(a) The department may own, lease, or lease-purchase in accordance with Chapters 2155, 2156, 2157, and 2158 any or all of the facilities or equipment necessary to provide telecommunications services. The department may acquire telecommunications services without competitive bid from the Lonestar Education and Research Network (LEARN) or its successors for the purposes established in Subsection (b).
(b) During an emergency, a single node failure or a systemwide failure of the consolidated telecommunications system, the department may divert telecommunications services traffic to the Lonestar Education and Research Network to avoid service interruption. Upon resolution of the emergency and upon determination that the consolidated telecommunications system is operational, traffic will be diverted back to the consolidated telecommunications system. The department may also use the Lonestar Education and Research Network for the purposes of latency tolerant data transfer of files to or from a consolidated state data center established and operated by the department. The Lonestar Education and Research Network shall be exclusively used by the department only for the purposes set out in this section.