KAUFMAN - Open Infra Fiber Internet company was back on the Kaufman County Commissioners Court agenda Tuesday. The company has been working in Kaufman County installing fiber internet infrastructure.
KAUFMAN - Open Infra Fiber Internet company was back on the Kaufman County Commissioners Court agenda Tuesday. The company has been working in Kaufman County installing fiber internet infrastructure.
Over the last two months, the Commissioners have had numerous discussions regarding Open Infra and their work in the county, including damage done to infrastructure in special utility districts (SUD) like Rose Hill.
On Tuesday, the Court adopted a Memorandum of Understanding that outlines the agreement between Open Infra and the County.
Chief Operating Officer at Open Infra, Kris Harrison, addressed the Court and expressed that the private company is bringing $40M of fiber optic infrastructure to rural areas. He acknowledged to the Court that there have been issues with the company's contractors regarding some of the work done to date.
The issue remains with invoices that need to be paid for damage done in the Rose Hill SUD. During the meeting, it was noted that five out of seven were paid, but two were outstanding.
Nanci Essary, the Rose Hill Special Utility District general manager between Kaufman and Terrell, stated that they are responsible since Open Infra did the work. Still, Open Infra says they must investigate to see who is ultimately accountable, sub-contractors or someone else.
Monique Hunter, Kaufman County’s Development Services Director, said the permits were granted to Open Infra, not anyone else. Commissioner Skeet Phillips added that since Open Infra hired the contractor, they are ultimately responsible for the damage their contractor caused.
“What she’s (Monique) trying to say is ‘you got the permit, you got the contractor, you pay,” said Phillips. “You can’t pass the buck just by hiring it away. If you take the permit out, you can’t pawn it off on different people.”
Moving forward, the agreement is that Open Infra can only do drilling once the locates have been done and permission has been granted. Then, before the fiber optic lines can be buried, the County Engineer must go out and review the work and ensure it meets standards. The timeline for completing the review will be at the discretion of the County and staff availability.
Each working crew with Open Infra will have a supervisor, and Kris Harrison expects that there will be five to six crews working at any given time. He plans to provide six to eight-week working plans for the work they are permitted to do.
After the meeting, Kris Harrison told inForney.com that Open Infra will follow all applicable rules and regulations, including 8-1-1, to ensure that work is done as efficiently and safely as possible.
“We follow all of the 8-1-1 and all of the legal requirements on locating, from the point of view of providing the locations where we are going to be drilling, when we are going to be drilling, etc.,” said Harrison. “Obviously, we will never drill without necessary permits and locates in place. Now, by all means, once you go underground, it is a bit more difficult if plans are slightly off to locate historic lines, it can be quite difficult.”
He says they will do what they can to mitigate potential damage and interruptions.
“We will mitigate as much as we can by doing what we call potholing to try and identify where these lines are, and we will make sure that the supervisors are on sight at any point in time with these construction crews to make sure they are following all the processes necessary.”
Harrison said that he can’t guarantee that accidents will never happen but that what is most important is how they react when it does. He’s confident that moving forward, this will be better managed.