Mastering telecommunications: Milpitas develops a master plan.

• Author: Quick, Cecilia M.
• Position: California - Includes related article on the finance office's perspective of the plan

On November 7, 1995, the city council of the City of Milpitas, California (population 62,000), adopted a long-range telecommunications master plan. It was the result of a year-long effort on the part of the city council, the city's telecommunications commission, staff, the community, and the city's consultants.

The plan is designed to serve as an instrument to guide the city through the confusing issues raised by the explosion in communication technology. It is composed of two parts: an internal plan covering the city's telephones, computers, and video equipment and an external plan covering the development of a fiber network to connect all major city facilities.

The plan contains policies and strategies for human resources, new infrastructure development, and upgrades to existing telephone and computer systems. The city anticipates that it can improve staff productivity and job satisfaction and improve the delivery of services to the public by implementing the recommendations regarding the city's internal operations.

In addition, by installing a private telephone system and creating a fiber link among city facilities, the city can create a "virtual building" for telephone and computer purposes. The city anticipates installing fiber optic cabling in existing traffic control conduits and installing additional conduits when the city opens trenches for public works projects to create the fiber link. Thus, the city will be able to build a self-contained network at a low cost. The city also will be able to protect itself from cost increases for voice, video, and data services; provide itself with full bandwidth for voice and video services; become largely independent of the cable and telephone industries; and significantly increase the functionality of its telephone and computer systems.

Finally, the plan recommends that the city exert greater control over its rights of way to rationalize the impact of repeated street excavations by competing telecommunications companies. It is recommended that the city impose a moratorium after each major street is cut. It is also recommended that the city determine the present value of the damage done by each street opening and assess that cost to the applicant for a permit. Further, it is recommended that the city recover the costs of city resources expended to supervise, inspect, and control street excavations.

Unanswered Questions

In 1993, the city was invited to be an early participant on the information super-highway when Pacific Bell approached the city about using it as the site of a video-dialtone trial. The trial was ultimately abandoned, but during the eight months of negotiations, the city came to realize that it had more questions than answers regarding the economic, social, and service impacts of the superhighway.

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