HomeMy WebLinkAboutBC 2024-06-21Town of Dryden
Broadband Committee Meeting
Friday, June 21, 2024 – Via Zoom
Approved Minutes
Attendees
Graham Dobson – Broadband Committee
Tony Salerno – Broadband Committee
Jason Leifer – Town Board
Dan Lamb – Town Board
Tracy Monell – Gleamon Technology
Ryan Garrison – HUNT EAS
Kate Morseman – HUNT EAS
Andrew Hafner – Netegrity
Eric Beckhorn – Clarity Connect
Dave Makar – Executive Director
Amanda Anderson – Bookkeeper
Cassie Byrnes – Confidential Secretary to the Town Supervisor
Ray Burger – Planning Director
Chuck Bartosch – Point Broadband
Doug Schneider – Cortland Standard
Dave Makar called the meeting to order at 10:33am.
Introductions – Dave Makar
• This is the second committee meeting of the month of June, where we go over the numbers
for the month of May, a sneak peek into what is happening so far in June, and other
announcements and big things that are going on
Executive Summary – Dave Makar
• BIG ANNOUNCEMENT – On Friday, June 14th, 2024, U.S. Senators Chuck Schumer and Kirstin
Gillibrand announced that the towns of Dryden and Caroline were recipients of the New York
State ConnectALL Office Municipal Infrastructure Program’s first round of grants (this funding
was made possible by the American Rescue Plan Act of 2021)
o There were 5 or 6 projects that were approved in the first round
o This started in February, with an incredible amount of work being done to get it ready
by the Town of Dryden and by the team from HUNT Engineers
o Dave Makar believes the reason we were selected was because we combined our
efforts with the Town of Caroline, who has a huge number of unserved and
underserved locations, as does the Town of Dryden
o This combined effort, led by Dryden Fiber, includes the Town of Dryden and the Town
of Caroline, and is going to bring over 125 miles of new fiber to 2 towns and reach over
2,600 houses
o This grant runs through December 31, 2026 (30 months from now)
We must have spent all the money by this deadline, and done all the work to
put fiber in and bring it to all these new homes
o Jason Leifer thanked everyone who worked on this, as now at least half of our
construction costs are covered by grants, and it makes us able to pay everything off
much more quickly (reach the break-even point in half the time of our original
estimate)
o Dan Lamb said this is a result of us taking a number of initiatives going back 5 years:
The initial $25,000 investment in the feasibility study, Cornell studies, investing in our
ARPA money, getting the ARC grant, hiring Dave Makar, prevailing with the county to
carve out our town and allowing Caroline to join us, getting out there and getting the
service out there (we are serving customers now); This is all a credit to everybody on
this meeting; In 25 years, he’s never seen a grant this big go into a community our size,
and it’s certainly never happened in Tompkins County; For us to get $9M to do this is a
remarkable accomplishment; Thanks to this committee and all of us for doing this work
and being in this position
o Ryan Garrison said we felt good about this funding and that it was tailor-made for a
program like ours; Some of the work that has been in plan and is currently being
worked on overlaps with the grant, so we are going to be able to start submitting
reimbursements on installation costs as soon as the process allows us to (we can get
right into it)
o Dave Makar mentioned some of the factors that helped us:
Local control
Sustainability
Our smaller initial proposal
o Graham Dobson thanked everyone for doing the work involved and asked if we will
have a focus on making sure we get the installs done before the funding runs out
Dave Makar responded “Definitely… It’s multi-prong like we’re doing now,
where half of our efforts are all construction and building the network and the
other half is about installation (selling the network, providing customer service,
doing installations); Part of this grant funds the construction, but there is also a
part of the grant that funds installations”; We are meeting for our first meeting
with the engineering team from HUNT, as well as Town of Dryden, Dryden Fiber,
and Town of Caroline next Thursday to figure out what the Steering Committee
looks like and discuss our milestones and timeline
o Graham Dobson asked, “With this money, will we be able to hit every underserved
house in the Town of Dryden? And then how to we know and how do we measure that
we met that goal?”
