BLANDFORD – The Board of Selectmen held a joint meeting with the Municipal Light Board (MLB) on Monday in Blandford to take care of one last item before submitting the request for more than $1 million earmarked by the state for Blandford’s broadband efforts.
Blandford Municipal Light Board chair Peter Langmore, members Kim Bergland and June Massa. (Photo by Amy Porter)
Needed was a vote by the board to authorize the ballot question on debt exclusion for municipal broadband work, which appeared on the warrant for the town election and passed 80 to 56, but was not voted by the Board of Selectmen. Procedurally, the town counsel had recommended that the board vote to ratify the placement of the question on the ballot retroactively, which passed.
The ratification was the last step before submission of a letter to the state for bond capital for the make ready work, including pole surveys.
MLB member Kim Bergland said the town is working with Wired West and speaking with Westfield Gas & Electric about laying down the fiber optic for the network after the make ready work is completed, but no contract has been signed. The town of Otis has just spent a year completing the pole surveys and is ready to start the fiber work with Westfield G&E. Otis has offered to help Blandford with the make ready work, which the MLB said has to happen next regardless of who Blandford ends up working with in the end.
“We’re trying to fulfill the checklist for the Bond Council for state money. Then you make real decisions,” said MLB chair Peter Langmore.
After the meeting, MLB member June Massa, who is also the town tax collector, said that as it stands right now, Westfield G&E is the only one approved in this part of the state for the bond to do the work. She said with 52 square miles of land, which she said is the largest land area for towns and a small population (1,233 residents based on 2010 census), other providers are not interested, or if they are, not approved. “That’s why we don’t have cable,” Massa said.
Langmore said Blandford is continuing to work with WiredWest, a cooperative of municipal light plants, which he said provides an economy of scale for purchasing and billing. He said WiredWest has voted Westfield G&E, also a municipal light plant, as their preferred provider.
During the meeting, Board of Selectman Adam Dolby said the town is approaching the time for an information event on broadband, to which Langmore agreed, and said he would invite representatives from Westfield G&E and WiredWest.
“We are moving along very quickly now, more so than in the last five years,” Langmore, who has been involved in the effort for that long, said.
“We’re starting to smell the finish line,” Bergland added.
