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Content tagged with "indiana"

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Indianola Municipal Utilities to Offer Gig Service

Indianola Municipal Utilities (IMU) announced in a December 1st press release that they will be offering gigabit service in 2015. IMU will also be expanding their FTTH network to an additional 150 premises this winter in the central part of Indianola.

IMU's service partner, MCG, has established the Build My Neighborhood site, which allows Indianolans to inform IMU where they want to see service expanded to next.

IMU and several local partners, including MCG, recently began the IMU Partners Program. According to the press release, the program provides marketing opportunities, common use of network facilities, outreach to the community, and assistance with business development. Member businesses receive advertising on the IMU TV channel and streaming video site, access to outreach STEM events at local schools, and hosting for tech-related events. 

Indianola Municipal Utilities use the network as a long term economic development tool, regularly cooperating with local partners to support entrepreneurs. In 2013, we shared the story of the Indianola + Simpson College Entrepreneurial Development Initiative (EMERGE). The college program relies on IMU for high capacity connectivity to support new high tech ventures. Simpson College and IMU have also developed an incubator to encourage high tech business growth through mentorship.

From the press release:

“Recent reports show that gigabit availability has become an important factor in economic growth, job creation, and property values” states IMU General Manager Todd Kielkopf. “Indianola’s technology investment in connectivity, collaborations, and content delivery is paying dividends”

The full press release is available below.

Crawfordsville Municipal Network Purchased by Metronet in Indiana

Our Community Broadband Map documents over 400 communities where publicly owned infrastructure serves residents, business, or government facilities. We rarely hear of publicly owned systems sold to private providers, but it does happen once in a blue moon.

Accelplus, the fiber optic FTTH network deployed by Crawfordsville Electric Light & Power (CEL&P) in Indiana was sold earlier this year to private provider Metronet.

According to a July Journal Review article, the transition for customers began this summer with completion expected by the end of 2014. Metronet invested approximately $2 million in upgrades. Metronet will also offer voice services via the network; Accelplus offered only Internet and video.

In the past, we have found that networks that offer triple-play can attract more customers, increasing revenues. In states where munis cannot offer triple-play or administrative requirements are so onerous they discourage it, municipalities that would like to deploy fiber networks sometimes decide to abandon their vision due to the added risk. 

A November 2013 Journal Review article reported that the network, launched in 2005, faced an expensive lawsuit commenced by US Bank. Apparently the network could not keep up with the repayment schedule for Certificates of Participation, backed by network revenue, that financed the investment.

Metronet purchased Accelplus and its assets for $5.2 million. The City also provided some economic development incentives. When all is said and done, investors are settling for a total of $5.6 million and the City avoids a $19.6 million lawsuit.

A February Journal Review article reported:

Metronet will receive a 10-year, $24,000 per year lease from CEL&P on property currently used by Accelplus. Metronet can purchase that property for $1 after the lease expires. Accelplus manager John Douglas has segregated those areas and provided AutoCAD drawings to Metronet.

Rural Indiana Looks to Tax Increment Financing to Build Fiber Networks

Wabash County, Indiana wants to expand its access to high speed internet through a fiber optic network build out, and is planning to use a distinctive financial tool to do so. The Wabash County Redevelopment Commission has begun the process of assigning a special Economic Development Area designation for the purpose of helping to finance new fiber deployment through parts of the mostly rural county of 33,000 people.

Auburn Essential Services; A Workhorse in Northeast Indiana Saves Jobs, Serves Public

In 1985, Auburn Electric became one of the first communities in the midwest to deploy fiber. At the time, the purpose was to improve electric and voice systems substation communications within the municipal utility. That investment laid the foundation for a municipal network that now encourages economic development and saves public dollars while enhancing services.

Auburn expanded its fiber network beyond electric systems in 1998. The utility began using the network to serve city and county government operations. It is not well known, but Auburn offered gigabit service to its public sector customers way back in 1998.

The benefits from the deployment prompted community leaders to develop an Information Technology Master Plan in 1998 that would answer the question of what other ways the fiber could serve the community? As part of the Master Plan, Auburn leaders collected information from other communities that were capitalizing on their own local fiber. While Auburn made no immediate plans, they kept an open mind, waiting until the time was right.

In 2004, Cooper Tire and Rubber (now Cooper Standard) was about to be sold from its parent company. The $1.6 billion auto component manufacturer needed a data center but bandwidth was insufficient and inconsistent in Auburn. Cooper considered leaving because the incumbents, Mediacom and AT&T, could not or would not provide the broadband capacity the company needed. If Cooper left town, an estimated $7 million in wages and benefits from 75 high-paying tech jobs would also leave. At the time, Auburn was home to 12,500 people.

