FPB Statement on Tanglewood Project: Process and Progress

In efforts to improve Cable-Telecom services, and to enable necessary repairs and upgrades at the 130 year old reservoir, The Directors of the Frankfort Plant Board made a decision to construct a new Cable-Telecom headend facility.

The headend facility is the central hub, or brains, of the cable-telecom operation. All Cable-Telecom services initiate from this location. Satellite receivers, connectors, fiber and other essential equipment supports the entire full service network line of business. These services all originate from this site.

Initial planning for this infrastructure project began in 2008, including a study, site evaluation and financial considerations, which led to the FPB Directors to make the decision stay on the same headend property where the facility had been located since 1952. FPB broke ground on the site in summer of 2014. The new facility was designed by GRW and construction began in May of 2015.

As construction continued, members of the Tanglewood Neighborhood Association (TNAi) expressed concerns about the facility. Multiple public meetings were held involving FPB, TNAi and the Frankfort City Commission, among others.

In June 2016, construction of the facility was completed. Since then, FPB has been fully engaged in an exhaustive effort to relocate all of the technology equipment from the old head end to the new head end, while keeping outages to a minimum. The majority of this work has been done on third shift, in an effort to minimize a noticeable disruption of service to our customers.

In August, the City Commission issued a list of requirements that FPB was to complete. The cost, feasibility and complexity of the requirements are still being investigated by FPB staff and GRW, among others.

While the FPB Directors ask for clarification on some of the City’s concerns, there is still active work being conducted at the site.

“Our staff, vendors and consultants are heavily involved in decommissioning the old head end. While we appreciate everyone’s desire to take action on the list of requirements presented by the City Commission, FPB must maintain reliable service. Finishing the transition from the old facility to the new one is Priority One. Once the decommissioning is complete, the transition is finalized and our Board gets clarification from the City, we will move forward on cosmetic changes to the project.” Said Herbbie Bannister, FPB General Manager.

Bannister continued, “We look forward to a resolution to this issue and will continue to make providing reliable services our main priority.”