Leahy,
Vermont Broadband Council Announce Grants
To Bring Broadband Service To Vermont
Communities
(MONDAY, May 23) -- Sen. Patrick Leahy and the Vermont Broadband
Council Monday announced four grants totaling $125,000 to bring
high-speed Internet service to Vermont communities that have been
left off the global Internet highway. The grants will assist local
initiatives in Gilman, Lowell, Ripton and a region in Central
Vermont that will bring affordable broadband service to residents
who have been bypassed by telecommunications providers.
“High-speed Internet service will become a basic utility in the 21st
Century, and right now too many Vermont towns are in danger of
becoming second class communities,” said Leahy. “Our communities
recognize the need for broadband and are taking the initiative to
find affordable service. We need to build on this momentum and keep
pushing until broadband access is available everywhere in Vermont.
Without affordable broadband service, our businesses, residents and
students will be left behind with severe economic and cultural
disadvantages.”
The grants will supplement the broadband community grants created
last year by the Vermont Legislature, which were championed by State
Sens. Matt Dunne (D-Windsor), Hinda Miller (D-Chittenden) and
Vincent Illuzzi (R-Essex/Orleans). That program awarded four grants
to the communities of Brandon, Grand Isle/South Hero, Westmore, and
West Windsor/Reading late last year. The grants announced by Leahy
and the Vermont Broadband Council are for wireless projects,
allowing Internet service to be carried to homes and businesses
through radio waves.
“These grants are designed to complement the excellent community
broadband grant program that the Vermont Legislature established
last year,” said Leahy. “This is turning out to be a great
state-federal-community partnership. We need to continue to support
fledgling efforts that are beginning in communities around Vermont
to help make sure that no Vermonters become isolated when the
broadband superhighway comes through.”
Leahy helped establish the Vermont Broadband Council (www.vtbroadband.org)
as a public-private resource to work on improving access and
affordability of broadband technologies. The council’s first
demonstration project was MonptelierNet, a community cooperative
that has received national attention for bringing wireless Internet
service to city government, local businesses, the library and the
State House. That project has become a template for linking
communities with telecommunications providers and service companies
to provide wireless broadband service to their towns. The
Montpelier project also demonstrated the potential of wireless
service at lower costs -- in that case providing broadband access at
rates that were up to a third less than rates available to many
businesses in Montpelier before the launch of MontpelierNet.
The grants to Gilman, Lowell, Ripton and Central Vermont were
secured by Leahy, a senior member of the Senate Appropriations
Committee, in the Department of Housing and Urban Development FY05
budget.
PROJECTS OVERVIEW
Ripton: $25,000:
Residents of Ripton
have formed a cooperative that has similarities to the one formed in
Montpelier with MontpelierNet. The cooperative has negotiated an
agreement with Middlebury College to use some of its facilities.
The college is installing wireless equipment to provide high-speed
Internet connectivity to the Snow Bowl and the Breadloaf Campus.
The signal will originate from the main campus in Middlebury. The
coop will install equipment to run parallel to the Middlebury
connection, which will save the cost of having to build a tower at
the Snow Bowl as well as other equipment. The Ripton project will
initially provide wireless service to about 40 users, and the local
school will be one of the primary users.
Gilman: $25,000:
This project
represents the kind of partnership/anchor business model that has
been discussed in Vermont for the last few years. A local company,
Dirigo Paper Company, has bought a bigger Internet connection than
it needs for its own use and will sell the excess bandwidth to the
community. The VBC grant will be used to provide connections to
local residents.
Lowell:
$25,000: The town of
Westmore received one of the original state grants to develop a
wireless network in that community. Lowell will be able to
piggyback on the Westmore project, and this VBC grant will be used
to help purchase subscriber units for businesses and residents in
Lowell.
Central Vermont:
$50,000: This
started out as a project to serve residents in Marshfield and
Plainfield. It has expanded to include East Montpelier and Calais,
and groups are forming in Worcester and Middlesex to join this
network. Among the original four communities, there are more
than 600 people who have expressed interest in wireless broadband
service.
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