Duquesne Light Riazzi Substation
in Schenley Park

The following letter was sent on June 4, 2020.

Tishekia Williams
Duquesne Light
Director, Regulatory Legal

Ms. Williams

Thank you for responding to my June 1 email titled: "Goodnight, Malnight. Time to Resign."

You now reference the project as the "Riazzi Substation Project." You dropped the Panther Hollow designation and we are grateful. However, you neglect to mention that the project is in Schenley Park.

We will continue to refer to it as the Duquesne Light Riazzi Substation in Schenley Park.

You stated, "Duquesne Light has been fully transparent with impacted stakeholders," but not all members of the Oakland Planning and Development Corporation (OPDC) Board of Directors and residents of Oakland agree with your assessment. We continue to be stonewalled in having our nine questions answered that were posed in the May 19 letter to Steven Malnight.

By copy of this letter, we are once again requesting District Attorney Stephen Zappala to investigate more deeply beneath the numerous red flags of moral corruption in Pittsburgh politics that were mentioned in the June 1 email. We are also requesting that the OPDC Board of Directors fulfill their important fiduciary duty to our community by providing legal assistance for these well-known issues that are impacting our community.

Carlino Giampolo

(Note: The references made above to the June 1 email, and the May 19 letter to Steven Malnight, are on Link 103.)

The following letter was sent on June 3, 2020.

Re: Riazzi Substation Project

Mr. Giampolo,

I am in receipt of the letter you sent to Mr. Steve Malnight regarding the Riazzi Substation Project. Your passion and commitment to the Panther Hollow community is obviously sincere and long standing. Thank you for sharing your perspective. Please know that Duquesne Light is equally committed to the communities it serves. The most important aspect of our commitment to the community is providing reasonable, reliable and affordable service to our customers. To honor that commitment, the Duquesne Light must make prudent investments in infrastructure to serve its customers.

The Riazzi Substation Project is an example of an important infrastructure project. Substations are key to providing resiliency and redundancy to the electric grid. They function as a ‘step down,’ converting higher voltage electricity from our transmission system to lower voltage electricity that can be used in homes and businesses through our distribution lines. The Riazzi Substation Project will allow Duquesne Light to support the increasing need for electricity in the Oakland area.

Duquesne Light has been fully transparent with impacted stakeholders and taken reasonable steps to mitigate concerns raised by the community. Duquesne Light held multiple community stakeholder meetings between October 2019 and January 2020 regarding the Riazzi Substation. Additionally, Duquesne Light solicited feedback from the community on the design of the façade, conducted a sound analysis to verify that the site would not exceed City standards for noise, and performed a shade analysis to verify that the site would not create shade on any adjacent residential properties. These actions are a few examples of the steps that Duquesne Light has taken to be a good neighbor and minimize community impacts.

While Duquesne Light is not required to seek advance approval to build the Riazzi Substation Project from the Pennsylvania Public Utility Commission (PA PUC), we did review the Project with PJM Interconnection, LLC (PJM) and the PJM stakeholders on March 27, 2018. This Project has been incorporated into PJM’s Regional Transmission Expansion Plan and will be constructed as planned.

I understand that you continue to have concerns about the Project. Please note that you have a right to contact the PA PUC if you are not satisfied with Duquesne Light’s response to this matter. The PA PUC can be reached at 1-800-692-7380.

Regards,

Tishekia E. Williams
Director, Regulatory Legal
Duquesne Light Company