o Dave Makar responded that the number of homes in the Executive Summary, 2,674, are
actual locations on tax maps (every parcel that we said we would hit as part of this
plan), so we will be able to check them off and work our way through
• Construction Updates
o Massive expansion coming in the next 30 to 60 days in the Village of Dryden and the
Village of Freeville, including the southeast corner of the Village of Dryden (Union
Street, James Street, Pleasant Street, and Lake Street will be available in the green zone
in the next 10 days); This will double the number of homes with access to Dryden Fiber
o We are now able to serve 292 parcels
o We have 44 paying customers and 10 in the queue for the month of June, so we should
be over 50 paying customers by the end of the month
• Dryden Fiber, Town of Dryden, Town of Caroline Kick-Off Celebration and Press Event
o Monday, June 24th at 12:00pm at Dryden Town Hall
o Open to the public and all are invited to come
• Project Highlights
o Dave Makar shared a map that shows a number of connections into the Town of
Caroline from the Town of Dryden; The red lines on the map are the proposed network
that comes south; We’ll be able to provide a more detailed map with all the dots and
addresses in the future
Team Reports for May
• Customer Base – Amanda Anderson
o There were credits issued for the outage; Our SLA says that if there is any outage over
14 hours, we issue a 50% credit to all customers at the time; We still billed the normal
amount, but all customers received a 50% credit on their June bill
o Net change from the prior month – We had 6 installations but lost 2 (one due to
Dryden Fiber not being fast enough for them, and the other because they moved)
o Dave Makar gave an update from NextDoor where a customer commented “Just
moved here in Freeville, and the street was already set up for Dryden Fiber. I’m only on
day one but 960 Mbps up and down so far when I checked, coming from
Comcast/Xfinity, where sub 100 Mbps when paying for 1200 was the norm. Dryden
Fiber is winning.”
• Construction Permitting as of June 1st – Ryan Garrison
o NYSDOT Permits – 21
One pending permit issued last month
4 pending either survey or drawing
o NYSEG: Total Pole Attachment Applications: 11, DRY001-DRY007, DRY009-DRY012, 52
miles
5 pending approvals from NYSEG
6 approved by NYSEG, DRY001-DRY005, 31 miles
5 “Bid NYSEG Pole Attachment Applications”, DRY001-DRY005, DRY005,
DRY006, 24 miles
Awarded NYSEG Pole Attachment Applications = Five, DRY001-DRY005, 18
miles
Electrical make-ready in construction = One, DRY003, 3.5 miles
Electrical make-ready complete = Zero
Telco moves/cable installation in progress = One, DRY002, 4.5 miles
Telco moves/cable installation complete = One, DRY001, 9 miles
• Construction Implementation Updates as of June 1st – Ryan Garrison
o No new parcels added this month, so 59 total parcels and 51 total households
o Total coverage is now 292 parcels and 470 approximate households
o Total parcels in the Town of Dryden is 5,839 and total households is 6,036
o Total coverage to date = 5.00% of parcels and 7.78% of households
o No new fiber in the month of June
o The redundant ring through Main Street and Ferguson Road still has not been spliced
through, as we are working through some issues on Ferguson Road
The north backbone (Main Street) has been completed and is currently live, and
has been patched in so that all pops are patched in the way they will be in the
ring
o Freeville is our big project right now, it’s 260 households (about 4% of Dryden)
The build-out is in progress; we mobilized our second splicing crew; projecting
Freeville to be complete at the end of next week
o Fiber installation in the Village of Dryden – they’ve got the southeast quadrant spliced
in, and looking to activate either today or Monday
• Installations – Tracy Monell
o 6 installations completed in May
o 10 installations pending (as of May 31st)
o Installation blockers: 1200 Dryden Road (now resolved) and 16 Bills Way
• Finance – Capital Project – Amanda Anderson
o We had a rebate from Graybar of over $7,000 that came in May
o We submitted back to Tompkins County for our grant (Tompkins County Recovery
Grant), and that check came in June, so we will see that on the next report
o The month of May was consistent in terms of expenses
• Finance – Operations – Amanda Anderson
o Similar to the prior month in terms of revenue and expenses
o Our revenues need increases, but we should see that in the future
o Accounts Receivable is down to $0
o Dave Makar said that it’s useful to note that our expenses are consistent from month to
month (no matter how many customers we have), so as we increase, it’s just going to
keep shrinking that profit deficit per month
• Sales Operations (as of June 1st) – Tracy Monell
o Believes the owner of Congers Trailer Park has agreed to go ahead with the Landlord
Agreement, and Cassie Byrnes has sent it out for signature and will let Tracy know when
it is fully executed, as there are 2 people in the park who want service
o Rental agreement for 1200 Dryden Road has been fully executed and is scheduled for
this week or early next week, where 2 tenants have signed up for service
o New facility (34 tenants) being built at 1061 Dryden Road; The fiber for the loop goes
right through the property; Property owners have been contacted and plan to put a
conduit in for us to reach their building
o Will meet with the owner of 1062 Dryden Road (21 units) next week to see how we can
get in there
o The Village of Dryden has 5 people ready to go, and once the word gets out, sign-ups
will explode
• Customer Service – Dave Makar
o 8 install orders came in that were accessible; Some outage calls came in (44 total, but
this isn’t 44 separate customers); 42 unrelated calls (partially due to the dryden.ny.us
website telling people who called to press a button that would direct them to Netegrity
when they were trying to reach other Town departments)
• Marketing (as of June 1st) – Dave Makar
o 44 under contract
o 429 requests year-to-date (20 more requests added in the month of May); of those
requests, 87 were available parcels, 342 were not available parcels; the percentage of
those who have requested service, who are now live, is 51%
o User count for drydenfiber.com for the month of May is 516 (our biggest month so far);
New users, Sessions, and Engagement all up (people are hanging out on the site
longer); Most popular page is the maps page, and then the registration form
o Chuck Bartosch offered to send Ryan Garrison an invite to the State’s monthly meeting
run by John Rigosa, which discusses pole permits; Everyone in the State that uses poles
are supposed to be on that call; John has a form that he uses to track how long things
are in the queue with pole owners and he can help put pressure on them to speed
things up
Dave Makar added that our biggest challenge hitting this deadline is around
permitting
The meeting adjourned at 11:31am.
