HomeMy WebLinkAboutBbTF Minutes 04-21-2021 Attendees: Sally Greene(OC Commissioner)
Earl McKee(OC Commissioner)
Jim Northrup(OC CIO)
Vasu Kilaru (resident)
Paul Cardillo(resident)
Terri Buckner(resident)
Todd Broucksou (resident)
Pat Hull (resident)
Doug Noell (Chief IT Operations Officer Chapel Hill Carrboro City Schools)
Victoria Deaton (Compliance Specialist Office of Institutional Equity and Inclusion Durham Tech)
Jeff Sural (Director, NC Broadband Infrastructure Office)
Dr. Monique Felder(Superintendent,OC Schools)
Dr. Kathleen Dawson (Deputy Superintendent,OC Schools)
Laura Jensen (Clerk to the BOCC)
Travis Myren (Deputy County Manager)
Mark Johnson (maybe)
Broadband Task Force April 21,2021 @ 5:30 PM Meeting Agenda/Minutes
AGENDA
5:30 PM Welcomes and introductions-Greene/McKee
5:40 PM Catharine Rice—Broadband Matters
• https://ncheartsgigabit.com/board-of-directors/
• 1-min featuring Catherine illustrating the important difference between 10/1 Mbps
and Gigabit symmetrical service.
o https://www.loom.com/share/607560768b3142ac86a3ea49184dc2a6
6:00 PM Piedmont Electric(PEMC) Update Susan Cashion/Larry Hopkins General Update-questions and
answers
6:20 PM RiverStreet Communications Bill Shillito/Greg Coltrain-Introduction and What's going on
around us?-questions and answers.
6:40 PM Old Business/New Business/Housekeeping
• Action Register Grants Update
• Minutes/Notes approval
7:00 PM Adjourn
End Draft Agenda
Meeting Prep Links:
- https://www.dailytarheel.com/article/2021/04/city-digital-redlining-letter
- A Farm Bureau presentation—Jeff Sural is one of the presenters, and another one is a county
commissioner from Person County, Ray Jeffers,who talks about their positive experience with River
Street. If you just want to watch that part, start at about minute
45: https://www.facebook.com/northcarolinafarmbureau/videos/152360513402810/
This video is more detail on Person County. Person County leveraged the MCNC network running through
the county and were able to get two EMS towers through the VIPER program,and that serves double duty
for wireless Internet: https://vimeo.com/527982590
Meeting Notes:
Action Items:
- Discuss short/long term solutions+RFP at next meeting(All)
- Provide Task Force Charter to RiverStreet
- Viper expansion research (Travis)
- Determine what"next steps"should be before next meeting(Travis/Jim/Earl)
- Approve minutes from last meeting(4/21)at next meeting(All)
Discussion:
Catharine Rice—BACKGROUND(pulled info below from ncheartsgigabit.org because I couldn't hear well):
For more than a decade Catharine has been a broadband consultant serving North Carolina communities
in planning and deploying local broadband systems and closing the digital divide,focusing particularly on
those communities in the Research Triangle area and surrounding rural counties.
Highlights of Catharine's work include assisting Pinetops, N.C. in its 2017 legislative effort to keep gigabit
service(NC House Bill 396);contributing to the development, implementation and promotion of North
Carolina's first community-owned,fiber-to-the-home gigabit network in Wilson, N.C.;working with the
Town of Chapel Hill on piloting a free Wifi network to serve underprivileged public housing students with
no internet access at home, assisting Carrboro N.C. in its role as a participant in the Triangle's NCNGN
project and assisting in various broadband feasibility studies.
Catharine is known for organizing the NC fiber lunches,and co-founding NC Hearts Gigabits(previously
named CLIC-NC).She spearheaded a North Carolina grassroots effort that lobbied against NC House Bill
129 to defend local community authority to offer broadband services between 2007 and 2011.She is
currently the project director for the Coalition for Local Internet Choice(CLIC), president of the Virginia
Chapter of NATOA and at-large member and chair of the City of Alexandria,Virginia's IT Commission.
