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FiberNet Advisory Board Minutes 07-09-2013MINUTES FIBERNET MONTICELLO ADVISORY BOARD MEETING Tuesday, July 9, 2013 — 6 p.m. Boom Island Room, Monticello Community Center Present: Clint Herbst, Glen Posusta, Jon Morphew, Wayne Mayer, Dennis Sullivan Absent: None Others: Jeff O'Neill, Mark Pultusker 1. Call to Order Chair Clint Herbst called the meeting to order at 6:01 p.m. 2. Additions to Agenda No additions. 3. Approval of Meeting Minutes — April 9, 2013 WAYNE MAYERMOVED TO ACCEPT THE MEETING MINUTES FROM APRIL 9, 2013, AS PRESENTED. GLEN POSUSTA SECONDED THE MOTION. MOTION CARRIED 5 -0. 4. System updates a. Bond Restructuring Status Report — Jeff O'Neill updated FiberNet Advisory Board on the status. A Settlement was negotiated with bond trustee for $5.75 million to be distributed to all bondholders that participate in the class action settlement. Once settlement is completed, city would own FiberNet free and clear without any oversight from bondholders or trustees. Settlement is subject to court action before it is finalized. Lynn Dahl- Fleming asked what effect the settlement will have on the city's bond rating. It was noted that it should actually improve the city's credit and should have little effect on future bonds. Clint Herbst commented that there is more certainty of the city's position with the settlement. b. System Upgrades: Status Report on $200,000 disbursement - Mark Pultusker spoke about the disbursement of $200,000 allotted by Council several months ago. FiberNet is using these funds to upgrade and improve the system. One outcome of the improvements will be the ability to offer 1 GB of broadband. Glen Posusta asked who would use 1 GB and it was explained that the city and hospital could use that kind of speed for certain applications. Lynn Dahl- Fleming asked if this would be part of the economic development services provided by WSB. Jeff O'Neill indicated that they will be meeting with WSB to find ways to get the word out to the business community outside of FiberNet Advisory Board Minutes —July 9, 2013 Monticello. Jeff O'Neill noted that there are other communities in the United States that have fiber optic systems and are using their networks for business development. He is hoping that Monticello can enjoy a similar success at some time. Wayne Mayer brought up the idea of approaching Charter and TDS to discuss the possibility of forming a coalition for business development. Mark Pultusker commented on the lack of problems today when it stormed recently. He attributed that to the improvements to the system over the past months. Mark Pultusker is continuing to order other equipment under the $200,000 allotment which will provide more redundancy and backup. He is also looking at adding some cable channels but that may not happen until the fall. Mark Pultusker noted that he still has to order the advertising equipment, which will bring in additional revenues. C. Billing system conversion — Mark Pultusker reported that FiberNet is now several months into using the new billing system. In the conversion process, they found a number of errors in customer accounts and are working on getting those corrected. The next step with the new system will be integrating technician work orders via cell phones and tablets. Mark Pultusker showed a sample of the new bill that will replace the single page bill. Mark Pultusker will be using a vendor that will process the bill from an electronic file. Clint Herbst said he has talked to Mark Pultusker about adding some kind of advertising into the bill, maybe coupon offers. d. Gigabit Initiative for Fibernet 2.0 (see above) e. Minerva Middleware upgrade and what it means — Mark Pultusker talked about the internet display that customers can add to their video with the Minerva middleware (software). This allows customers to see the displays on android devices. Mark Pultusker explained that customers with phone service as well as TV can see phone calls on their TV. Whole house DVR is also available with separate set top boxes, which allows you to watch any recorded program from any TV in the house. Currently the $20 fee for this service is not charged. Dennis Sullivan asked about HD channels and how to get those to display in HD. Mark Pultusker acknowledged that they need to get customers educated on the features of the system. f. Added redundancy and diversity in equipment and backbone - (see above). Mark Pultusker also commented about the reduction in personnel to decrease the payroll expenditures. The remaining staff has been cross - trained in a number of areas and they meet each week as a group to share information. They are also writing up procedures based on actual situations. He is focusing on making the operational side of FiberNet at zero loss ratio in the next year. Mark Pultusker is looking at ways to increase revenues and is looking closely at charges for services outside of regular customer bills. FiberNet Advisory Board Minutes — July 9, 2013 Glen Posusta asked why FiberNet needs to wait until after Labor Day to start marketing their services to the public. Mark Pultusker explained that they are not ready yet to be inundated with customer inquiries. They also need to finish some of the upgrades and testing of the system. Wayne Mayer asked what the sales staff is doing if they don't have a marketing campaign. Jeff O'Neill noted that person is working with business customers and they don't have anyone focused on residential customers at this time. Mark Pultusker is not looking at competing with TDS and Charter in the same manner that they market. He wants to use some different methods for FiberNet marketing dollars. 