Respectfully submitted,
Cassie Byrnes
Confidential Secretary to the Town Supervisor
DRYDEN FIBER
MID-MONTH REPORT
JUNE 2024
TOWN OF DRYDEN BROADBAND COMMITTEE MEETING
JUNE 21, 2024
EXECUTIVE SUMMARY
On Friday, June 14th, 2024, U.S. Senators Chuck Schumer and Kirsten Gillibrand announced
the towns of Dryden and Caroline were recipients of the New York State ConnectAll Office
Municipal Infrastructure Program’s first round of grants. This funding was made possible by the
federal American Rescue Plan Act of 2021.
The total for our project is an $8.9M grant and will help Dryden Fiber extend service to
unserved and underserved homes in both the towns of Dryden and Caroline. We will be
constructing 125 miles of new fiber optic line and will reach over 2,650 homes with this grant.
The grant runs through December 31, 2026 and we are ready to get to work.
Construction Updates:
o Massive Expansion coming in the next 30-60 days: Village of Dryden; Village of Freeville; this will
double the number of homes with access to Dryden Fiber
We are now able to serve 292 parcels
o We are now able to serve 421 households (apartments; mobile homes)
We have 44 paying customers
We have 10 customers in the installation queue for this month (June 2024)
Dryden Fiber,Town of Dryden,Town of Caroline
Kick-off Celebration and Press Event
Monday,June 24th
12pm
Dryden Town Hall
93 E.Main Street, Dryden, NY
Open to the Public, All Are Invited to Attend
Invited Guests Include:
US Senate Majority Leader Chuck Schumer, US Senator Kirsten
Gillibrand,NY Governor Kathy Hochul,NY State Senator Leah
Webb,NY State Assemblyperson Anna Kelles,Tompkins
County Legislature chair Dan Klein, Tompkins County Legislators Mike
Lane,Greg Mezey, and Lee Shurtleff
Project Highlights
Project Name:Dryden Fiber Expansion
for Towns of Dryden and Caroline
Applicant and Partner(s):Town of
Dryden dba, Dryden Fiber and Town of
Caroline
Construction Miles (Fiber): 124.6
Total Locations Served:2,674
ConnectALL Grant Amount:$ 8,995,979.00
Local Contribution:$ 906,321.00
Total Project Investment: $9,902,300.00
Team Reports
Customer Base – Amanda, Town of Dryden Bookkeeper
Construction Permitting Updates – Hunt Engineering
Construction Implementation Updates – Hunt,Syracuse Utilities,Lightspeed
Installations – Clarity Connect, Netegrity, Gleamon
Sales Operations – Gleamon
Finance – Amanda,Town of Dryden Bookkeeper
Customer Service - Netegrity
Marketing – Exec. Dir. Dave Makar
Customer Base
As of June 1st, 2024 (billing date is 1st of month)
Speed
Number
of
customers
Billed
Monthly
Revenue
Credits
Issued
Net Change from
Prior Month
Average
Monthly
Revenue
Residential
- Silver ($45)400 Mbps 32 $1,440 -607.50 +6 / -2
- Gold ($75)700 Mbps 4 $300 -150 No Change
- Platinum ($90)1 Gbps 2 $180 -90 No Change
38 $1,920 -847.50 $50.53
Commercial
- Silver ($75)400 Mbps 3 $195 -97.50 No Change
- Gold ($150)700 Mbps 2 $300 -150 No Change
- Platinum ($250)1 Gbps 1 $250 -125 No Change
6 $745 -372.50 $124.17
Total 44
Construction Permitting Updates
As of June 1st, 2024
NYDOT: Total Permits: 21
o 17 Issued Permits (+1 for this month)
o 0 Permits under review awaiting approval
o 4 Permits pending either drawings or survey
NYSEG: Total Pole Attachment Applications: 11 DRY001-DRY007, DRY009-DRY012, 52 miles.