Catharine holds a master's degree from the Annenberg School of Communications and a B.A.from the
University of Michigan.
- Questions/comments:
o Commissioner McKee—how to proceed?; Catharine-Wireless is interim technology;fiber is
ultimate goal
o Terri—what are other counties doing about acquiring vertical assets; Catharine-using anything
they can get their hands on; Person Co is using ES towers;viper built 2 of 4 public safety towers;
took fiber to towers as well for backhaul;grain silos,any kind of towers
OpenBB-only able to serve 225;switched to CBRS which will be faster and penetrate trees 100mb down/20mb
up. On 2 county towers,and crown castle,want to get on ToH water tower,funding expansion on their own now;
OC situation is a lot like Person Co in that so much rural
PEMC: Susan/Larry—Background:
- in 2014 PEMC started looking at fiber so could connect their business/offices and substations;2016 or so
started putting in 144 fiber between facilities that went from H'boro to Roxboro and many substation in
between; 2017-2018 extended up through Person Co and into Granville Co;sub-leased fiber from MCNC;
phase 3 started in 2019 and finished in 2020 that formed big/couple of loops for PEMC for connectivity
and failover
- started looking at what could do to help membership; how to leverage all the bandwidth they have in the
air;Susan—160 miles of fiber(nearly all aerial but some underground—costs 2-2.5x to go underground);
30 miles is leased; put in 144 strand; all about doing what can to help community/members
- PEMC looked for partner that knowledgable about broadband—owned by members so required to be
fair/equitable;for-profit subsidiary—RiverStreet
o =>share philosophy regarding members; RiverStreet started as"fiber to the home" but had to
change focus to wireless(without forgetting fiber for long run); NC GREAT grant had 2 year
timeframe to meet requirements; members and non-members will be served
o RiverStreet has had some great successes—buildout of the towers in Person Co, RiverStreet is
building one tower; in June in Person Co, PEMC will be announcing service;Caswell Co another
success$1.5 million GREAT grant; 2918 accounts planned;CBRS—RiverStreet has secured a lot of
CBRS;
■ Q:Terri Buckner—how will service cost work;A:will be separate from PEMC and will
come from RiverStreet; have programs for homes that can't afford service;State is
making funding available
o RDOF is a disappointment—winners that didn't submit bids that included their costs but still
received funding and therefore locked out other vendors from federal funding; PEMC is trying to
address this with legislature
o Bill Schillito(scatter map)—RiverStreet=>PEMC fiber wouldn't go down to any members'
homes; PEMC fiber is used as backaul then RiverStreet takes over from there to provide service
■ PEMC/RiverStreet has a great partnership; Bill is fixed wireless expert;fixed wireless for
last mile; needs to be sustainable—be here for at least 5 years;when need for greater
speed comes about,technology needs to advance to meet need
■ Bill wants background of Task Force/Charter—how do we know when we're done?
• Jim-Task Force is time limited group working toward making
recommendation(s)to BOCC for how best to move forward. BOCC goal is to
extend service to as many county residents as possible.
• Greene-started with spirit of inquiry and exploration;COVID money available
to searching for all options and cost of each. Charge is to recommend a viable
and responsible option and provide the best service possible to the—5000
homes in unserved/underserved areas.
• McKee—best opportunity for funding for this is right now—strike while the
iron is hot! Possible movement on state level that will help this.
• Bill—is this an empowered committee?At what point will you know when
you're ready to propose a solution?
o Answer: NO;Jim—OC RFP is a possibility, money coming to states
from Federal govt may be for shovel ready projects;would likely draw
from Task Force group to participate in RFP process/responses;
o McKee/Greene could introduce an agenda item if needed;4 meetings
for background, 2-3 meetings for providers to present,then a couple
of meetings to decide on a solution to propose
o Bill—no one solution is the right solution; probably need hybrid
solution—is there a fiber plan cost in place?
