Sundre's mayor convinced his council colleagues to temporarily hold off on a decision to further direct administration regarding the pursuit of broadband until, among other reasons, the municipality's budget review process is wrapped up.
"I feel ó personally ó that it's a little early, for a number of reasons," said Mayor Terry Leslie during the Dec. 4 meeting, about proceeding to provide direction during the Dec. 11 meeting as had initially been planned.
The first reason being council had heard from two companies ó Axia and O-NET ó just before last week's regular meeting, which did not allow sufficient time for elected officials to further discuss those presentations. Secondly, council had lined up for this week two budget review meetings, he said.
"Three, we have not really had an opportunity to have any further contact with the community at all. So I propose for your consideration the following ideas," he said.
"We put off with an advertisement for the first week in January the opportunity for the chamber of commerce, the medical community and any interested people in the community to come in and have a conversation with council in some format," he said, suggesting scheduling in mid-January the decision to provide administration with direction on broadband.
With the floor open for discussion, Coun. Rob Wolfe felt there was no need to delay any further.
"Knowing the information that we've got on broadband, I think it's quite vast and we've been given all of that," said Wolfe, adding putting off the issue was unnecessary.
"We all have the information that we need."
However, Coun. Richard Warnock said he respectfully disagreed.
"The reason I do that is because this is a big decision. It wasn't made by the last council," said Warnock.
"There's debentures, there's huge borrowing on one side of the coin, and not on the other. We need to understand as council, and I need to understand as a councillor, that we can accept that debt liability and not burden our town for future infrastructure projects."
More work needs to be done, and since the project has been under discussion for the better part of two years, another month or two should not be a big deal, he said.
Coun. Todd Dalke said he to an extent agreed with his colleagues' positions.
"I don't know if putting out the consultation to the public is needed at the moment. They have been given all of the options," said Dalke, referring to the previous survey finished earlier this summer.
"We should certainly let them know that we are reviewing the two options, and maybe a short explanation of both options," he said about the choice between pursuing a publicly-owned network versus inviting a private interest.
Before going back to the community for additional input, the councillor was more concerned about ensuring the costs compiled by administration's studies are thorough and not about to change unexpectedly, "so that way we can review that information to make sure it's viable."
Coun. Paul Isaac said he would like to see a council host with financial staff a meeting at a larger venue to welcome hundreds of residents to debate the next five to 10 years of capital projects that are on the table, including the multi-million dollar wastewater facility upgrades.
Vic Pirie, director of finance and administration, said postponing the decision from Dec. 11 to some time in January would offer council additional time to consider during upcoming financial reviews the impact that pursuing broadband would have on the capital budget.
The mayor sought council's support in rescheduling the decision to provide administration with direction on broadband so the agendas for upcoming meetings could be adjusted to reflect that change, and his colleagues were not opposed to that course of action.
Council recently heard during a presentation by administrative staff at the Nov. 27 meeting that even accounting for maintenance and operational costs, publicly- owned broadband infrastructure would at conservative buy-in rates be profitable in about 10 years, generating an annual revenue stream of more than $100,000 for future councils. However, installing a community-owned network at an estimated cost of roughly $3 million would first require allocating additional funds to complete a detailed deployment plan at a cost of about $150,000.
Meanwhile, although the private option presents zero financial risk to the municipality, profits would be siphoned out of the community and be unavailable for future projects.
"Soon, your town council will be faced with the decision to either invite Axia to invest privately with no risk, or to move forward with the publicly-owned option which could generate community profits down the road," wrote Jon Allan, Sundre's economic development officer, in a public report.
"If council decides to pursue this option, it will first involve spending the requisite dollars to develop a detailed infrastructure deployment plan for a Town-owned network."
Administration was to provide any additional information requested by council during last night's meeting.
Visit www.sundre.com/broadband-fibre-optics.html for more information.
