Image
Fast, affordable Internet access for all.
Municipal Broadband PDX Asks Portlanders to Call on Local Officials for Support
By
on
This past summer, a group of Portlanders with digital equity as a primary goal, launched Municipal Broadband PDX. The grassroots organization seeks to mobilize folks from the Rose City to let their local leaders know that they’d like local government to take the lead in bringing fast, affordable, reliable connectivity to the entire city. At their official kick-off, our own Christopher Mitchell spoke to the crowd along with Commissioner Lori Stegmann, who pledged her support to the initiative. Now Municipal Broadband PDX is asking Portlanders to answer a call to action to move to the next phase.
A first and important step for any community considering investing in high-quality Internet access infrastructure is to conduct a feasibility study. Multnomah County Board of Commissioners approved $150,000 for a broadband study earlier this year along with the communities of Gresham, Troutdale, Fairview, and Wood Village. Municipal Broadband PDX has applied to the City of Portland for a special appropriations grant program. The group is requesting $100,000 to add to the pledges from the county and the other municipalities. The Portland City Council is considering the grant applications and results will be announced on November 26th.
Municipal Broadband PDX asks that supporters contact Portland elected officials and request that the project receive the grant. If you’re interested in making an impact and letting your elected representatives know that you support learning more about local options with a feasibility study, now is your opportunity.
The group has drafted a sample email and a draft voice mail message, along with contact information for decision makers. You can find the drafts and information here.
More on Municipal Broadband PDX
The organization follows the philosophy that Internet access is a public utility and should be provided to every member of the public in the same manner as other utilities we take for granted — as a service that is always there. Municipal Broadband PDX also strongly supports the concept of network neutrality and argues that income level should not be a barrier to Internet access. According to Michael Hanna, a Municipal Broadband PDX representative, “Almost 30% of low-income households in the Portland Metro area lack broadband access, and this disproportionally affects communities of color and other marginalized or under-resourced groups.”
Municipal Broadband PDX's mission is "Internet for the People."
Check out their fun video released at their launch:
You can follow the Municipal Broadband PDX campaign at their website, enroll for updates, and follow them on Facebook and Twitter (@PublicNetPDX).
Geoterm
Related Stories
Capital Construction of a Municipal Broadband Utility 101
Brieana Reed-Harmel, manager of the municipal-owned Pulse fiber network in Loveland, Colorado, shares her experience leading the city through the assessment and feasibility study that led to building a sucessful municipal broadband network. Reed-Harmel covers planning considerations, managing experts, scaling and quality assurance, as well as nurturing the human elements in a technical project
New Resource: How to Submit Challenges to the FCC Broadband Map
To help communities get a handle on the unwieldy and confusing FCC Broadband Availability Maps, we created a short series of instructional videos and a click-through guide.
Holland, Michigan Votes to Build Citywide Open Access Fiber Network
In early August, the city of Holland, Michigan (pop. 33,000) voted to fund the construction of a citywide, open access fiber-to-the-home (FTTH) network. It’s the culmination of almost a decade of consideration, education, planning, and success, and builds on decades of work by the Holland Board of Public Works (HBPW) and city officials to build and maintain resilient essential infrastructure for its citizens. It also signals the work the community has done to listen to local residents, community anchor institutions, and the business owners in pushing for an investment that will benefit every premises equally and ensure fast, affordable Internet access is universally available for decades down the road.
LTD and Starlink Booted from Rural Digital Opportunity Fund by FCC
In a release today, the Federal Communications Commission (FCC) announced it was voiding applications by two of the biggest Rural Digital Opportunity Fund (RDOF) bidders from December 2020. This includes more than $885 million for Low-Earth Orbit (LEO) provider Starlink and more than $1.3 billion for LTD Broadband, Inc.
Trailblazing Ashland Fiber Network (AFN) Faces Its Fiber Future
Ashland, Oregon has long been a trailblazer in terms of meeting community demand for faster, more affordable broadband access. The city-owned network has also had a bumpy road—at times being branded as an example of municipal broadband failure. But the network continues to grow as it faces down an urgently-needed pivot toward a fiber-based future. Despite the current economic healthiness of the network and the clear benefits it’s brought to the community over the last twenty years, local officials are talking about divesting instead of making the financial commitment to continue the investment the city has already made.
Gainesville Tosses Muni Broadband Project into Big Telecom Swamp
Gainesville City Commissioners dealt a severe – if not fatal – blow to the expansion of municipal broadband in the Florida city where Gatorade was invented. Last week, five of the city’s seven commissioners voted to reject a proposal to spend $10 million of its American Rescue Plan funds to build a fiber-to-the-home (FTTH) pilot project. And now that city commissioners opted not to take advantage of this once-in-a-lifetime infusion of federal funds for broadband, Connected Gainesville founder Bryan Eastman sees last week’s vote as a death-knell for expanding municipal broadband in the city.