Editor’s note: This commentary is by Katherine Sims, who is director of the Northeast Kingdom Collaborative.
Internet access is no longer a luxury, but a necessity. We need the internet to find and apply to jobs, run our businesses, do our homework, learn about resources, and connect with our community and the world at large. And yet, only half of addresses in the Northeast Kingdom have access to high-speed internet which is defined by the FCC as 25 megabits per second download speed and three megabits per second upload speed. Our residents and businesses are suffering because of it.
Unfortunately, it’s not financially appealing to internet companies to invest in infrastructure to serve our town. We can’t rely on them to offer the kind of service we so badly need. So what can we do?
It’s up to us to build our own plan to solve this issue. The substantial leaps in service across the state have come from communities banding together or partnering with providers to build their own networks.
The first step is for us to create a communications union district, or “CUD.” A CUD is a municipal entity, made up of two or more towns, with the specific purpose of bringing high-speed internet access to the region it represents.
Other rural regions of Vermont have already formed CUDs and are working toward high-speed internet access for all of their residents and businesses. ECFiber, Vermont’s first CUD formed in 2015, now delivers up to 700 mbps service to 3,500 customers in 22 rural towns and is profitable.
The takeaway? Rural Vermonters can take matters into their own hands and make meaningful change for their communities.
To form a CUD for our region, community members will vote on Town Meeting Day whether or not their town should become a member of the CUD, which will be called “NEK Community Broadband.”
Towns that vote to join the CUD will appoint a member to the CUD governing board, which will be responsible for funding, planning and working with contractors to build and operate the broadband infrastructure. Membership in the CUD doesn’t cost anything and poses no financial risk to the town or taxpayer.
Funding for the infrastructure and operation of the service will come from state and federal grants, bonds and low-interest loans. The service itself will be cost-competitive with other services currently available.
This is our chance to improve the quality of life for current and prospective Northeast Kingdom residents.