■ $30-50 million; mixed solution along with mixed costs—
would need to put together a cost plan that includes all
technologies;
■ Catharine concerned that fixed wireless folks will be
forgotten which would continue the digital divide;think big
and try to get funding to achieve the best long term solution;
■ Jim—not a business model that will sustain the
unserved/underserved and make it a money making model,
prefers plan to shoot for fiber to every home as goal then
fixed wireless becomes backup rather than first;
■ Bill—America Recovery program ($28million for OQ who
owns it and maintains it will need to be wrestled with;
■ Cardillo—if we only focus on unserved/underserved 5000, is
it scalable to look at how to connect whole county with
fiber?
■ Jim—fiber is the only solution that will scale into the future,
at very least we'd need fiber close to the 5000 homes to
provide highspeed the last mile;start with fiber then work
with companies for partnership to go from there;
■ Cardillo—is it possible to get a wired or fiber solution to
everyone
■ Todd -is RiverStreet working with PEMC to determine what
solution will work in OC?; if Task Force decides that best
solution is something in northern OC,would
PEMC/RiverStreet share plans so we can understand their
plan so don't step on each others' infrastructure; unserved
are that way for a reason, expectation was that infra would
be built out but that never happened;capital costs of building
infrastructure will be required if goal is to reach
unserved/underserved; no reason to develop a plan if no
money for capital costs are part of the conversation;
• Greg—what is the county's desire to fulfill the goal of getting communities
connected; resources for broadband is being gobbled up quickly;tying up
resources, labor,etc; large fiber producers(Corning)are saying 6 months or
longer for fiber; help county build a county-wide plan -even areas already
being served just to see what county-wide build would cost;gives you a plan so
can know what costs are; build a fiber backbone,then connect to towers and
other vertical assets,or look at infrastructure methods for funding;4 licenses
for CBRS spectrum that can be utilized (can travel further and penetrate denser
foliage);
o Doug-$7.1 billion from eRate American Rescue Plan Act(only covers
devices not fiber); hybrid LTE solution (managed model)that could be
entertained;state office(BB Infra office)trying to formulate a plan for
how best to use funding coming down;
■ Terri—short term and long term needs; identify audience—
unserved/underserved first but could create inequities; some
areas where service is available but unaffordable
■ Jim—hotspots-are hotspots solving problems?
■ Doug economic problem because 1 year of service is
$350,000, since own hotspots,only useable if continue
service;
■ Catharine—1mb up is frustrating;short term solution;
■ Sally—Travis/Todd,viper option for vertical assets?CIP has
money for public safety—can we use money for getting on
existing viper tower? Have 1st responder upgrade-would be
viper expansion (4-6 new towers)—Travis, looking into this;
■ Todd—can OC use MCNC infrastructure,yes, but because it's
in southern OC and goes into Chapel Hill,won't help H'boro
any;
■ Bill-existing viper tower will be problematic getting state
permission to put equipment on existing towers—need to
plan for viper use before towers erected;
■ Greene—going to need to patch together a plan; layers of
things that can be done,comprehensive plan needs to be
drawn up
Closing:
Thank you to guests—hope to be able to work with all of you. Next Steps: Travis/Jim/Earl need to say what next
steps should be; have discussion between now and 2 weeks from now to even come up with a direction then have
committee to discuss amongst ourselves. Immediate next step is RFP(Jim)Jim—RFP, request plans from
providers; RFI instead of RFP—will force OC to ask questions;what problem are you trying to solve—fiber to every
home?
- RFP says we already know what we want and we want you to tell us how much it will cost?
- Catharine, RiverStreet and PEMC left the meeting(7:31).
- Terri—sat in on RFP last summer,OpenBB clear that couldn't meet the needs without vertical assets;sole
source for PEMC because only 1 of 2 respondents and only one that comes to the table with their own
vertical assets;fiber is long term solution,do we need to move quickly for long term or just the short
term? Need to move quickly for funding from Feds. Have until 2024 for$28million (many hands in the
pot for this);funding expected to be coming from the State to OC and announcement coming soon.
- Decision we need to make is RFP or RFI. Jim—can provide RFP and RFI for review by next meeting. RFP-
coverage for 5000 homes in next 6 months. Jim/Travis to review RFP to see if it's workable and if not,will
put something else together by early next week.
Adjourn—7:51pm