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Electric Department
- TIMELINE for Electric Projects 3-2011 click here
Over a century later, the department is still at work. It purchases wholesale power from American Municipal Power INC to meet the city's peak demand of 42 million watt hours. The city also generates a portion of the city's peak demand energy at a historic hydroelectric dam on the Smith River (right).
The electric department always has at least one on-call crew prepared to respond to any emergencies. Customers with evening, weekend or holiday outages should call 276-403-5138 to report their utility emergency.
The department is under the daily direction of the Director of Utilities Dennis Bowles in concert with the City Manager.
Administrative offices are located in Suite 102 of the Martinsville Municipal Building. Call the department at 276-403-5183 or fax 276-403-5233 Molly Shelton, Administrative Office Assistant, handles clerical needs, accepts complaints and directs responses, records and compiles technical information, maintains records and files required reports.
The electric department will do free energy audits for citizen to look at ways to reduce their energy cost. For this free audit contact Molly Shelton at 276-403-5183.
Hydro at Smith River Dam on Rt. 220. This clean, reliable source of electric generation meets two percent of Martinsville's power needs and reduces the amount of peak power demand the city must purchase at wholesale. The staff maintains the dam and its surrounding environment, monitors flooding conditions, removes debris stuck on the dam and keeps state-required records.
The City Electric Department's operations division is located in the City Shop at 276-403-5183 or fax 276-403-5356. This division's line crews maintain the city's power grid, including transmission and distribution lines, install and maintain poles and transformers and oversee underground facilities. The department also furnishes and maintains streetlights and dusk-to-dawn lights. For reporting streetlights or dusk-to-dawn light outages contact Molly Shelton at 276-403-5183.
The electric department maintains and clears trees in the right-away. For tree complaints please contact Molly Shelton at 276-403-5183.
A substation/metering crew handles commercial and residential metering and handles customer meter complaints. The meter crew also monitors, controls & repairs substations and schedules and supervises hydro plant operations. The substation crew also operates the Supervisory Control and Data Acquisitions System (SCADA) which allows for control and monitoring of voltage level, current in each feeder, number of operations of the circuit breakers, the time the breaker operated, the status of protective relaying and many other features that help provide reliable electric service.
The Electric Department is an active a member of Blue Ridge Power Agency, Municipal Electric Power Association of Virginia and the American Public Power Association. Through these agencies the Electric Department has been actively participating in both Federal and State deregulation efforts.
Before you dig, please call Miss Utility: 1-800-552-7001, or in Virginia you may simply dial 811. For more information visit: http://www.missutilityofvirginia.com/
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To view rates for local customers click here:
Electric Utility Rate Schedule for Martinsville customers
If you are a new City resident and want to sign up for electric service contact: Utility Billing Office at 276-403-5146.
