in the ward I represent, the entire street pretty much didn’t have streetlights operating for well over three weeks,” said Singh.

Singh wants city staff to work with Enova to ensure that when outages occur, residents are notified and that the timeline of when repairs may be completed be shared.

“There needs to be some improvement in how we communicate when there’s an outage,” said Singh. “We can’t stop an outage happening, these are sometime underground wires. Outages will happen. I think it’s more of how Enova partners with us to communicate to the residents what’s happened.”

Councillor Margaret Johnston noted that constituents in her ward were dealing with similar issues.

The balance of council supported Singh’s notice of motion.