Salisbury Schools Shopping for New Phone Service

Frustrated by an erratic, old phone system  that frequently shuts down and a , Salisbury Township School District is shopping around for better components and service.

William Brackett, director of maintenance and grounds, discussed new options with the Salisbury Township School Board at its meeting Monday night.  Phones went out of service at Salisbury Middle School earlier that day.

 Brackett said the biggest problem with the phones is the old-fashioned copper wires. He recommended replacing the copper wires with fiber optics because they are more reliable.

Bracket said the district should drop and move to another provider, such as Service Electric. The monthly costs would be similar, he said.

“If we get away from Verizon I believe it will eliminate 88 to 90 percent of our problems with the phones,” he said.

Brackett has been frustrated because he is not permitted to talk directly to Verizon officials, which provides the phone lines to the district’s five buildings. Instead he is required to deal only with Level 3 Communications, the Oklahoma City-based company with whom the district contracts to get phone service.

Brackett said the district’s phone problems are also caused by hardware that is “very old, very tired.”  Salisbury Middle School’s phones went down Monday because of the old hardware, he said.  A new phone system that uses voice over Internet, or VOIP, could have avoided the shutdown because it would find open lines, Brackett said.

He said new hardware from NEC, the district’s current provider, could cost between $140,000 and $150,000, or as much as $250,000 if they use a new company, he said.

The problem-plagued phone system shuts down frequently, each time preventing all incoming and outgoing calls. The system shut down for more than a month in 2010. The district has issued each school office a cell phone for emergencies.