Cleveland Public Power (also known as CPP) is a publicly owned

electricity generation Electricity generation is the process of generating electric power from sources of primary energy. For electric utility, utilities in the electric power industry, it is the stage prior to its Electricity delivery, delivery (Electric power transm ...

and

distribution Distribution may refer to: Mathematics *Distribution (mathematics), generalized functions used to formulate solutions of partial differential equations *Probability distribution, the probability of a particular value or value range of a varia ...

company in

Cleveland, Ohio Cleveland is a city in the U.S. state of Ohio and the county seat of Cuyahoga County, Ohio, Cuyahoga County. Located along the southern shore of Lake Erie, it is situated across the Canada–United States border, Canada–U.S. maritime border ...

. It was founded in 1907 by then-Cleveland mayor Tom L. Johnson. Prior to 1983, it was known as Municipal Light (or "Muny Light" for short). CPP does not have sufficient capacity to compete across the entire

Greater Cleveland The Cleveland metropolitan area, or Greater Cleveland as it is more commonly known, is the metropolitan area surrounding the city of Cleveland in Northeast Ohio, United States. According to the 2020 census results, the six-county Cleveland, OH ...

area. Rather, it is intended to create additional capacity and to create a benchmark price in order to prevent

price gouging Price gouging is the practice of increasing the prices of goods, services, or commodities to a level much higher than is considered reasonable or fair by some. This commonly applies to price increases of basic necessities after natural disaste ...

by local private utilities and prevent the private market from controlling the city's electricity supply for municipal services such as

streetlights A street light, light pole, lamp pole, lamppost, streetlamp, light standard, or lamp standard is a raised source of light on the edge of a road or path. Similar lights may be found on a railway platform. When urban electric power distribution b ...

and buildings. CPP also provides power to Cleveland Browns Stadium. In December 1978, Mayor

Dennis Kucinich Dennis John Kucinich ( ; October 8, 1946) is an American politician. Originally a Democratic Party (United States), Democrat, Kucinich served as U.S. Representative from Ohio's Ohio's 10th congressional district, 10th congressional district fro ...

refused to sell the company when a number of

bank A bank is a financial institution that accepts Deposit account, deposits from the public and creates a demand deposit while simultaneously making loans. Lending activities can be directly performed by the bank or indirectly through capital m ...

s, which were heavily invested in Muny Light's largest privately owned competitor, the Cleveland Electric Illuminating Company (better known as CEI or The Illuminating Company) refused to roll over the city's debt, as had previously been customary. This was seen as a bad move at the time; unable to pay its debts, the city became the first since the

Great Depression The Great Depression was a severe global economic downturn from 1929 to 1939. The period was characterized by high rates of unemployment and poverty, drastic reductions in industrial production and international trade, and widespread bank and ...

to enter default, which cost Kucinich his job in next year's mayoral election. However, Kucinich's decision was later vindicated by both city officials and the

U.S. Senate The United States Senate is a chamber of the bicameral United States Congress; it is the upper house, with the U.S. House of Representatives being the lower house. Together, the Senate and House have the authority under Article One of the ...

, which found that CEI and the banks had acted improperly. In December 2006, a new commissioner for CPP, Ivan Henderson, took over the reins from the incumbent James Majer. Under the new commissioner's leadership, CPP took over streetlight maintenance within the city from CEI.

References

External links

Cleveland Public Power
{{authority control Companies based in Cleveland Municipal electric utilities of the United States 1907 establishments in Ohio