By Susan Carroll

Review Writer

The Village of Lake Orion has 174 street lights: 31 high-pressure sodium and 143 mercury vapor. The village administration proposed, and the council approved, the conversion of these lights to LED.

The energy cost of LED is substantially lower than those currently used by the village, administrators said during Monday’s council meeting.

The project cost to replace all 174 lights is $52,133.

DTE’s energy-saving program will allow the village to deduct a labor cost of $8,866. This deduction applies only to the labor involved in the replacement of the mercury vapor lights. The total upfront cost to the village after the labor deduction is $43,247.00.

Upon completion of the project, the village will be issued a rebate of $4,996.74, bringing the final cost to $38,250.26.

Village Manager Joe Young said that there will be an annual energy savings of approximately $13,850.79. This provides a 36.2 percent return on investment and the payback from the lower energy charges would be 2.76 years.

Also at the meeting:

Lakeview Street

The council considered a motion to approve a Special Assessment roll covering all assessable properties benefiting from the improvements from the Lakeview Street drainage project.

The roll was prepared for the purpose of assessing a portion of the costs of construction to the 15 properties on Lakeview Street, allowing forward movement with the construction.

The project will rectify the storm water drainage/flooding issue on Lakeview Street, which has deteriorated the roadway surface.

The village has deemed that the best fix without an outfall to the lake (running water directly into Lake Orion through pipe) is to install an improved system which includes removal of the two existing basins in the middle of Lakeview and install four infiltration basins interconnected with perforated/trench wrapped PVC pipe.

The properties receiving the benefit of the improvement will be accessed a portion of the cost of the construction, resulting in an assessment of $23,441 of the total cost of $52,600.

The original motion failed, and a new motion was made to recalculate the footage being accessed to 258 Lakeview from 90 feet of frontage to approximately 45 feet.

A second public hearing is set for May 29.

Paint Creek Trailways

The council approved the license agreement for the Paint Creek Trailways and approved the Paint Creek Interlocal Agreement between Orion Township and the Village of Lake Orion.

Carport for police vehicles

The village approved a budget amendment of $14,350 to construct a carport for police vehicles.

The five-vehicle metal flat roof car port will be constructed in the parking lot at 21 East Church St., where the units are currently parked. The carport would shield the police vehicles from snow and ice and the summer heat, which would increase the life expectancy of the vehicle and the computer equipment, village officials said.

Chief Jerry Narsh commented that the response time would increase as the officers would not have to clean the cars of ice and snow, “and could possibly prohibit a timely dispatch to a situation such as a child not breathing.”

Sign Ordinance Passes

The village will now have a new sign ordinance that establishes guidelines for signs in the village. Sign standards for measurement, illumination, construction, maintenance, legibility, design and prohibited signs have been clarified. Copies of the ordinance are available in the clerk’s office at village hall.