Todd Paris, Attorney and Candidate for Salisbury City Council
♦ Since the Summer of 2011 the Fibrant network has been out of violation with its Pole Attachment Agreement with Duke Energy due to the network being constructed out of compliance with the National Electric Safety Code. An assessment performed by Atlantic Engineering Group found over 1,000 issues with the network involving 663 poles and 842 attachments.
In a letter to the City of Salisbury documenting the issue, Duke Energy asked that the network be fixed by December 2013.
Instead, since 2011 the City of Salisbury has paid $198,000 in legal fees to the law firm Brooks Pierce related to this issue, including over $17,000 in the month of August 2015 alone. Also, it appears the invoices from the law firm were paid from the Salisbury-Rowan Utilities Water and sewer Fund and not the Fibrant Fund.
The fact that the City of Salisbury has determined it to be more economical to pay $198,000 in legal fees to defer this issue is a clear sign that fixing the over 1,000 issues with the network will not be a quick or cheap fix.
The fact that both the City of Salisbury and Duke Energy is aware that the network is out of compliance with the electric safety code and still allowed employees to work on the network for four years places both under liability for any incident that happens on the lines. In addition, Duke Energy could be fined by both State and Federal regulators.
Click to view the letter from Duke Power requesting that repairs be done:
Page 1 – https://app.box.com/s/drbz4tezdbwcomf33069rr1pxjwz8eha
Page 2 – https://app.box.com/s/hv1atz6an04sp1xe8nwjizagozrnq53r
Click to view a spreadsheet of the City of Salisbury’s legal bills to resolve code violations on Duke Energy’s utility poles: https://app.box.com/s/gbj0tiuprjd7f1i1s3joqfgow72juefo
See all the actual documents: https://www.dropbox.com/sh/1numzaq84zfvqsb/AAC2N8aThNpbBzMPEC08dYsDa?dl=0