o 5 Pending Approval (no change as of 6/1/24)
o 6 Approved NYSEG Pole Attachment Applications,DRY001-DRY006, 31 miles.(no change as of 6/1/24)
o 5 "Bid NYSEG Pole Attachment Applications", DRY001-DRY005 (Village of Freeville and Dryden), DRY005 & DRY006, 24 miles
total.(no change as of 6/1/24)
o Awarded NYSEG Pole Attachment Applications - Five,DRY001-DRY005,18 Miles. (Village of Freeville and Dryden). (+2 for this
month)
o Electrical make-ready in construction - One, DRY003, 3.5 miles.(North half of the Village of Dryden).(no change as of 6/1/24)
o Electrical make-ready Complete - Zero (-2 for this month)
o Telco moves / cable installation complete -One, DRY002, 4.5 miles.(Village of Dryden)
o Telco moves / cable installation complete -One,DRY001, 9 miles.(Village of Freeville, including overlash to Sims Hill Rd.) (+1 for this
month)
The redundant ring that connects Dryden's four equipment locations is being finalized by way of construction on
Main Street and Furguson Road in the Village of Dryden. The north backbone and the south backbone links at
these locations have been prioritized and splicing is scheduled for the week of April 29th.
Freeville (260 Households, 4%) buildout is in progress,fiber cable is 80% complete and splicing will begin in
May. This includes the overlash to Sims Hill Road.
Fiber installation in the Village of Dryden (772 Households, 13%) will begin in May and consists of 9 total miles
of fiber. Splicing will likely occur in June depending on progress made in Freeville.
Construction Implementation Updates
As of June 1st, 2024
Coverage Parcels Households
New (April 2024)+59 +51
Total w/ coverage 292 470 (est.)
Total 5,839 6,036
Coverage %5.00%7.78%
New Fiber Aerial Underground
New (April 2024)+10 miles +1.3 miles
Total XX miles XX miles
Construction Update
Route Name Status ECD Application#Notes
Village Buildout
North Backbone Complete 5/24/2024 Underground Cable installed 5/7, Lightspeed to
begin 5/20
South Backbone Starts 4/29 5/17/2024 DRY002 MR Complete, Strand complete,
Cabling this week.
Village of Freeville (Empire Overlash Inc.)Starts 4/8 7/1/2024 DRY001 Splicing in progress.
Village of Dryden Aerial Starts 5/6 7/14/2024 DRY002,003 Splicing in progress.
Village of Dryden Underground*Starts 6/1 9/1/2024 Underground Sub-divisions.
Phase 2 Expansion
Lower Creek Rd Bids received and awarded.60 Days DRY004 HRS is scheduled for electrical MR
construction in July.
Tompkins County Recovery Fund Bids received and awarded.60 Days DRY005, 006 HRS projects electrical MR
construction in July/August.
West Dryden Rd Pending NYSEG Approval of make ready
costs.
90 Days DRY007
Rt. 38 North Pending NYSEG Approval of make ready
costs.
90 Days DRY007
Peruville Rd Pending NYSEG Approval of make ready
costs.
90 Days DRY008
Fall Creek Rd/ Ed Hill Rd/Telco Design 120 Days DRY009
West Mallory Rd/ Morris Rd Telco Design 120 Days DRY009
North Rd/ Dutcher Rd Telco Design 120Days DRY010
Gulf Hill Rd./ Sweetland Rd Telco Design 120 Days DRY011
Rt. 366 (Freeville to Rt. 13)Pending NYSEG Approval of make ready
costs.
