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FiberNet Advisory Board Minutes 07-06-2010MINUTES FIBERNET ADVISORY BOARD Tuesday, July 6, 2010 6:00 p.m. Present: Clint Herbst, Glen Posusta, Wayne Mayer, Wayne Nehrenz, Jon Morphew, Jeff O'Neill (non- voting), Don Patten (non- voting) Absent: none 1. Call to order The meeting was called to order by Clint Herbst at 6:07 p.m. at the FiberNet Office. 2. Additions to Agenda There were no additions. 3. Approval of Minutes - June 1, 2010 GLEN POSUSTA MOVED TO ACCEPT THE MINUTES AS CORRECTED. JON MORPHEW SECONDED THE MOTION. MOTION CARRIED 4 -0. (Wayne Mayer not in attendance until later.) 4. Review City/HBC Workshop — June 21 (content and conclusions) a. Contract review b. Financial reporting C. Lessons learned Jeff O'Neill summarized the workshop held on June 21 to discuss status of FiberNet in terms of business plan and accounting practices. The contract with HBC was reviewed to ensure that terms were favorable for both HBC and the City. The FNM business plan was looked at in terms of customer and construction expectations as well as assembling accounting data to provide proper accounting for those that need the information. Jeff explained some of the problems that Burlington VT has been experiencing and noted the difference in practices compared to the City. Jeff noted that the City accounts for the FNM business in transparent ways that should not produce the problems that Burlington has experienced. He also noted that the City received a good audit in terms of its accounting for FNM. Jeff explained that the City Finance Department will be working with HBC to provide data in a format that can be used by HBC for reporting and analysis. It is hoped to get the purchase order system in place before too long, which should be a help to FNM. 1 FiberNet Advisory Board Minutes —July 6, 2010 Jeff commented on the transition of marketing services from Megan Barnett to HBC. The City will be taking back some of the marketing activities, which should be more in line with the budget. Don Patten explained the work that HBC had done with Burlington and some of the ways that Monticello can learn from their problem areas. There was some discussion on business practices for FNM and how to handle responsiveness to complaints and service calls. Don requested input from the Advisory Board for the type of information that they would like to receive in monthly reports. It is hoped to have a report with the desired format by the September board meeting. Jeff suggested adding sales information to the report. Glen Posusta stated he thought this would be helpful to the Board. There was some concern expressed about knowledge of the products by the Sales Account Manager. 5. Construction Update A spreadsheet showing construction progress was handed out to board members. The construction contract is 51% completed. So far there have been no delays in construction or supplies. There are 4 construction boring crews, 4 splicing crews and 4 drop crews. Wayne Mayer asked about process for reporting problems out in the field, which Don Patten explained. Jeff O'Neill explained that the City altered the original plan by putting in drops to every premise that requested. This in turn has generated a lot of demand for service installations. An opportunity has been created and FNM has found a need to keep on top of operations to handle installs and services. Wayne Mayer asked about possibility of getting students from tech schools that could help with installs and service calls. Don explained that currently the process is working with about 4 installs per technician per day. The City is doing about 25 installs per day using 3 contract installers in addition to FNM staff. Don expressed some concern about adding too many outside contract installers as it becomes difficult to keep track of their work. They have added several temporary helpers to take care of miscellaneous tasks. 6. Customer and Services update Glen Posusta asked about the current billing stanis and whether that information could be provided to the Board each month. For example, reporting the number of residential and business customers broken out by the type of services (data, phone, cable) and comparing them to the business benchmarks for the year. Wayne Mayer asked Don Patten for a list of tariff services for phone. Clint Herbst suggested that the City start looking at the process of offering cellular service. Don noted that the City may eventually want to look at reselling wireless service, which does not create much profit, but does provide a necessary consumer service. He also noted the industry trend is to