5. Product and Service Development Update a. Co- location / Data Center - Mark Pultusker commented that one of his goals is to utilize the Head -end building as a data center in order to generate some revenue from that. Mark Pultusker explained the moving of the city's servers from city hall to the head -end took place last weekend and staff experienced no problems following the move except for one computer at the DMV office. Mark Pultusker talked about future plans to provide computer services for other businesses where FiberNet would provide the servers and equipment at the data center. For example, businesses could pay a monthly fee for use of the FiberNet equipment rather than purchase their own servers to be stored at the data center. b. Virtualization and what it means - (see data center above). C. Marketing and PR work with City intern — Mark Pultusker briefed the group on. the plan for implementing marketing after Labor Day. d. FTTH Communications Services update — Mark Pultusker talked about the status of work with FTTH Communications as a partnership which benefits both companies and shares assets. e. Potential Communication Tower — Mark Pultusker noted that the city is in the process of looking into the potential for constructing a communication tower. He noted that Council has authorized $2500 for a Phase 1 environmental assessment. More information will be provided after Mark Pultusker garners more details about the project. Lease agreements connected with the tower could generate revenue for FiberNet. f. Consideration of recommendation to City Council on establishing service agreements — Mark Pultusker talked about business accounts and the advantage to providing services through an agreement rather than month to month. Wayne Mayer asked what contract terms they would be looking at. Mark Pultusker said it would vary from 2 years and up. Mark Pultusker also stated they are trying to move as many customers as possible to electronic payments and e- billing. C': __...:__ .,...�;� -.,_ ,.. �...>..'. �.. >._.._... .. .:... :....:. ..:...� .._..,.,m._,.M„`.. _, ...v.. ,.. .._._. _m�A >„m ......:.: �..�.:.:ee._v_,�._.. ,.::. __..._..�.w ...�..r:,: ...�_...::..e.:r......._,..«.: .�.�...�..�..::'n ....::...._�.�.....e.: .,..�. . a..,._e.:: .,.v....,.._.'�.�:� »�."��.:�.`� z FiberNet Advisory Board Minutes —July 9, 2013 Clint Herbst suggested that current customers could remain month to month without a contract. New customers could be subject to a contract in the future. g. Subscriber Advisory Committee — Mark Pultusker explained that he has received feedback from staff related to customer requests about channels. It might be worthwhile looking at setting up an advisory committee to provide input for FiberNet content and services offerings. This would be a rotating committee consisting of different focus groups h. Digital signage update — Jeff O'Neill commented on the equipment that the city has invested in which provides digital feeds to various buildings in the city such as MCC, DMV and the Liquor Store. It took some time to get training completed and there is one MCC staff member that is doing the programming. It may be possible to provide this feed into the FiberNet video system. Mark Pultusker is planning to look into this further when they get the ad splicing equipment. 6. Update on New Channels (AMC, IFC, etc) Mark Pultusker talked about the channels they are looking at adding and mentioned that he has negotiated a number of the contracts which actually increased the number of channels in the line -up. Wayne Mayer asked about the HD channels and how that works using Channel 4 and 504 as an example. 7. Other Meeting date - discussed changing to bi- monthly or quarterly meetings. DENNIS SULLIVAN MOVED TO HAVE THE FIBERNET ADVISORY BOARD MEET ON A BI- MONTHLY AFTER THIS MEETING. GLEN POSUSTA SECONDED THE MOTION. MOTION CARRIED 5 -0. 8. Next Meeting The next meeting date will be September 10, 2013 under the new bi- monthly schedule. 9. Adjourn WAYNE MAYER MOVED TO ADJOURN THE MEETING AT 7:29 P.M. DENNIS SULLIVAN SECONDED THE MOTION. MOTION CARRIED 5 -0. Recorder: Catherine M. Shuman ,�,� Approved: November 13, 2013 Attest:, Administrator FiberNet Advisory Board Minutes —July 9, 2013