90 Days DRY012
Installations
As of June 1st, 2024 (billing date is 1st of month)
April Install Summary
o Number of installations completed this month:6
o Number of installations pending (as of May 31st):10
o Installation blockers / questions:0
Finance – Capital Project
As of May 31, 2024
Balance Sheet as of 5/31/2024 2024 Year to
Date
Total Project to
Date Project Budget
Assets
- Cash 1,307,514.59 Inflows 36,609.65 1,422,536.78
- Due from Grants 685,173.00 Expenses
Total Assets 1,992,687.59 Professional Fees 295,993.19 754,004.01
Incidental Const. Exp 2,577.11 68,868.21
Equipment Purchases 36,675.51 1,918,060.94
Liabilities and Equity Subcontractor Costs 162,271.69 2,584,857.95
- Bond Anticipation
Note
5,840,000.00 Pole and Permit Cost 266,220.65 837,187.05
Equity -3,847,312.41 Interest Payment 146,840.97 168,641.73
Total 1,992,687.59 Total Expenses 910,579.12 6,331,619.89 14,535,281.00
Budget Remaining 8,203,661.11 56.4%
Finance -Operations
As of May 31, 2024
May 2024 Year to Date
Residential 1,785.00 7,504.50
Balances as of 5/31/24 Commercial 700.00 4,060.00,
Accounts Receivable 0.00 Misc Fees -790.00
Accounts Payable 14,970.15 Total Revenue 2,485.00 12,354.50
Parcels Serviceable 5/31 292 Expenses
+ New Parcels added in May Credit Card Fees 179.68 662.05
Total Parcels available 5/31 292 Billing Program -2,320.92
*does not include MUDs Utilites 6,241.89 43,702.29
Total Addressed Served by 5/31 44 Subscriptions 8,405.39 38,965.57
Total Expenses 14,826.96 85,650.83
Profit/Deficit -12,341.96 -73,296.33
Sales Operations
As of June 1, 2024 (billing date is 1st of month)
Multi-Use Development – Sent documents to the owner of the Congers Mobile home
park. Still waiting for signed return.74 possibilities and 2 have made request already
Renters – were able to garner another landlord approval for 1200 Dryden Rd
Commercial Sales - 34 possibilities and all have been contacted. Reached out to
Mr.Lawliss regarding his new venture and he cannot wait for our service
Prospects-We have 5 new installs and 4 pending. Also 4 potentials that are not
responsive but we are still trying to reach out to them. Also had multiple contacts with
residents and village officials regarding lawn issues
TC3 – Had a very productive meeting with TC3 on April 23rd. They are interested in
partnering with us.Next step: Propose first phase for them (1 Gig vs. 10 Gig)
Customer Service
As of June 1st, 2024 (billing date is 1st of month)
Helpdesk Call Report May 2024
•Bandwidth Complaint (Speed Concerns)
•1
•Billing Related Call
•14
•Downed Drop (Damaged Service Line)
•0
•Email (Calls related to email difficulties)
•1
•No Connectivity
•4
•ONT / Power Cycle (Calls related to the
ONT where unplugging or rebooting
equipment was necessary)
•1
•Other / Unrelated (Calls looking for
unrelated departments or information)
•42
•Outage
•44
•Install Orders / Create Service
•8
•Router Issue
•0
•Sporadic Connection
•0
•Streaming Related Issue
•0
•User Error / Education
•3
•Wireless
•2
Sum: 120
Note:
Install Orders denote an
incoming install scheduling
request – not a completed install
One caller can generate
numerous tickets for a single
issue (i.e. calls in 5x for same
problem)
Marketing
As of June 1st, 2024 (billing date is 1st of month)
8/10 9/8 10/5 11/2 12/1 1/1/24 2/1/24 3/1/24 4/1/24 5/1/24 6/1/24
Under Contract 8 22 26 32 28 28 29
(+3, -
2)
32
(+3)
37
(+5)
40
(+3)
44
(+6,-2)
Requests YTD 150 174
(+11)
230
(+21)
252
(clean-
up)
274 (+9)298
(+24)
332
(+13)
363
(+31)
389
(+26)
409
(+20)
429
(+20)
Available 30 38 41 43 44**44 56 TBD TBD 75 87
Not Available 120 136 189 209 226 250 276 TBD TBD 340~342
Serviceable Live 76.7
%
76.3%80.5%83.7%72%63.6%51.8%TBD TBD 40/70 51%
(44/87)
Site Visits 8/25-9/7 9/22-10/4 10/21-11/2 11/17-11/30 12/1-12/31 1/1-1/31 2/1-
2/29
3/1-
3/31
4/1-
4/30
5/1-
5/31
Users N/A 226 193 161 140 320 484 392 403 368 516
New Users N/A 211 170 137 115 288 424 346 353 315 471
Sessions N/A 324 271 515 194 448 673 617 706 601 739
Engagement (secs.)N/A 0m 46s 1m 09s 1m 10s 42s 1m 7s 1m 6s 1m
30s
1m 6s 53 s 58 s
Appendix A
Background and Definitions
Permitting
NYSEG
Permitting Steps
Permitting
NYSDOT
Permitting Steps