To Our Morgan Hill Community,
As you know, yesterday, Morgan Hill experienced a massive outage that affected internet, cable TV, and phone services in our community. This was isolated to Morgan Hill and caused significant inconvenience for most and was devasting for many. We want to share what happened, how we responded and what, if anything, can be done to prevent future, similar events from happening.
What Caused the Outage
Yesterday’s outage was allegedly caused by a Spectrum fiber line that was inadvertently cut by one of Spectrum’s subcontractors. The City was not notified directly of this incident. City staff learned of this situation at the same time as the rest of our community.
Spectrum and Verizon’s services were both impacted by the fiber cut. Frontier also experienced an outage, but disruption to Frontier services was unrelated.
How the City Responded
Upon learning that there was an extensive outage impacting a majority of our community, the City’s Emergency Operations Center began working to identify the extent of the outage, address immediate communications, and solve other public safety challenges.
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9-1-1: All of the City’s 9-1-1 systems and equipment were intact and unaffected by yesterday's fiber cut. However, since we did not know the extent of the damage, there was a concern that VOIP and Verizon Wireless customers needing 9-1-1 services would be unable to dial out due to their service being affected. Because of this, the City’s Dispatch Supervisor immediately asked for 9-1-1 to be routed to Santa Clara County Communication. This change had not impact to the end user.
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Police: Police patrol teams were doubled and sent to highly visible and heavily traveled locations within the City. Patrol teams also checked on vulnerable facilities such as assisted living centers.
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Communication: The City sent out information through our many communication channels as we received it from Spectrum, knowing that many would not be able to access or receive, but hoping that those that did would be able to share accurate information with friends and neighbors.
What can be done to prevent future outages?
Despite what you may read on social media, the City of Morgan Hill does not and cannot regulate or contract with any providers of internet, phone, or cable TV services. The City has no control over which providers offer service to Morgan Hill or the infrastructure they provide. Cities including Morgan Hill are prevented by State and Federal law from regulating cable and internet services. Cable franchises are granted by the State, not the City.
The City has reached out to Spectrum and demanded that they provide Morgan Hill with redundancy of service. Additionally, we have reached out to the California Public Utilities Commission (CPUC), Robert Rivas, our State Assemblyman, and Senator John Laird asking that they also demand and require Spectrum to dramatically enhance the redundancy built into their system to reduce the scope, duration, and impact of future outages.
What can residents do?
Residents should also reach out to Spectrum, the CPUC, and our state representatives. We have crafted a letter for you to use available on the City website.
Email addresses for each is provided below for your convenience:
CPUC
Broadband Community Workshops
As was previously announced, the City was already planning a series of community workshops on the broadband issues in Morgan Hill. They have been scheduled for 7 p.m. on February 24, March 24, and April 28th. Details, including the link to these meetings will be shared in another email very soon. We hope you will join us.
