St. Martinville – The St. Martinville City Council unanimously approved a motion at Monday’s council meeting to allow Optimum Cable and Internet Service to provide broadband internet service and fiber optic cable access for residents of the city.
The city would grant access to the company to use its utility poles, and some right of way access for underground cable in small areas on the north and south ends of the city under the proposal. About 90 percent of the service in the city would be via poles with 10 percent underground.
The plan is contingent on the city and company approving a small fee to be paid per pole that the company would use to provide cable and internet access to customers.
Mayor Jason Willis said the city was already working on a plan to set up a fee for companies such as AT&T and Cox Cable to use its poles for providing service to customers. The city has not been charging fees for such access to date.
Moyer said the company typically pays $5$10 per year, per pole it uses, to whoever owns the utility pole. In some cases that’s Cleco, or the city, in the case of St. Martinville, which owns the utility poles in the city limits.
City attorney Allan Durand will look over the proposed agreement, and work to make it standard with what the city plans to do for other companies using city poles.
Optimum plans to provide 1GB upload and download speeds for its high-speed fiber optic cable internet access customers, Moyer said.
Internet
“Our construction guys have already got the venders ready to go,” Moyer said. “So we’re pretty much at the point where we can start pulling permits. We’re at the final stage of our design. I would say if we can get this in a timely matter with a right-of-way agreement and a pole-attachment agreement, we’re ready to go.”
Willis, New Iberia Mayor Freddie DeCourt and St. Martin Parish President Pete Delcambre met with Optimum Cable representatives last week. St. Martinville would be the first city in the parish with the service, with the company planning to expand to other communities in the parish.
“We look forward to heavily investing in the community,” Moyer said.
Upcoming events
The city council discussed clarifying its policy on when security is required for outdoor recreational events on city property, at the request of Culture, Recreation and Tourism Director Danielle Fontenette.
Police Chief Ricky Martin would have to provide an assessment of how many security officers would be needed for events, the council decided, and the type of event would also factor in.
City ordinances consider any approved outdoor event to be a festival, so festival ordinances would apply but the city must enforce those.
A key factor would be whether alcohol is sold at the event, in which case security would be required as well as insurance by the event organizers.
The council asked her to look into the policies in Parks, Breaux Bridge and Henderson, then report back before the council makes a final policy decision.
The council approved three upcoming events for city parks, including:
• the Phillip “Poppa” Dauterive III Foundation’s Poppa Bash to be held at Magnolia Park Pavilion on Saturday, April 12, with the sale of alcohol granted to the organizers;
• DJ Pug’s 3rd Annual Easter Egg Hunt for children to be held Sunday, April 6, at the front end of Magnolia Park;
• and a Car Show and Spring-Q-nik barbecue picnic event to be held from 10 a.m.-6 p.m. on Saturday, April 19, at Adam Carlson Park, sponsored by the nonprofit Black Wallstreet group.
Nuisance property
The council heard from David Daspit about cleanup of property he owns on Seiber Road, granting a 30-day window for Daspit and his son to clean up 70 percent of the items on the property and to put the rest behind a privacy fence or in buildings — if the family gets proper permits for those buildings.
Daspit had spoken to the council at its previous meeting about the property and was updating the council on the plan to clean it up.
City Zoning Coordinator Otis Chatman updated the council with photos of the nuisance property and talked about the work that must be done to clean it up.
Utility tampering fee The council approved levying a $250 utility tampering fee for water, electrical or sewer service for first-time offenders and doubling that to the maximum of $500 for the next offense.
The city has an ordinance on the books to fine customers $200 for tampering with electrical meters or service, and voted to increase the fee and added water and sewer tampering to the ordinance.
In other business
In other business, the council approved the hiring of Jasper Savoy as a full-time meter reader. Savoy has been working part-time as a meterreader, but essentially working full-time hours, Willis said.
The mayor also discussed a clearance grant that the city is using to deal with 10 blighted properties.
The city had drawn up a list of 43 properties to seek action on originally, then cut that to 33 and then to 10 as federal and state regulations needed to be met to qualify for the grant.
The city will apply for another grant in May, the mayor said, and won’t have to meet the same requirements because the new federal administration has changed its rules.
The city also is in the process of replacing all of its outdoor lights to a brighter, more energy efficient fixture, and has received a grant to put a sidewalk in from St. Martinville Senior High, going through the Longfellow-Evangeline State Historic Site to Magnolia Park, Willis said.
