As we previously noted, the city of Longmont, Colorado, is preparing for a referendum to allow the City to offer telecommunications services to local businesses and residents using a fiber ring it built long ago. This is due to a 2005 law (the "Qwest" law) that was pushed through the Colorado Legislature by incumbents seeking to prevent competition.

That law has succeeded -- most Colorado communities can only choose between slow DSL from the incumbent telephone company and comparatively faster services from the incumbent cable company. And when Longmont last attempted to pass a referendum to share its fiber infrastructure with local businesses, Comcast and Qwest swamped the town with unprecedented sums to confuse residents -- leading to the referendum failure with 44% voting yes.

But after the referendum passed and people had time to better understand the issue, many who voted against it realized they had been duped. We have seen the same dynamic elsewhere -- in Windom, MN, for example, where the second referendum succeeded. WindomNet has since saved a number of jobs and is expanding to eight other underserved rural communities around it.

Longmont built its fiber ring in the late 90's but it still has a lot of unused capacity that could be used to attract economic development if the publicly owned power utility were authorized to offer services to businesses. Without this authority, the community has a valuable asset that they are forced to leave unused -- even as local businesses could benefit greatly from it.

The Longmont Times-Call outlined the situation in July:

Without that vote, the city can't let homes or businesses use that fiber without a vote, thanks to a 2005 state law. It's a fight the city's lost once before in 2009, when opponents -- including the Colorado Cable Telecommunications Association -- spent $245,513 to urge the measure's defeat.

This time out, there's a different tack. The city has been underlining in discussions that the measure would "restore its rights" to provide telecommunications service. And it's stressing that no high-dollar project is on the table -- the first words of the ballot measure now read "Without increasing taxes ...

But Comcast and CenturyLink (previously Qwest) don't want to see their duopoly threatened by a new entrant that will create new competition. So they are again trying to swamp the referendum.
The incumbents have already started their FUD (fear, uncertainty, and doubt) campaign. The anti-competition group called "Americans for Prosperity" (that is the short name, the full name is "Americans for the Prosperity of a few Massive Corporations at the Expense of Everyone Else - or AFPMCEEE) is mobilizing its base to oppose the City. Funny how groups that support the most powerful corporations never seem to run short of funds.

The incumbents (and their hired minions) are robo-calling many citizens with misleading claims to scare people into opposing the referendum. They are framing it as the city using tax dollars to compete with private businesses to deliver cable services. They may or may not be aware that the City is not going to use tax dollars (ahem, the fiber loop is already built!!) but they will undoubtedly continue using these lies to scare voters.

The question is whether people will be swayed by these annoying calls, emails, and glossy mailers or by the debate they had last Friday night.

Note: We think having a debate is a great approach to airing pros and cons of broadband investments. We encourage you to record (video if possible, audio otherwise) to make sure people can revisit it as the referendum approaches. Many people are still not even aware of the issue and likely did not attend the debate but will later be curious.

At the debate, pro-incumbent spokespeople from outside the community came into town to convince others that Longmont should let Comcast and Qwest decide what Internet access is available and on what terms. They made the same old arguments, claiming that "most" of these networks have failed. When pressed, they were unable to offer specifics beyond UTOPIA and Burlington Telecom -- networks that we have demonstrated are not representative of community broadband in general.

They also made the same farcical claims that we should loudly laugh at when we encounter them:

"Right now, there's robust competition in wired and wireless," he said. "I'm concerned that when the government gets in, it'll drive away companies instead of attracting them."

Robust competition in wired and wireless??? Longmont has 2 wired choices - crap DSL and slightly better cable. In wireless, we are about to see the market go from 2 big providers and 2 small to 2 big providers and 1 small. Robust???

Longmont Mayor noted that Longmont wants to partner with businesses:

Baum said the city had no interest in being a telecommunications company itself, but wanted to partner with private businesses -- including those opposed to the measure, such as Comcast -- to help connect Longmont homes and companies to the loop. Comcast already leases fiber all over the country, he said; by doing so here, it could bring down its cost of doing business.

"I'm a free-market guy," Baum said. "I'm a capitalist pig. We're trying to create competition here."

This is exactly right. Communities desperately want more telecom competition while Comcast and CenturyLink desperately want to limit it in order to maximize their profits. They pretend local governments will "scare" away private investment but we have seen far more investment from the private sector in communities that have built their own networks.

If Longmont is allowed to use its fiber to offer services to local businesses, Comcast and CenturyLink are not going to leave town! They will invest more in the network, cut prices, and compete.

The crowd supported allowing Longmont to offer services to the private sector:

"You say you want government not to interfere with business," audience member Bernie Stoecker said to Paige and Gifford. "What we've got right now is a state law that interferes with our business."
"How is it a risky bet if the infrastructure's here and we're not using it?" someone else asked.
"Think of the city as a landlord and owning a commercial building that has offices for rent, but there's a prohibition that says it can't rent space to businesses," Joel Champion said. "We're wasting an asset."

