SENATOR BENJAMIN DOWNING
BOSTON – Last Thursday, State Senator Benjamin B. Downing (D-Pittsfield) and State Representative Stephen Kulik (D-Worthington) announced that both houses of the Massachusetts State House had enacted an Act Relative to the Massachusetts Broadband Institute, moving the bill to the desk of Governor Deval L. Patrick.
A division of the Massachusetts Technology Collaborative, or MassTech, the Massachusetts Broadband Institute (MBI) has sought to expand affordable high-speed/broadband internet access in the Bay State, long a priority for Downing and Kulik, who represent the most rural and underserved districts in the state.
The bill was drafted in consultation with the MBI and cable provider Comcast, and the process of crafting the legislation began last year, when the MBI did not expect the pending Information Technology Bond Bill to fund last mile solutions in certain hilltowns that are considered “partially served” by cable providers.
STEPHEN KULIK
(D – WORTHINGTON)
The bond bill – $50 million in total, $10 million of which will be used for towns with existing cable access – was discussed in conference committee over the weekend, and is up for vote in both Houses today.
Kulik said the legislation and bond bill are “seperate companion pieces.”
“The legislation is going to enable that $50 million to be spent in innovative and flexible ways to address the needs of different kinds of communities,” he said. “They very much compliment each other and one needs the other to get our last mile initiative underway.”
Kulik referenced Chester and Huntington as communities which are partially served by Comcast for cable television and will benefit from the bond bill.
“This IT Bond Bill was originally proposed by Governor Patrick at $40 million, but I filed an amendment in the House to increase it to $50 million and to devote several million to address the needs of these ‘partial cable towns,'” he said. “We’ve developed a plan so that the state can subsidize the build-out by Comcast or other providers in the communities where they serve a portion of the town but not all of it.”
Regarding the Act Relative to the Massachusetts Broadband Institute, Downing said that bill is “specifically aimed” at dealing with the problem faced by partially-served municipalities.
“This bill gives the Mass. Broadband Institute and Mass. Tech Collaborative the ability to provide grants and incentives to the cable providers if they’re interested in a community of expanding their existing plan for internet access,” Downing said, referencing similar efforts which have been made in rural neighboring states like Vermont.
Regarding the next steps which the state must take to ensure that the rest of rural western Mass. can get broadband service, Downing said the wheels are in motion.
“Once they (these towns) have the resources, the Patrick administration will develop a plan for the rollout of those resources,” said Downing, adding that the western Mass. legislative delegation has been discussing this with Patrick, but didn’t want to announce the plan until they had their ducks in a row.
“We’ll be bringing the conversation out to western Mass., with the Broadband Institute and others, about the different options before communities,” he said. “This last mile is going to be driven by local communities saying what they want – how they want the dollars invested and what role they can play in increasing those investments.”
Monica Webb, chair of the board of directors for WiredWest, a cooperative formed in 2011 to bring high-speed broadband Internet to rural western Mass., said she expects the IT Bond Bill to receive a simple yay-nay vote today and that WiredWest is “very pleased” with the legislation.
“The Governor and legislature have stepped up with coming up with almost half of the funding required for a robust last-mile network,” she said. “This is what we lobbied for so hard in 2008 when the legislation that created the MBI was first proposed – it was to get service for homes and businesses.”
Webb said that the time is now to figure out how to bridge the “funding gap.”
“It really comes down to the towns, which will not be an easy task in many towns. The proposition gives towns the opportunity to finance a long-lived, productive asset at a 50 percent discount,” she said.
Webb said that bridging the funding gap and implementing wireless Internet will help communities “secure the longterm economic viability of their towns and their taxbases”, and referenced a study conducted by Berkshire Regional Planning on population characteristics and loss in rural western Mass.
“It was pretty dire. We’re losing population and, if you follow projections, we’re going to continue losing population, particularly young professionals with families,” she said. “We all now recognize that connection to the Internet is vital today for high quality education, healthcare, telecommuting, and perhaps most importantly, to stimulate business growth and startups. Until all of our towns have that capability, we’re going to lag behind the rest of the state.”
WiredWest, which includes in it’s membership the hilltowns of Blandford, Chester and Huntington, knows that the discussion on bridging the funding gap won’t be an easy one to broach, but Webb is confident, now that the legislature is primed to foot half the bill, that the towns will do their part.
“We already have models for other types of infrastructure – financing and operation models for education and roads, where both the state and municipalities contribute to capital costs and the services are managed locally,” she said. “A lot of this is going to be how to put it in context and understand that this is a significant, longterm investment in an asset that is going to secure the future of our region for decades to come.”
