Torrington council approves fiber optic connection for faster communication

TORRINGTON >> With a grant helping pay for a majority of the final cost, the City Council approved a $37,725.72 contract with a Plainfield-based utilities construction company Monday to install a fiber optic connection in the city.

The council unanimously approved waiving the bid process to choose Sertex, LLC, to install a fiber optic connection fora cost of $37,725.72.

The city’s director of information technology, Gerry Crowley, said the pricing is based on the master agreement between Sertex and Capital Region Council of Governments, a collective council comprised of 37 municipal leaders in metro Hartford that work closely to share services and advocate for the represented municipalities.

The total amount approved included $250 for a membership fee to join CRCOG to ensure the deal was available for the city.

A majority of the contract’s costs are being paid by a $35,400 grant from the Regional Performance Incentive, which the city formally accepted in July. Torrington was one of more than 50 municipalities that collectively received $1.7 million in grant monies to help connect the city to the Nutmeg Network, a state-owned high-speed Internet connection offered to schools, libraries and emergency services in the state.

The remaining monetary portion of the contract ($2,325.72) is being paid by the IT Department’s Computer Fire account, which has roughly $10,000, Crowley said. Extra costs for poles and the membership fees increased the initial cost estimate, Crowley said.

While accepting the grant monies means the city must now join the Nutmeg Network by March 2015, Crowley said he was primarily interested in the grant because it will help the city establish a more reliable connection between City Hall on 140 Main St. and Fire Department headquarters on 111 Water St.

Crowley said the fiber optic connection will help increase the city’s bandwidth capacity tenfold.

“My main goal is to provide better infrastructure,” Crowley said. “By applying for the grant, we can get money to establish a city-owned network connection between these two facilities.”

The fiber optic connection isn’t necessarily improving Internet speeds, but is instead helping strengthen the city’s current connection between the two buildings. Higher bandwidth allows for faster communication, which would beneficial for situations like disaster recovery, Crowley said. The new connection will sit next to an existing connection there that’s serviced through AT&T, Crowley said.

The five-year contract with AT&T still has three years left, which means the city will have to continue paying $1,250 a month for the service even as they being to shift to the new fiber optic network.

City officials are hoping connecting the city to the Nutmeg Network will eventually result in cost-savings; the city currently pays $120 per month for Optimum Internet service, while the Nutmeg Network would cost $170 per month. However, Crowley said the latter’s prices are expected to decrease as more municipalities connect to its service.

The city will have to evaluate whether to keep its Optimum connection or switch over to the Nutmeg Network once the March 2015 deadline arrives, Crowley said. The Nutmeg Network offers added benefits including the potential for information and resource sharing for participating municipalities.

Sertex has also worked with municipalities including Bristol, Glastonbury and Vernon with their Internet infrastructure.

Torrington was one of six municipalities in Litchfield County who received a portion of the $1.7 million in grant money to connect to the Nutmeg Network. The others included Barkhamsted, Burlington, Goshen, Harwinton and Norfolk.

Reach Esteban L. Hernandez at 860-294-0158.

Correction: A previous version of this article misspelled “AT&T” as “AT&S”.