Finally, Geek News Central has published an interesting story by Susabelle that explores the issue from the perspective of someone who recently moved to town:

Fortunately, I think people are a little smarter than they were a few years ago.  Every time they write that check to Qwest for $80 for Internet and basic home phone, they wonder if the city offered broadband, would it be a little cheaper?  Maybe a LOT cheaper?  Considering our municipal-run electric utility sells us electricity for about 6.9 cents a kilowatt hour, I can only imagine that the broadband cost might be pretty darned low.

And even if it isn’t, and Qwest or Comcast end up being more cost-effective, that’s great for them, and will keep them customers.  If they are worried about losing customers to a cheaper alternative, then maybe they should examine their pricing a little more closely and see if they can find a more competitive pricing structure.
I’m hoping that the people of my town don’t fall for the ridiculous counter-advertising that the tel-cos and cable companies will be spreading our way in the next month or so.  I hope they all look at that exceedingly cheap electric bill, do the math, and realize that our little city can give us a much better deal on broadband, the same way they are giving us a much better deal on electric service.

People supporting local authority to use the fiber ring for economic development have set up a website as a hub for information about their campaign - Longmont's Future. Check in there to get more information.

Also, Craig Settles interviewed Vince Jordan, CEO of a local service provider RidgeviewTel and supporter of the City in the referendum, on Gigabit Nation. (Audio to come.)

Santa Monica's approach to building community owned broadband that puts the community first has been wildly successful. They have not focused on providing residential connections, and likely will not in the future, focusing instead on meeting their municipal needs and businesses to spur economic development.

They can deliver up to 10Gbps to businesses that need it and they have connectivity throughout the City for whatever projects they choose to pursue. This includes free Wi-Fi in parks, controlling traffic signaling (prioritizing mass transit, for instance), and smart parking applications. On top of all that, their investments have saved more than a million dollars that would have been wasted on slower, less reliable connections provided by leased lines.

In the matter of controlling traffic signals, Santa Monica wants all intersections with fiber-optics.

Arizona Avenue, the Mid-City area and the city's office district will all be getting makeovers if the City Council approves two contracts that will connect 40 signalized intersections to City Hall's centralized traffic control system.

The work represents the fourth phase in a five-phase effort to connect all of Santa Monica's intersections using fiber optic cables. Some signals will need to be fully replaced, while others can get by on smaller upgrades, according to the staff report.

Don't miss this hour long interview between Craig Settles and Jory Wolf, the brains behind Santa Monica's success.

Around 45 minutes into the interview, Jory Wolf talks about the ways the free Wi-Fi network promotes local businesses in partnership with a Buy Local campaign. I was thrilled to hear this as a colleague of mine at the Institute for Local Self-Reliance is a great friend of buy local campaigns because they are proven to help the small, independent businesses that contribute so much to communities.

If you want to learn more, particularly about how Santa Monica's approach has created many new jobs (that's right, smart public investments in broadband create jobs!) check out .

For more information about Santa Monica, check out this article from Broadband Communities Magazine.

-Though the city provides Internet access directly, it also makes the network available to third-party providers on an open-access basis. “The incumbents have chosen not to use our assets,” Wolf says, explaining that larger providers are often reluctant to operate over networks where they cannot control the user experience and that their marketing and support organizations are not geared to using other companies’ networks. 


However, other ISPs have shown interest in the network now that it is becoming successful. Currently, two ISPs offer services generally over the network, and other ISPs serve the Santa Monica offices of businesses that they deal with in other locations. Wolf says, “We have the opportunity to handle the business any way they prefer. … We’re not an obstacle; we’re an enabler. We don’t see ourselves as competitors, but as filling a void.” 


City Net’s revenue from current business customers totals about $300,000 per year, enough to fund network operations and maintenance and to support an extensive system of free Wi-Fi hot spots throughout the city. Wi-Fi is now available at parks, beaches, libraries, public buildings and other open-space areas. On any given day, about 2,000 of Santa Monica’s 87,000 residents use the 27 Wi-Fi hot spots. 


The city also has $190,000 of its capital funds remaining, which it uses as a revolving capital improvement project account. This account funds construction for network expansion, which is repaid by customers as the network is extended to their premises. 


An indirect benefit of City Net is that it has forced competing networks to lower their prices. Wolf’s office estimates that nonparticipating providers have lowered their bandwidth prices by 20 percent or more, making bandwidth generally more affordable throughout the city. “If that’s all we had accomplished, we’d feel that we’d done what we intended,” Wolf says.

See also a webinar hosted by Broadband Communities [Cisco WebEx] where Jory discusses Santa Monica and nearby Long Beach talks about a similar approach they are using.

