The Paris Board of Public Utilities made a planned addition on Tuesday to protect its computer network and other systems in the event of a disaster in the city center.
The board unanimously approved a recommendation to accept the low offer of all Searcy Buildings of Union City as a contractor for a two -story building of 8,425 square meters.
The company offers $ 4.5 million, which is less than the initial construction advisions of 4.9 million US dollars from TLM Associates of Jackson.
Barger Construction of Union City and Henson Construction from Jackson also hired.
The building will take the property in the corner of East Washington and North Brewer Street next to the main office of the BPU in 117 E. Washington Street. The room is currently being used for customer parking spaces and a kiosk outdoors.
The new building will be a hardened structure approved by the Federal Administration Agency that can withstand an F-4 tornado. If the worst happen, the new room protects the servers, fiber optic network systems and other devices from the supply company and a command center to concentrate the efforts to restore the power failures after a severe disaster.
“The main goal of the construction project is to create a sustainable space in order to operate this utility in view of a catastrophe that could affect our current building,” said Terry Wimberley, President and CEO of BPU, during the meeting. “It's about being sustainable. It's about being here and being ready to serve as a utility.”
The new building has been discussing for more than a year, with the board of directors TLM approved as a designer at its meeting in July 2024. The offers were received on September 24th, with TLM checked before ultimately recommended the low bid. The BPU employees agreed to the recommendation.
The project was budgeted with USD 5.2 million, with $ 2.8 million from bond proceeds and USD 2.4 million from investment expenditure funds that were put aside.
While there are plans to bring the engineering department of the BPU into the new room, which released space in the existing headquarters Wimberley
described its main function as a reduction in hazard in the event of a disaster.
“We will have a protected space for all of our network servers and all of our fiber network systems, right?” he said. “These are the brains of our utility from a technological point of view, and that will be in the protected space. We will also have an operational command center for the restoration of storms that is available. And then we have space to fulfill emergency administrator functions if this building is compromised (and) we are building up there in an emergency.
“The space for growth in the future is part of it, but to put a structure that will be in the light of something that can come to us here, it is about being (more) ready to serve the community.”