The Fortville town council approved an exception to its wire burial ordinance for local telephone company Brightspeed to install aerial fiber cables, which would provide 10,459 of the company’s customers in northwestern Hancock County with faster internet service.
Brightspeed bought out the infrastructure in the area previously owned by CenturyLink, which had grown unresponsive to the needs and requests of the town, in October 2022. “Before [Brightspeed’s purchase of the infrastructure], we couldn’t get a hold of anybody,” town manager Joe Renner said.
Renner went on to say Brightspeed has been much more cooperative with Fortville since taking over those phone lines.
“I told [Brightspeed] what my concerns were about them putting more overhead in, so they came out and met with me,” Renner said. “We drove around and I took them to several locations for poles that were leaning, wires that were broken and hanging, and the next day they had crews out working on it. They’ve been very responsive.”
The measure would cut costs for Brightspeed in the installation of fiber cables in comparison to burying the wires, a process which council vice president Ryan Rummell noted would also prevent residents from having another company digging in their front yards after NineStar did so recently. The process wouldn’t add any additional poles, adding a small additional wire to the existing infrastructure. The company would tag all of its poles in the community, which police chief Patrick Bratton noted helps local police reach the scene more quickly if someone runs into a pole, as the tag would give police an immediate and exact location for the pole. Brightspeed would also replace any of its poles which are in disrepair during the wiring process.
The process would take at least 90 days to complete according to Brightspeed, but no major road closures would be necessary, with a bucket truck only needing to stay in front of a house for a short period of time to install the fiber equipment. It will cover 109 street miles and provide aerial fiber internet to 36% of Brightspeed’s customers in the area.
Brightspeed manager of government affairs and public policy Michelle Brzycki also noted that the installation in and around Fortville would allow the company to build more rural infrastructure and extend better internet coverage to county residents who currently do not have access to it, making progress toward “bridging the digital divide.”
Council member Vanessa Battaglia pushed back, saying the company hadn’t provided enough reason for the council to waive the wire burial ordinance, and Rummell agreed initially, saying that if the town was giving a concession in waiving the ordinance, the company should be giving a concession back, but after Brightspeed said they’d be replacing poles and reassurance from Renner on Brightspeed’s existing responsiveness to replacing dilapidated infrastructure, Rummell relented and motioned to waive the ordinance. Battaglia continued to push back, citing concerns such as animals chewing through the wire and fallen trees and limbs as additional reasons not to allow the waiver, but the rest of the council overrode her, approving the waiver in a 4-1 vote.
This was the first waiver requested, and, ultimately, the first waiver granted, since the wire burial ordinance was initially instituted in 2017, which town planning and building director Adam Zaklikowski said was initially adopted to begin phasing out the “unsightly wires” involved with overhead installation.
