Commissioners hear updates on broadband, jail space
Aug. 16—The Cass County Commissioners met on August 15 to discuss broadband, the Community Crossings Resurfacing Project funding, and housing jail inmates from Howard County.
The Cass County Sheriff's Office told the commissioners that 25 inmates from Howard County will be housed in the Cass County Jail due to space issues in the Howard County jail.
Matt Mavrick, director of information technology at the member-owned electric utility company Miami-Cass County REMC, told the commissioners that there were 17 new broadband installations in the county over the past month.
"We connected the new Waverly Fire Department to fiber," Mavrick said. "They were previously on our wireless solution. They receive fiber now, and we also back feed our fiber to other customers around there."
Mavrick said the company is working on installing fiber down Indiana State Road 16 and north of Deacon. He also mentioned efforts to install a fiber pole in the agribusiness park so fiber can be connected quickly and easily in the area.
Mavrick concluded his update by telling the commissioners that security cameras in France Park are installed and functional.
"Our guys have spent quite a bit of time out there making sure (Cass County Information Technology Director CJ Gilsinger) has them where he needs them," he said. "Overall, I think it's the best solution we came up with and it's working good."
Cass County Highway Department Supervisor Jeff Smith updated the commissioners on bids for the Community Crossings road resurfacing project.
"Our Community Crossings bids came in more favorably than we had feared after hearing the horror stories about all the price increases," he said. "The low bid was about $30,000 over the engineer's estimate and about $23,000 more than the maximum amount that we had planned to match, but we will be able to find the extra money."
Stout recommended that the commissioners choose the lowest bid of $1,356,095.20 from Central Paving, Inc. The commissioners voted to approve the bid.
