City of Sumner Deploys New Broadband Services to Operate During COVID-19

Many businesses and industries have pivoted their strategy during the pandemic, and the public sector is no exception. As we continue to deal with Covid-19 and work towards recovery, there is a silver lining of sorts as local cities turn to technology to find new ways to operate remotely and conduct everyday business.

One great example of this is the work of one city in Western Washington to create a new way to remotely operate during this pandemic so it could continue to conduct business and ultimately serve the people and businesses during ongoing stay-at-home order.

Following a swift transition to a remote workforce as the COVID-19 outbreak worsened, the City of Sumner soon realized its data connection — which had been suitable for day-to-day, in-office purposes — did not have the capacity to support voice calls and upload speed requirements with the majority of employees now connected from home.

The city of approximately 10,000 residents urgently needed to increase the capacity of its IT infrastructure to keep its workforce productive in order to serve the public. Through Comcast Business services, in just a few days SUmner upgraded the data connection, giving the city bandwidth it needed to meet its employees’ remote connectivity needs.

“We expected it would take several days to a week to get everything up and running for our new remote workforce, but Comcast Business pushed it through quickly without any snags,” said Brian Cunningham, IT manager for the City of Sumner. “This increased capacity more than satisfied our new requirements with a reliable connection. Our city staff is now able to work remotely while continuing to provide the citizens of Sumner with the same high level of service as before.”

Following the success of its recent upgrade, Sumner aspires to further enhance its connectivity infrastructure, with plans to install a Comcast Fiber connection to City Hall, once non-essential upgrades can take place.

With Comcast Business providing connectivity for its distributed workforce, the City of Sumner has stayed up and running through the pandemic. The mayor, city council members and staff experienced successful video-conference public meetings, including city council meetings, study sessions and planning commissions, allowing city employees to safely conduct municipal business without the health risk of coming to City Hall in person.

Residents, too, have benefited: With all requests and forms now web-based, the public can access the same city services and participation from the safety of their homes. Thanks to the boosted connection from Comcast, Sumner is able to continue to ensure people are getting the services and support they need at a time when it is more important than ever.

To learn more about Comcast Business services in Washington state, the areas we serve and the types of technology services we we provide visit https://business.comcast.com/local/washington.