(Note: Two documents mentioned below will be attached as soon as they are made available: The IRU Subcommittee's recommendation and the full text of the Community Benefit Agreement)

The UC2B Technical Committee and Policy Committee both met during the first week of May.  A summary of the two meetings can be found below.  There is only one UC2B meeting this week (May 9^th - 13^th).  

UC2B Marketing Subcommittee

Thursday, May 12^th, 12:00

Douglas Branch Library Meeting Room A/B

504 East Grove Street, Champaign

Technical Committee

The UC2B Technical Committee met on Tuesday May 3^rd in the City of Champaign’s Council Chambers.  The Main topics of discussion included:

• Fiber construction
• FTTP Electronics
• FTTP Construction
• OSS/BSS Software
• IRU Subcommittee

Fiber Construction

Craig Shonkwiler reported to the Technical Committee that things were beginning to come together for the ring construction to go to bid on the 12^th or the 13^th.  There are still details being worked out regarding the fiber design and language coordination between the construction projects for each of the organizational entities.  The final review was set for Monday May 9^th.

Fiber-to-the-Premises (FTTP) Electronics

The National Telecommunications and Information Administration (NTIA) officially approved the change of electronics from WDM-PON to Active Ethernet.  The change was necessary after an Active Ethernet solution won the bid to provide the service requested.  The final step in the process of having the electronics changed as a part of the grant purchase is approval from the Illinois Procurement Office.  Although it might be some time before this approval becomes official, there are no anticipated problems in obtaining approval.

FTTP Construction

Mike Smeltzer suggested that it is a possibility to bid the FTTP Construction portion of the project together with the management of the FTTP customers.  The Technical Committee requested that the Policy Committee put this on their agenda for the following meeting.  The Technical Committee will work on a list of pros and cons for bidding the projects together and separately.    

OSS/BSS Software

The Policy Committee has directed the Technical Committee to prepare the Request for Proposals (RFP) and evaluation criteria for Operational Support Systems and Business Support Systems (OSS/BSS) Software.  The most pressing need is the asset management system that will be used to input information during the infrastructure construction.  Mike Smeltzer is going to draft scoring criteria using the University’s template for discussion at the next Technical Committee meeting.

IRU Subcommittee

Bill Dejarnette handed out the most recent draft of the IRU Subcommittee’s recommendation for the Policy Committee.  The draft is attached below.  The goal of handing the document to the technical committee now is to bring fresh eyes to it.  The subcommittee can get feedback from the rest of the Technical Committee and include suggestions in their final draft.

Policy Committee

The UC2B Policy Committee (PC) met on Wednesday May 4^th in the Champaign City Council Chambers.  The main topics of discussion included:

• The Community Benefit Agreement
• Adding existing production class facilities to the UC2B network path
• The Timeline for hiring marketing Canvassers
• Meeting on a more regular basis

Community Benefit

Richard Schnuer and Abdul Alkalimat presented edited contract language to the existing draft of the Community Benefit Agreement.  The language below was adopted in section 5.

A majority of the advisory committee members will be chosen from the anchor institutions which service the underserved populations of the UC2B service area. 

The language was a small change adding the words “a majority of” to the beginning of the sentence above.  This language unanimously passed.  Although not quite as quickly or as easily as the original authors of the agreement hoped, they are ultimately pleased with the agreement that is in place.

Production Class Facilities

Richard Schnuer produced a memo regarding production class facilities that is attached titled “Access Facility Memo and Motion” regarding production class facilities.  After much lively discussion regarding the process of the Policy Committee being able to make changes to the existing construction plans, the Policy Committee decided to ask Mike Smeltzer and the Technical Committee to produce a document outlining the costs and options of adding such a facility to the network.

Canvassing and Meeting Frequency

Abdul Alkalimat was concerned that no progress was being made regarding the hiring of canvassers to market UC2B’s fiber to the home service.  John Kersh from the Marketing Subcommittee was asked to attend the Policy Committee meeting and provide a plan for the canvassing of the FTTP area.  To help speed up progress, Alkalimat believes it is in the best interest of the community for the PC to begin meeting weekly.  No decisions or motions were made to change the meeting frequency at this time, but it was added to the agenda for the next PC meeting.