The Missoula City Council recently approved a measure to finance a feasibility study on improving local Internet options. Keila Szpaller of the Missoulian reports the council voted 9-1 to spend $13,125 as a first step in improving business connections to boost economic development. Szpaller writes:

“We did a survey around that and identified that one of the needs that folks have is for high-speed, high-capacity connections at an affordable price,” said Councilwoman Caitlin Copple.

Copple chairs the Economic Development Subcommittee of the council, a group that formed to research the way municipal government can best support technology infrastructure to bolster local businesses – and recruit more technology startups.

“We felt like the time is now to bring on a consultant and really get a professional assessment on what we have, what the demand is and what the potential partnerships are,” Copple said.

The Montana Department of Commerce, through its Big Sky Economic Development Trust Fund, awarded $26,250 to the city and Missoula County. The county Board of Commissioners voted earlier this month to guarantee another $13,125 to meet the matching contribution requirement. The city contribution comes out of a federal grant to the city from the U.S. Department of Housing and Urban Development. Encouraging economic development will improve affordable housing options says Councilman Jason Wiener:

“When we talk about housing affordability in particular, people often talk about the gap between prices and income and working to close that as well, so this is really money put to that purpose,” Wiener said.

Cox pushed Ketchum one step too far. The community of 2,700 formed a broadband advisory committee in November, 2012, and included a representative from Cox on the committee. Brennan Rego of the Idaho Mountain Express recently reported on happenings in Ketchum.

When residents in Wood River Valley started receiving push poll telephone calls from Cox to poison any possibility of a community owned network, Mayor Randy Hall and city leaders reacted promptly. They booted Cox off the broadband advisory committee.

Consistent with Cox push polls in other places, questions were leading:

 “The questions were so outrageous, I didn’t want to continue with the survey,” [Valley resident Sarah Michael] said. “I got offended. They were inappropriate and misleading.”
 

Michael said that, in essence, one question asked: Would you support Ketchum’s broadband initiative if you knew the city would cut police, fire and other essential services to pay for it?
    

“Who’s going to answer yes to that?” she said.

Michael and other residents who received the calls contacted surprised city staff and Mayor Hall. 

 “As the mayor, I can’t stand by and let somebody imply that I’m going to compromise the Police Department and the Fire Department by taking money away from them and putting it toward a broadband initiative,” Hall said. “That’s insane. I would never do that. I think the survey was trying to create fear.”

Cox claimed the questions were designed to "learn more about the public's opinion" but would not divulge the wording of the survey questions.

The city posted a disclaimer on its website to ensure residents knew the survey was not associated with the committee. 

“Cox is a very valuable member of our community,” Hall said. “But to imply that the city is willing to compromise the health and safety of its citizens by funding a broadband initiative is false and irresponsible.”
    

Hall said he considers Cox’s “unilateral action” in deciding to conduct the survey a “breach of trust,” but that the city would welcome a new representative of the company to the committee.

The town of Erie, Colorado, is conducting a residential survey as it considers a community owned network. Erie has about 18,000 residents and straddles Boulder and Weld Counties. 

The concerns facing Erie's community leaders were recently summed up in a John Aguilar article in the Boulder Daily Camera. According to the article, four companies were to be screened to complete a $50,000 feasibility study. The community owned broadband approach has both strong supporters and some doubters in town.

From the article:

Trustee Jonathan Hager, who has spent the last dozen years managing fiber-optic networks for a Westminster-based wholesale electric power supplier, championed the idea for Erie from both a local control perspective and an economic development one.

"If I'm a company and I'm going to relocate here with 100 employees and I need 100 megabits per second of speed and the town can provide that, I think that would be something I would look at," Hager said. "If we can make Erie stand out as a good place to live because we offer broadband, that puts us in a good position."

Internet access, he said, has become so ubiquitous and necessary that it could be seen as just another municipally provided utility, like water and electrical service.

"We can provide it ourselves and cut out the middle man," Hager said.

Those who are not sold on the idea of funding a study, express resignation at entering a challenging industry:

"I'm very sensitive to the speed of technology's progression," Mayor Joe Wilson said. "By the time we cut the ribbon on this technology, it's old news."

Wilson also voiced concerns about whether it is government's proper role to be providing broadband Internet service or whether that is better left up to the private sector. He said there hasn't been an outcry from residents to pursue such a service.

A collaboration between local Idaho and Wyoming counties, the town of Rexburg, Idaho, and Brigham Young University will be exploring the possibility of a community owned fiber optic network. Significant business interest in the project has contributed to the decision to move forward with a feasibility study.