Finally, check out a recent segment of Santa Monica Update that discusses Santa Monica City Net (fast forward to 9:20 in the video to skip right to it).

Video: 

Last month, we were excited to write about the open access network in Cortez, Colorado. We can update the story with information from this article:

[B]usiness participation on Cortez's own municipal fiber-optic network has exceeded expectations - with 76 drops purchased to connect 98 Cortez businesses to the network.

Rick Smith, director of the city's General Services Department, said crews are working to get the drops connected and to extend conduit to the west side of Broadway Street.

"(The demand) exceeded my expectations," he said. "It's a good problem to have. ... I think the business owners see the value in being connected to the fiber for the long-term future. I think they see it as a way to stay competitive and enhance their business."

These businesses could start using the network in July but no service provider has yet committed to providing services. When the network is ready, there is no doubt at least one will take advantage of the community network to offer next-generation services. Over time, as more subscribers are available, more service providers will want to compete for their attention.

"It's going to give us an advantage that other communities don't have," Smith said. "You've got communities starting to take notice of what Cortez is doing, and it's exciting."

Businesses interested in joining the network can purchase "drops" to physically connect to the fiber-optic line. Drops currently cost a one-time fee of $150 for a small business or home and $175 for a medium business. Other rates are available for large businesses and multi-unit buildings.

But drops are only available in a limited area of town along Main Street currently. As the network generates more revenues, it will expand to other areas of the community.

On the heals of our story announcing a new open access community fiber project in Idaho, we have learned of a similar project in Cortez, Colorado. Cortez is the county seat of Montezuma County in the extreme southwest of the state and has approximately 8,000 residents.

Much of Colorado has long suffered from Qwest's refusal to invest in modern networks -- though a more charitable take on it would be to say Qwest's inability because it simply does not have the capacity to invest in the kind of networks communities now need to take advantage of modern communications technologies.

In the late 90's, Qwest's services in Cortez were served by microwave links incapable of meeting local needs and Qwest refused to invest in a better connection due to an insufficient business case. In the words of Rick Smith, Director of General Services for Cortez (and in charge of the network), the city then decided "to take its destiny in its own hands." They began building their own network.

The initial phase was an I-Net, built with the City's capital funds, to connect schools and other public facilities. They were able to later expand that under Colorado's Beanpole Project, a program that sought to aggregate community traffic in an attempt to lure more private sector investment in networks.

Along the way, they began leasing some dark fiber to private companies that needed better telecommunications options. When Qwest pushed through a bill in 2005 to limit local authority to build networks (click on Colorado on the Community Broadband Preemption Map), Cortez was grandfathered, leaving it with more authority to invest in this essential infrastructure than most communities.

A press release details the financing for this latest phase:

Southwest Colorado Council of Governments secured the initial funding for this project which came from a state grant of one million dollars from oil, gas and coal leasing rights. The City of Cortez provided the 25% match for the grant funds. The funds are being funneled back into developing the economy and growth of Cortez and the surrounding area by offering potential large employers or data center providers the bandwidth and technology to grow their business from Colorado.

The Cortez Journal reported on the new network and local enthusiasm:

Ernie Young, a technical supervisor for Baja Broadband in Cortez, spoke at a Cortez Area Chamber of Commerce luncheon Wednesday, saying the proposed network is comparable in technological capability to networks in major metropolitan areas.

"It's really impressive to see how far advanced this community is going to get with this fiber-optic (network) that is going to be put in as a backbone," Young said.

Young believes the network will draw businesses to Cortez by offering information infrastructure capable of supporting satellite businesses, software companies and video conferencing.

The local Chamber of Commerce is fully supportive of this public investment:

Chamber of commerce Executive Director Dena Guttridge agreed.

"Everybody is keeping an eye on little Southwest Colorado," Guttridge said. "Here we are right on the verge of launching this amazing project. I don't think people really understand what we're doing in this area. This is huge. We have the potential of having the fastest, most capable Internet in the state, and all over the Southwest."

From what we have heard, many nearby communities (including from nearby states) have been sending people to see what Cortez is doing and start investigating how they could duplicate it.

Cortez is not immediately building the network out to all residents and businesses -- trying to build a universal open access network in a single phase is very difficult to finance. This phase will connect local businesses and will be expanded when opportunities allow for it. It is likely that this network will start by offering only data and phone services. Delivering television services require more investment and fewer providers are able to do it for smaller networks like Cortez and Ammon, Idaho.

The Cortez Community Network Fiber Project web site has a significant amount of information as well as Frequently Asked Questions to help people to understand their approach.

They list some great principles for the network, including Universal access, geographic equality, level playing field, community control, symmetrical and unlimited bandwidth. These principles are each elaborated on. Stating and defining these principles is a smart move for any community network.

Though Qwest has not been able to build a next-generation network in Cortez, it has attempted to lock its customers into long-term (3 year) contracts in order to make life more difficult for the public network.