Longmont, Colorado, kept its eye on the prize. City leaders' vision, to bring high-speed connectivity to residents, businesses, schools, libraries, and government facilities began many years ago and the community faced multiple challenges. Citizens knocked down legislative barriers through referendum, fought corporate misinformation campaigns, and contended with tough economic times. Throughout the ordeal, community leaders held fast and now the vision is becoming a reality.

Current Mayor Dennis Combs inherited the project but he understands what the vision will bring to the community. In a recent article in the Boulder County Business Report, Combs focuses on economic development, education, and lifestyle as primary driving factors and says:

These are just a few reasons why it’s important for Longmont to realize its vision of being a connected city. If the city moves forward and deploys this network, it will join a number of elite communities around the country where citizens can work, learn, and live using the latest technologies available.

After ample opportunity to invest in the network Longmont residents and businesses asked for, Comcast chose to spend significant resources repeatedly trying to block a municipal network.

Fortunately, Combs and previous leadership took action to fix the lack of connectivity rather wait forever for two providers that did not want to invest in the community. Longmont's vision would never be this close to reality without leaders and citizens who chose a path of local self-reliance.

Bartow, Florida, located in Polk County near the center of the state, is considering a FTTH network for the community's 17,000 residents. At a recent City Commission meeting, members decided to put city administrators on task and develop a plan to eventually offer triple play services to residents.

Suzie Schottelkotte reported on the initiative for The Ledger.com, quoting Mayor Leo Longworth, who commented, "I think the residents are ready for it and it's something that's needed."

The City has an existing 100 mile fiber network and offers connections to some local businesses. Government and schools also use the network. At the meeting, city commissioners heard from a fiber optic consulting firm that estimated an expansion to households at $3.3 million for capital costs and $2.5 million to run the network during the startup years until the network breaks even. 

Comcast now serves the community through its cable television franchise agreement and is a source of constituent discontent:

"Without discrediting anybody, we just don't have the quality," [Mayor Longworth] said.

The Polk County Democrat also covered the discussion. Steve Steiner referred to the Mayor's comments about the private sector:

[Mayor] Long reminded commissioners that they as well as city staffers and the general public present, are familiar with the problems experienced with the current broadband provider. Long also expressed the doubt another provider would be willing to come to Bartow to install and upgrade the current system in place. The number of businesses and the size of the population does not provide any true incentive.

The Florida Cable Telecommunications Association (lobbyists for the cable industry) responded to the initiative in a predictable fashion. From the Ledger article:

"Before the city fathers take the taxpayers' money and move in this direction, they had better understand what they're getting into," he said. "It's going to be a long time before they're making money. How long do they want to lose money? — that's the real...

Glasgow was a true pioneer in community owned broadband networks, starting with its own cable plant in the 1980s. Billy Ray, CEO of Glasgow Electric Plant Board, has been an inspiration for municipal broadband networks -- one can't dig into the early history of LUS Fiber in Louisiana without running into something from Billy Ray, for instance. Glasgow's network has been a tremendous success, resulting in tens of millions of dollars of benefits to the community.

In our interview, we discuss the bitter legal fights of the early years as Glasgow built its own cable network and eventually began offering Internet access. Additionally, we discuss the important role of these information networks in creating more efficient (and less costly) electrical systems -- an incredibly important implication that does not get enough coverage.

Given the extraordinary history of Billy Ray and Glasgow EPB, we hope this will be the first of several conversations exploring that community. You can read more from Billy Ray on his blog.

Read the transcript from our call here. Also, we created a video on Glasgow called The Birth of Community Broadband.

We want your feedback and suggestions for the show - please e-mail us or leave a comment below. Also, feel free to suggest other guests, topics, or questions you want us to address.

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Thanks to mojo monkeys for the music, licensed using Creative Commons.

This post comes to us from Patrick Lucey of the Open Technology Institute at the New America Foundation. The post was originally published there, but we are excited to feature it here as well.

Last month my colleagues and I at the the Open Technology Institute released a paper titled “Capping the Nation’s Broadband Future?” The paper examines data caps, an increasingly common practice where internet service providers charge individuals a fee if they exceed a monthly threshold on the data they use. The paper discusses how data caps are not a solution to network congestion concerns, nor a reflection of increased costs due to more people being online. A review of public financial documents for Comcast shows their broadband network operating are decreasing. Other costs, like bandwidth transit, are decreasing as well. Instead, data caps are a reflection of a lack of competition in both the home and wireless broadband market. 

As if to hammer home the larger point about a lack of competition, a few days after releasing the paper I received the following flyer in my mailbox. It is a promo piece from a joint marketing agreement between Comcast and Verizon Wireless where they promote each others’ services. Signing up for Verizon Wireless service will give me a discount on my home Comcast subscription. 

Although this agreement was approved by the FCC and Department of Justice, this kind of chummy behavior between supposedly rival companies is hardly a sign of aggressive competition. Verizon FiOS is often cited as the main competitor to incumbent cable companies, even though Verizon officials have stated the company is not expanding FiOS to new markets.  

At a recent public event, Vint Cerf, recognized as one of the creators of the...