SNOW HILL — Deciding that owning is sometimes better than renting, the Worcester County Commissioners voted this week to purchase a high speed fiber optic line that will connect the Government Center in Snow Hill with the Landfill and the Fire Training Center in Newark.
At $81,000, it’s not a cheap investment, but was deemed the more practical move as opposed to leasing a similar fiber optic network that would cost $11,242 annually.
The move to fiber optics started last fall when the Network Maryland Department of Information Technology (DoIT) approached Worcester with an offer to run fiber cable to connect several county facilities.
“There are significant advantages to this proposal which would provide continuous and reliable high speed network connectivity, from the Worcester County Government Center in Snow Hill to the Landfill and Fire Training Center in Newark. However, the annual fees of $11,242 proposed by DoIT seemed a bit excessive,” wrote Fred Webster, director of Emergency Services, in a memo to the commission.
Instead, Webster recommended that the county work with Maryland Broadband Cooperative, Inc. (MdBC) to extend their cable to the Government Center, Landfill and Fire Training Center and then have Worcester buy the line for just under $81,000.
“In summary, by owning our own cable, the county would recoup our initial investment after a little more than 7 years, as compared to the annual lease cost of more than $11,000 proposed by DoIT,” wrote Webster.
Brian Jones, the IT manager for Emergency Services, filled in the commission Tuesday on some of the specifics. The fiber optic line will be a huge boon to county operations, Jones explained, since the current arrangement is far less reliable.
“Right now we’re using Verizon wireless which, any problems that we’ve had with snow recently, they went down. We’ve lost connectivity with them,” he said.
While the deal to connect several Emergency Service facilities appealed to the commission, there were questions on why a similar offer was turned down by both the Board of Education and the Health Department. Jones replied that it was less the two agencies rejecting the deal and more of them falling into a “holding pattern.”
“They wanted to see how it went with us first,” he explained.
Similar to the investment needed to connect the county facilities with fiber optic, it wouldn’t be cheap to bring the Board of Education and Health Department into the fold. It would cost approximately $28,000 to connect the Health Department to fiber and roughly $31,000 to reach just the Worcester Technical High School.
Commissioner Judy Boggs wondered if there could be any future costs added to the $81,000 the county will be paying now for fiber services, specifically, the potential price tag for repairs.
“Is that factored into our costs?” she asked.
Jones confirmed that it was not taken into account but that repair costs down the road should be minor.
“Once we get the line in, there’s really no repairs needed,” he said, added that the only scenario likely to require repairs would involve the line accidently being severed by construction, which is rare.
Boggs also questioned where the funds for the project will come from. Money has been set aside for the extension of fiber optics service in Worcester, said Chief Administrative Officer Harold Higgins. There is enough funding to cover the arrangement with MdBC. The commission voted unanimously to purchase the fiber optic line.