Charles City likely to phase out Public Access Network

By Travis Fischer, tkfischer@charlescitypress.com

The Charles City Council discussed the future, or lack thereof, for the city’s Public Access Network (PAN) during its workshop meeting on Wednesday, March 13.

The locally produced “Channel 4” was once the primary method of cablecasting public meetings, school performances, and other locally produced content for the community.

However, relying on increasingly defunct technology and being made largely redundant in the Internet Age has left PAN on a downward spiral to obsolescence.

The equipment for the channel was formerly housed and operated at the public school, which at one time used PAN as an educational opportunity for students. The district has since disassociated with the network after having to cut its own communications position.

After several months, the CastNet box that feeds the channel was eventually moved to the Chamber of Commerce building, where Community Development Director Mark Wicks maintained minimal operations cablecasting the Senior Center menu and local obituaries, both of which needed to be manually typed in.

The aging technology failed completely last November, but the missing information has resulted in only a single complaint from a person that used the service, Wicks said.

At the meeting, the council discussed whether investment should be made in re-establishing PAN or if it should be discontinued officially and completely.

Currently, maintaining the largely non-functional CastNet box is costing $50 per month to Main Street Charles City, which is reimbursed by the city with broadband funds. Bringing the technology up to date would be an expenditure of thousands of dollars, beginning with $1,300 in work on the building to install CAT6 line from the basement to the building’s router.

With such limited usage, the council found it difficult to justify the expense of keeping the network active.

“We’ve heard varying reasons to get rid of it,” said Mayor Dean Andrews. “I’ve heard very few reasons to keep it.”

The council takes no official actions at workshop meetings.

In other business, the council discussed a street closure request from Kayden Barnish, who is planning to host a truck show and would like to close off the 700 block of South Iowa Street for additional parking.

Barnish, a 16-year-old truck enthusiast, explained that he has organized the event with other pick-up truck owners over TikTok and is anticipating about 40 trucks to line up for the show.

“It’s a way for them to show their trucks,” said Barnish.

Barnish plans to start at 2 p.m. on Saturday, March 23, and has the support of his grandfather, who owns the businesses along the street for the show.

Police Chief Hugh Anderson recommended approving the request, foreseeing no problems with the street closure so long as everybody behaves.

“I’m cautiously optimistic and I appreciate young people taking the initiative and doing something in the community,” said Anderson.

The council also met with representatives from Sisson & Associates for a review of the city’s upcoming insurance renewal, reviewed a proposal from T.P. Anderson to renew the city’s contract for auditing services, and looked at making a formal agreement with Merrit Computers to handle the city’s IT needs.

Finally, City Administrator Steve Diers updated the council about ongoing negotiations for the renewal of a three-year water agreement for Valero. The city and Valero are negotiating a rate structure based on the potential for additional volume needed and increasing the cap on how much water the city will provide. The current cap is 1.3 million gallons per day or 420 million gallons per year.