The Fire Department may be reached by calling 508-881-2323, or you may use this email link** to send a streetlight maintenance request electronically.  

**When reporting a streetlight issue, please include the number of the pole that the streetlight is located on, or the nearest street address to the streetlight.  This will assist the contractor in locating the light.

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The Town of Ashland purchased our streetlights from NSTAR Electric on December 1, 2006.  Ownership of the streetlights has saved the Town more than $60,000 annually in charges that were paid to NSTAR for the same service.  This savings allowed the Town to keep streetlights at our current level (approximately 800 town wide) at a time when reducing the number of streetlights in order to cut costs was under consideration.  It also improved the response time for getting streetlights repaired.

Maintenance of the streetlights is performed by Republic ITS, who also provide streetlight maintenance services for several area communities including Framingham. 

Streetlight issues are reported to the Fire Department and logged by the dispatcher.  Calls are batched and sent to Republic for service calls.  Republic is in Town weekly to repair all calls logged within the past week.  Therefore, most repairs are made within a week of the call being reported.  If there are issues that go beyond the normal replacement of a bulb and/or photo cell, such as no power to the light which requires the assistance of NSTAR, the repair time may be increased by several weeks.  The Town is able to track the status of the repair through an online database, and we do audit the repairs that are made to ensure the work is being done.

Thank you for your input and assistance.  If you have any additional questions, please feel free to contact my office at 508-881-0100, ext. 618. 

Mark J. Purple

Assistant Town Manager/Finance Director