County Courthouse in Auburn, Indiana

According to Schweitzer, the City tried to persuade the telephone company to find a solution with Cooper but the two could not reach an agreement. Rather than lose Cooper, the City of Auburn stepped in to fill the connectivity gap in 2005.

In a 2007 interview with Public Power magazine, Schweitzer noted advantages in Auburn that facilitated the project:

"It Opens Up Our World," Dark Fiber Coming to Marshall County Indiana

Marshall County Council recently approved a motion to join several other entities to bring Indiana's dark fiber Metronet to the area. WNDU reports St. Joseph County and the city of Plymouth are also contributing to the project (video available at WNDU link). The St. Joseph Regional Medical Center and a local company, Hoosier Racing Tire, will also provide funding. 

Marshall County, located in the north central part of Indiana, will contribute $500,000 to the project. Plymouth anticipates significant public savings and economic growth and will contribute $1.3 million. Hoosier Racing Tire needs higher bandwidth than is now available in Marshall County.

We previously reported on Metronet Zing, the dark fiber network in the South Bend, Mishawaka, and St. Joseph County region. The dark fiber network is open access and multiple carriers provide services via the fiber. The network was funded by public and private entities. St. Joe Valley Metronet (SJVM) is a for-profit entity that serves only business clients and pays income and property taxes. Non-profit Metronet serves only government entities and educational institutions.

From the article:

Communities are coming together to gather the funds for the more than $3 million project.

“It opens up our world,” said county commissioner Kevin Overmyer.

“Dark fiber today is what electricity was back in the 40s and 50s. We are the trend-setter. Set the standard. We have a plan in place. We have accomplished it locally not with help from anybody else.”

The community hopes to have the network up and running by September 2014.

In Indiana, Auburn Built Fiber Network Incrementally - Community Broadband Bits Episode 77

When a major employer in Auburn, a town of 13,000 in northeast Indiana, told the local government that it would have to move jobs to a different location unless it had improved Internet access, the local government first encouraged it to work with the telephone company. But when that telephone company, headquartered far from Auburn, refused to meet local needs, the town formed Auburn Essential Utilities and extended city fiber to the business. Chris Schweitzer, Director of Auburn Essential Services, joins us for episode 77 of the Community Broadband Bits podcast. We discuss how Auburn was prepared for that moment and how it expanded the network in future years to now offer services on a citywide basis. Listen to the show to learn more about Auburn, including how they have structured the project financially. See all of our coverage of AES here. Read the transcript from this show here. 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. This show is 20 minutes long and can be played below on this page or via iTunes or via the tool of your choice using this feed. Listen to previous episodes here. You can can download this Mp3 file directly from here. Find more episodes in our podcast index. Thanks to Haggard Beat for the music, licensed using Creative Commons.

Fort Wayne, Indiana: What Happens When You Beg

For years, I have heard Graham Richards, former mayor of Fort Wayne Indiana, brag about this "beg, borrow, buy, build" [pdf] philosophy as Mayor.  I am not insulting him -- his brash style is quite likable, but it is bragging.  He was somewhat of a celebrity among the broadband folks because he both understood the importance of broadband and had convinced Verizon to roll out FiOS in Fort Wayne when they had no plans to.  His philosophy is to first beg, then borrow, then buy, and finally build the network if necessary -- a similar approach of many local governments.  This is also often the path of least resistance (which, Utah Phillips reminds us, is what makes the river crooked).  

Graham is a terrific guy and a great evangelist for broadband (though he never jumped into a frozen Lake Superior) -- but we have long argued that his priorities were wrong in the long term.  Not owning the network means the network is unlikely to care about what the community needs.  Unfortunately, our philosophy has proven prescient.

When we last discussed Frontier's radical price increases for the FiOS subscribers they bought from Verizon, we failed to note that Fort Wayne was one of the transferred communities.  They begged for the network and they have no voice in how it is run.  So when Frontier jacks up its FiOS prices and glibly encourages people to drop their high quality FiOS cable for lesser quality DirectTV (with a long contract), the folks in Fort Wayne have little choice but to shrug their shoulders.

Serfs may occasion upon a good Lord of the Manor, but mostly they didn't.  Ownership of essential infrastructure offers long term benefits.

Photo used under Creative Commons, courtesy of Jenn Raynes