High court: Utilities can be sued for dark streets (Florida)

[Judi Lynn]

High court: Utilities can be sued for dark streets

By JACKIE HALLIFAX
Associated Press Writer

TALLAHASSEE, Fla. --
The families of people hit by cars on dark streets can sue utility companies for failing to keep street lights working, the Florida Supreme Court ruled Thursday.

The 4-2 decision means the families of teens killed in Jacksonville and Miami can go back to court.

The parents of 16-year-old Albert Martinez sued Florida Power & Light after he was killed in November 1996 in Miami. Fourteen-year-old Dante Johnson was killed a year later in Jacksonville. His grandmother sued Clay Electric Cooperative. Both were hit while walking on dark streets. (snip)

(snip) Justices Raoul Cantero and Charles Wells dissented. (snip/)

http://www.heraldtribune.com/apps/pbcs.dll/article?AID=/20031218/APN/312180982

Note: Florida Supreme Court Justice Raul Cantero is the grandson of Cuban dicator Fulgencio Batista, and was appointed to the bench by Jeb Bush.

(There's a bit more to this article than could be revealed in the four short paragraphs. You might think it's an interesting developement.)

[kainah]

1. Wow! The courts have been on a roll this week

Several interesting court decisions this week, including the judge who threw out the Yellowstone snowmobiling rules that bushco tried to implement. The night before the season opened, the judge said they had to go back to Clinton-era rules. Now everyone's in an uproar. More on this story: http://www.polstate.com/archives/004749.html#004749

And the Padilla ruling and the Hinckley ruling... It's almost as if the courts are flexing a little muscle here, as the junta progresses. At least we can hope. Certainly I doubt the utility companies in Florida are very happy tonight!!

[LiberalFighter]

2. The cost?

"The cost of guaranteeing working street lights will inevitably be passed on to customers and utility companies will be less likely to new street lighting in rural areas, he warned in an opinion supported by Wells."

I wonder if the utility wasn't charging the full cost anyhow. Wouldn't street lights generally be paid for by the local government or other government agency that oversees the infrastructure? If so, wouldn't a contract be negogiated on a annual basis or longer? Possibly not even cost per kilowatt but cost per year. The city/county/state government would had contracted based on the lights being in use 100% of the time that it was needed with any normal shutdowns caused by weather or substation problems considered acceptable.

In today's technology, a utility should have the ability to know when power usage is below a certain level and should be investigated. In addition, if that particular area was as widely traveled as stated then there should had been a good chance that one of their employees would had noticed the problem while passing through conducting their regular business.

The utility probably knew about the "outage" and intentionally didn't do anything because they wanted to increase their profits.

[Occulus]

3. That sounds about right.

Especially when you factor in the fact that utility companies can and do measure the amount of electricity you use in your home. If there's a "suspicious" spike in usage- usually, the amount of power needed to run a grow lamp for so many hours, on a timer, so the spike happens at the same time each day- they can and do turn that information over to drug officers to investigate possible illegal; activity.

I heard about that years and years ago. There's NO excuse for them not having those streetlights fixed. Apparently, the court agreed.

[Occulus]

4. Double post.

Mods, please delete. Thanks!