The fourth edition of our report, Cooperatives Fiberize Rural America: A Trusted Model for the Internet Age, reveals the steady growth of cooperative fiber since we originally released the report in 2017. In the report, we present rural telephone and electric cooperatives as a proven model to connect rural communities across the country with high-quality Internet access. This version updates the maps and analysis in the report with the most recent federal data.

Download the May 2020 update of Cooperatives Fiberize Rural America: A Trusted Model for the Internet Age [pdf].

We first published this report in 2017 and have updated it in the years since. For all versions, including the most current, visit the Reports Archive.

Highlights from the fourth edition of Cooperatives Fiberize Rural America include:

• More than 109 rural electric cooperatives have invested in fiber optics to provide broadband access or have fiber projects underway.
• Cooperative fiber networks cover nearly 82 percent of North Dakota by area, more than 53 percent of South Dakota, and about a quarter of Iowa, Minnesota, and Montana.
• Updated maps display the extent of rural cooperative networks, the change in network coverage between June 2018 and June 2019, and the predicted future growth of cooperative networks.

Read the updated version of Cooperatives Fiberize Rural America: A Trusted Model for the Internet Age [pdf].

Lighting up the first phase of middle-mile network Project THOR isn’t the only good news coming out of northwest Colorado recently. Glenwood Springs, a city of 10,000 forty-five minutes north of Aspen, is once again looking to secure the future of its information infrastructure.

In a recent 6-1 decision, the city council voted to replace and expand the reach of its existing fiber system, which currently serves businesses and a select number of residents. The resulting network of 150 miles is projected to cost around $9 million and take two years to complete. Once done, current users will be switched over with no disruption. The new network will be citywide and have the capacity to handle Glenwood Springs’ 4,800 residences and commercial premises. Hopes are, many will sign up.

Building up a Fiber Legacy

This isn’t the first time Glenwood Springs has taken such initiative. Almost twenty years ago the city had access to speeds below one megabit per second (Mbps) and — after being told by Qwest (now CenturyLink) there were no plans for investment or upgrades — it built its own fiber backbone to community anchor institutions with a wireless overlay to provide service to residential customers. The city later expanded the fiber network to connect businesses and some households and opened up the network for participation by private Internet service providers (ISPs).

In the Monadnock Region of New Hampshire, at least six towns have voted to issue bonds to construct fiber networks in partnership with regional incumbent telephone company Consolidated Communications. Chesterfield approved the measure in April 2019 and recently executed a public-private partnership contract with Consolidated.

Chesterfield was the first municipality in New Hampshire to take advantage of Senate Bill 170, signed into law in 2018, which allows municipal governments to bond in order to build broadband infrastructure in places not served by commercial broadband providers. Over the last year, the towns of Dublin, Harrisville, Rindge, Walpole, and Westmoreland have also voted to bond are also in the process of bonding, or have already bonded (Rindge), and are finalizing public-private partnership contracts with Consolidated to develop Fiber-to-the-Home networks. The towns plan to issue bonds in July and should have finalized contracts by that point.

New Hampshire’s rural areas have struggled to connect rural residents to adequate broadband, and these towns are undertaking these partnerships to improve currently insufficient connectivity. Part of the challenge has been the rotating series of incumbent telephone companies, from Verizon to FairPoint and now Consolidated. Large publicly-traded telephone firms have difficulty justifying investments in rural areas when the same amount of capital could offer a much greater return in higher-density cities. But Consolidated is developing a new model with these towns that may work to everyone’s benefit.

Two more electric cooperatives recently announced plans to build Fiber-to-the-Home (FTTH) networks to connect their rural members in the southeastern United States with high-quality Internet access.

The co-ops, Mississippi County Electric Cooperative (MCEC) in Arkansas and Monroe County Electric Power Association (EPA) in Mississippi, will partner with Conexon to manage network design, buildout, and implementation. Conexon has worked with dozens of rural electric cooperatives across the country to deploy broadband access to better serve their member-owners.

Rural communities in the southeast have long struggled with unreliable, unaffordable connectivity, and the current Covid-19 pandemic is further amplifying the health, education, and economic disparities that result from inequitable Internet access. But rural cooperatives, in the region and beyond, are stepping up to meet their members’ broadband needs.

Arkansas Co-op Continues Through Crisis

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Late last month in a Conexon press release, MCEC announced that it was launching a new subsidiary, MCEC Fiber, to offer its members Internet access with speeds up to one Gigabit per second symmetrical. With its new 600-mile fiber network, MCEC will join several other electric co-ops in Arkansas, including Ozarks Electric Cooperative and Craigshead Electric Cooperative Corporation, that have invested in broadband infrastructure for their communities.

MCEC President and CEO Brad Harrison said in the release:

According to a recent article in Bluebonnet News, the City Council of Dayton, Texas, has approved a $13.7 million bond to operate its own fiber optic system. The city aims to make residents and businesses more self-reliant and less dependent on big cable companies.

Located 15 miles east of Houston, Dayton has a population of nearly 8,000 people. Once the 70 mile fiber network is complete, it will meet the connectivity needs of Dayton's residents and businesses now and well into the foreseeable future.

Slow Start in Texas

Texas is one of 19 states that have laws restricting cities from offering their own telecommunications services to residents. In Texas, state laws prevent municipal networks from offering voice and video services, but they can still provide Internet access to households. Mont Belvieu became the first city in the state to deploy its own citywide fiber network, after successful court rulings clarified the city's authority to offer broadband access. Since the city of Mont Belvieu created its high-quality fiber optic network, MB Link, it has connected about half of its residents and has inspired other rural areas and towns in the country. Dayton, Texas, is one of those communities which shares Mont Belvieu's vision, as per the article from Bluebonnet News:

Like Mont Belvieu, the City of Dayton will provide the Internet service as another utility, like water and sewer service. Theo Melancon, City Manager, believes the cost of the service will be more affordable for Dayton residents and businesses.

Dayton Dreams of Speed

John Lester, General Manager of Clarksville Connected Utilities (CCU) in Clarksville, Arkansas, knows a thing or two about the value of a municipal broadband network.

“Just keeping the dollars in Clarksville is gonna have a big impact. Do you have a calculator handy?” Lester asked me, when I called him earlier this month to learn more about the city’s planned foray into residential broadband services.

“Let me talk you through something,” he replied, after I said I did. “Let’s say we’ve got 4,500 potential customers and 75 percent of them get high-speed Internet, in some fashion. What’s that number?”

From there, he ran through a handful of calculations to illustrate the economic benefit of Clarksville’s new Fiber-to-the-Home network. Assuming residents save about $20 per month and the savings continue to circulate locally, the network could grow the city’s economy by $4 million every year.

“That stays in our consumers’ pockets right here in Clarksville, Arkansas,” Lester explained. “There is an economic impact today and every year going forward.”

Residential broadband service is only the most recent evolution for Clarksville’s municipal fiber network, which already connects utility infrastructure as well as area businesses and community anchor institutions in the city of nearly 10,000. Home installations are due to start soon, depending on delays caused by the global Covid-19 outbreak.

Starting With a Plan