Township, Comcast Spar Over Fiber Network

West Bloomfield Township officials are engaged in a fight over broadband with a local cable company, which officials say is interfering with the township’s emergency response system and other services.

Under a franchise agreement between the township and Comcast that expired Oct. 1, the cable company paid for part of the I-Net (Institutional Network) closed fiber optic system and equipment used for telecommunications between township offices.

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Now the cable company wants the township to either pay user fees or find another system, The Detroit News reports. The township can use the system free of charge through 2015.

The township has filed a lawsuit in Oakland County Circuit Court against Comcast of Colorado/Florida/Michigan/New Mexico/Pennsylvania/Washington to resolve the issue.

In it, the township maintains its previous cable company, MediaOne, offered to fund $400,000 of the costs in exchange for a franchise agreement, which was transferred to Comcast in 2000.

Comcast claims it has shown generosity toward the township by allowing it to use the network at no charge and has received benefits not extended to its other customers, and that the network was never handed over to the township.

The township says it’s illegal for the cable company to assume ownership partially paid for with public funds, and said there was never any agreement that the cable company would own I-Net. The township also says it has paid for upgrades and maintenance of the system, which it says is “imperative to public safety operations of the township and will impact the township’s budget which is currently being prepared for 2016.”

The township is seeking a preliminary and permanent injunction against Comcast, and wants Judge Daniel O’Brien, who has been assigned the case, to declare the company’s act A “wrongful conversion of township property.”

» Photo by Drew Streib / Flickr