offer a minimum package amount in order to get incentives, with 2 FiberNet Advisory Board Minutes —July 6, 2010 those packages often requiring land line phone service. Clint brought up the possibility of partnering with a cellular company where the city would receive a fee in exchange for promoting their cell phone service. Don noted that the difficulty with that could be in the phone offers that go with cellular plans. Jon Morphew commented on his experience with a service call related to a problem with the router. He was impressed with the response on the 4th of July holiday when the router went out; the service tech did a great job. Don Patten gave an update on the status of the video service. They are in the process of working with MTV on the contract, which should be completed soon. Organizational Structure update Don Patten explained the handouts included in their packets. He has a status report for HBC outlining the various items that have been accomplished this year. He also included a description of the duties completed by various positions in FNM. a. Review Organizational Chart Matt Henning — Don Patten explained his request to update Matt's job description and pay to recognize the responsibilities of his position. He would like to have him made in charge of all the technical staff as Technical Services Supervisor. Don would also like to have a Business Service Center (BSC) internet technician to coordinate local service calls, with this person reporting to the Supervisor position. Thaddeus Rousu — is in charge of the Metaswitch (phone) product, with Matt serving as backup. Don would like his job description updated if needed. Wayne Mayer and Clint Herbst asked whether it would be better to add some more responsibilities to the BSC tech position rather than add too much on Matt's job description. Wayne Nehrenz suggested that some of the tasks for Matt could be identified as more supervisory in nature and spread the actual tasks among other positions. b. Recommendation to Personnel Committee (Action Requested) 1) Consideration of amending Lead Service Technical job description and associated points to Technical Services Supervisor position 2) Discuss filling the position 3) Discuss IT need and position Wayne M expressed his concern over creating a job description that will be difficult to adjust in the future. Jon Morphew asked for an explanation of whether 3 1 FiberNet Advisory Board Minutes —July 6, 2010 the tasks are actually being performed or were they put on the list to justify creating a new position. WAYNE NEHRENZ MOVED TO RECOMMEND TO THE PERSONNEL COMMITTEE TO RECLASSIFY THE POSITION TO SUPERVISORY AND NOT ADVERTISE FOR A NEW POSITION. WAYNE MAYER SECONDED THE MOTION. MOTION CARRIED 5 -0. C. On Call Policy discussion (Action Requested) Don Patten explained the handout related to the proposed on -call policy. Consensus of the Board is to table the discussion until the next meeting to give members a chance to review proposed policy. Don explained that essential service for phones is being on call 24 hours every day. The policy addresses on- call for emergency response in person. 8. Marketing update Don Patten discussed the current ad production and showed some of the ads including a postcard mailing and newspaper ads. FNM will be starting a "refer a friend" program for customer incentives. 9. Lawsuit update Jeff O'Neill noted that all data requests have been forwarded to Greene Espel for the current lawsuit and corresponding request for data. 10. Mayor /Council/Advisory Board Customer Contact Don Patten provided business cards for Advisory Board members to hand out to friends and business associates. He encouraged them to ask people to consider trying FiberNet services. 11. Approval of Expenditures JON MORPHEW MOVED TO APPROVE THE BILL REGISTER FOR FIBERNET MONTICELLO. GLEN POSUSTA SECONDED THE MOTION. MOTION CARRIED 5 -0. 12. Clint Herbst suggested that the Board consider changing the Advisory Board meeting to the Tuesday following the first Council meeting of the month. The Board would like a list of proposed dates to discuss at August meeting. 13. Jeff O'Neill talked about streaming the Council meetings on the Internet. Is this something that the Board would be willing to do? The Board is willing to give it a try but not stream until about a week after the meeting. 4 FiberNet Advisory Board Minutes —July 6, 2010 14. Adjournment WAYNE NEHRENZ MOVED TO ADJOURN THE MEETING AT 8:36 P.M. GLEN POSUSTA SECONDED THE MOTION. MOTION CARRIED 5 -0. Recorder: Catherine M. Shuman Approved: September 7, 2010 Attest: C' wistrator 5 1 FiberNet Advisory Board Minutes —July 6, 2010