RBC | Commissioners held work sessions and had a regular meeting Tuesday, Jan. 26. Here’s what happened.
COUNTY ROAD 8 FIBER
County commissioners met with representatives of Cimarron Communications, Visionary Broadband and White River Electric Association during Tuesday’s work session to discuss a special fiber project on County Road 8.
According to local service providers, a resident on CR8 has inquired about getting fiber service to their property. Since the location is too far upriver to connect to existing county-owned fiber, the resident is seeking an agreement with WREA, who owns private fiber in the area.
The resident would install their own private fiber to connect to WREA’s upriver, which would then interface with county broadband infrastructure at a point closer to town. Keeping consistent with existing fiber service in RBC, neither the county nor WREA would act as the service provider to the resident and the responsibility would fall on one of the local private service providers.
Tuesday’s discussions mostly revolved around which entity would act as the point of contact for the resident in the event of an internet outage.
The county, WREA and local ISPs plan to hash out the specific details of such an arrangement at a future date.
COMMUNITY COUNTS
The board heard from Nita Smith, who shared an update on Community Counts Colorado 2020 activities. Smith noted efforts to keep operators and officials on the same page during the Pine Gulch fire and thanked the board for their continued support in 2021. The board commended Smith’s efforts, and commissioner Moyer described it as a “vital service.” Commissioner Ty Gates also commented on the value of CCC’s efforts in emergency management especially relating to fires.
APPOINTMENTS
Commissioners approved the RBC Fair Board amended bylaws, and tabled an appointment of fair board members until more interest could be drummed up for the positions. Other appointments included Dorothy Chappell and Commissioner Jeff Rector for the Services Block Grant Advisory Committee, Commissioner Gary Moyer as the board’s representative to the Yampa White Green River Basin Roundtable, Tod Gould to the Fairgrounds Board, Clint Chappell to the Planning Commission, and others to the Council on Aging and Rangely Library Boards.
The board of commissioners approved 2021 appointments for Todd Starr as County Attorney and Janae Stanworth as Budget and Finance Director. They voted unanimously against the reappointment of Dave Morlan as Road and Bridge Director (see story on PAGE 1A) and chose to table the appointment of Barbara Bofinger as Director of Human Services. They also approved wage increases for employees Mark Litzelman and Boyd Richardson.
MOUS, CONTRACTS AND AGREEMENTS
The board approved a contract not to exceed $20,500 with Visual Lease Services, Inc. for oil and gas property evaluation services and an agreement with Value West, Inc. not to exceed $24,720 for commercial reappraisal services. They then approved an agreement for services with Lance Coulter to provide independent contractor services as the Rio Blanco County Meeker Airport Manager, in an amount not to exceed $36,000 per year.
By LUCAS TURNER | [email protected]om