According to a Standard Journal article, Design Nine has been hired to conduct the study which will look at what networks are currently in place and provide a detailed plan for future development. The $78,000 study, to be completed in May, is funded in half by a federal grant with the remaining paid for by public and private donations. 

Fremont County, Idaho; Madison County, Idaho; Teton County, Idaho; and Teton County, Wyoming are all participating and together obtained the federal grant. According to the City of Rexburg Department of Economic Development website on the fiber initiative:

Rexburg's City Council recently (June, 2011) passed an initiative to facilitate the availability of broadband internet in Rexburg. High-speed broadband internet, as referred to in this initiative, is a fiber-optic connection with download speeds exceeding 1,000 bytes per second (1 Gbps). Private businesses have requested for upgraded services, but these requests have not yet been met. Accordingly, citizens and city officials have established the Rexburg Community Access Network Initiative. High-speed broadband means smart growth for Rexburg.

From the Standard Journal Article:

Two companies have already expressed interest in adding data centers in Rexburg, but current lack of bandwidth makes that a challenge, [Economic Development Director for Rexburg Scott] Johnson told members of the Kiwanis Club earlier this week.

Brigham Young University-Idaho is the main component behind the study, he said during the meeting.

Not long ago, we brought you news about the status of the new network being constructed in Carroll County, Maryland. The County is partnering with local Maryland Broadband Cooperative to provide better service to local businesses.

Earlier this week, Brett Lake of the Carroll County Times reported that Westminster, a town of about 18,000 residents in the north central part of the state, will move forward with a broadband feasibility study. From the article:

The study will include an assessment of the city’s long-term broadband needs, a market and benefits study, analysis and business plan, a detailed installation plan and options for potential funding opportunities.

...

Among the scope of work performed for the study includes the likely long-term broadband needs of Westminster’s community including residents, businesses and industrial parks.

The study will also provide the city with the potential market for fiber-based voice, data and video services along with the opportunities and obstacles for economic development related to the fiber-based services.

The city will also receive a report on the benefits and risks of community broadband initiatives on various fields including education, public safety, healthcare, economic development and government services.

The study is scheduled to be completed within nine months. We look forward to following the developments in Westminster.

Elizabethton, Tennessee, population 14,000, is the county seat of Carter County, which is home to 57,000 residents. The two, located in the extreme northeast corner of the state, now join the ranks of the growing number of rural communities exploring the publicly owned network option.

A Task Force, appointed by Carter County Mayor in January of this year, includes local leaders from local government, school districts, higher education, and the business community. They were charged with determining the need, feasibility, and level of community support for a publicly owned network.

In addition to conducting surveys in the local business and non-profit sectors, the Task Force met with potential ISPs to gauge interest and explore potential public/private partnerships. The group identified anchor institutions, researched keys to success and causes of failure in other communities, determined an estimate for the build out, and explored potential financing. The Task Force finished their final report in May. The group formerly presented it to the Carter County Commission last week and Elizabethton City Council earlier this week. The report revealed that a county/city network can be a reality and is critical to local economic development and quality of life. Like other small communities around the country, Carter County and Elizabethton recognize that their residents will be left behind if they don't take action.

Carter County Tomorrow (CCT), an economic development partnership between the County, Elizabethton, and nearby Watauga, contributed to the presentation. Jason R. Mullins, of the Elizabethton Star, covered the City Council meeting:

The CCT President [Tom Anderson] said the county could attract high-tech companies to the area to develop a data center or server farm. “We could possibly get one of those if we could get the proper infrastructure in place to get what they need, which is either  a dual feed from two different fiber companies or we could have redundancy. That is when you have a loop to make sure if something gets cut, it re-routes data in the other direction,” Anderson said.

Redwood County’s Economic Development Authority (EDA) opted to move forward with a broadband feasibility study that would determine just what the county would need to do in order to get fiber to every premises. … The study, which is being conducted by the Blandin Foundation through what is known as the Robust Broad-band Networks Feasibility Grant Program. The grant, which includes up to $40,000 for the county as it addresses the needs of every community and farm site from one end of the county to the other, requires matching funds, which are available through the county EDA.

“I think some of the other commissioners maybe feel like it’s more of a private matter, that some of the commercial businesses should be putting in infrastructure,” he said. “However, someone like Windstream, if they have a potential customer for a data center, they’re going to steer that customer to where they have infrastructure. They don’t care about Franklin County.” It’s important to understand, he added, that high-quality jobs will not come to Franklin County if it is not up-to-date with its infrastructure.