TUCSON, Ariz. (KGUN) — About 25 years ago, residents near Palo Verde Road in Tucson were left in the dark. That’s when residents from the Mortimore neighborhood petitioned their neighbors for more lights.
“These are the street lights we got way back in 1998 and it really makes us feel much safer with all the lighting,” Oralia Duchene said as she pointed to the street lights above her.
She lives in the Mortimore neighborhood in Tucson and said they fund the street lights through their property tax.
After TEP installed them, she said crime went down.
“You could drive at night. It was more safer for the children, for us to be walking around also,” Duchene said.
The Mortimore neighborhood is just one of the neighborhoods the Pima County Board of Supervisors is considering for streetlight improvements. On Tuesday they unanimously agreed to set the budget ceiling for street light improvements in 21 neighborhoods.
The money going towards neighborhoods ranges from about $2,700 dollars all the way up to $40 thousand.
The Mortimore neighborhood would get over $30 thousand.
Duchene said even though she’d rather see the money go towards improving streets, she’d like to see streetlights on Alvernon Way near Los Niños School.
“We’d have homeless that hide behind the bushes and the trees around the perimeter so maybe that would discourage them,” she said.
The Board is also considering about $14 thousand for improvements in the Midvale Park neighborhood.
“It’s a great investment in neighborhoods,” Joseph Miller said.
He’s the president of the Midvale Park Neighborhood Association and said he’s hoping to see more lights on Drexel Road and Hadley Street.
“Areas where we have lights, crime is reduced and in areas where there is no lights, we still have a lot of problems,” Miller said.
He said some of those problems included car crashes, but street lights helped.
“We used to have a whole photo album of crashes along the areas but those areas really got more safe,” he said.
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Andrew Christiansen is a reporter for KGUN 9. Before joining the team, Andrew reported in Corpus Christi, Texas for KRIS6 News, Action 10 News and guest reported in Spanish for Telemundo Corpus Christi. Share your story ideas with Andrew by emailing andrew.christiansen@kgun9.com or by connecting on Facebook, or Twitter.
