It's no secret that delivering broadband Internet service to every corner of Vermont has not been easy to accomplish.
But what's been happening in the Londonderry area in recent weeks illustrated all the potential pitfalls to delivering this service - and what it will take to overcome them.
The trouble started when Great Auk Wireless (GAW), which serves about 50 customers in Londonderry, Stratton and Winhall, learned a few months ago that Stratton Mountain Resort had increased the company's rent for a cell phone tower on the mountain from $300 to $2,300 a month.
Great Auk CEO Josh Garza said that with the rent increase, it no longer made economic sense to continue using the Stratton site for 50 wireless Internet customers.
“We're not in the business of turning customers off,” said Garza, “but we really need more customers to be profitable.”
State Rep. Oliver Olsen, R-Jamaica, then stepped in and arranged a meeting last week between GAW and residents to work out a compromise to keep the Stratton transmitter operating until an alternative can be found.
“It was a good meeting,” said Olsen. “There were a few gripes about the existing service, but overall, it was a very positive meeting. The next steps are that I will be heading up an effort to organize folks in the local area to identify unserved households that are looking for broadband and to help identify potential transmission sites.”
Recently, more than $150 million in federal economic stimulus grants and loans were awarded to several Vermont companies, including Sovernet Communications in Bellows Falls and VTel in Springfield, to improve and expand high-speed Internet access.
Great Auk Wireless did not receive funding.
Also, the Vermont Telecomunications Authority recently announced that six companies - North Country Communications, Cloud Alliance, EC Fiber, FairPoint, Sovernet and VTel - submitted proposals for its Backroads Broadband program, which is designed to bring service to 10,000 households and businesses in 99 communities where broadband is lacking and offers money to service providers to connect these towns.
According to VTA Chairman Chris Campbell, VTel was asked to provide a list of communities that would be covered by the company's proposed wireless Internet service. Campbell said towns that will be getting broadband coverage through programs funded with federal stimulus money will not be eligible to participate in the VTA's Backroads Broadband.
Garza said GAW did not submit a proposal.
“There are a lot of strings attached to programs [like Backroads Broadband] and the VTA's proposal did not meet our needs,” he said.
Growing pains
Great Auk Wireless, which was formed in Brattleboro in 2005 by Garza and some other partners, has been on a growth spurt over the last year or so.
Last year, the company bought Power Shift in Stowe, APC Services in Rutland and Southern New England Wireless Internet Service Provider Inc. in Springfield, Mass. Earlier this year, it bought FINOWEN in West Lebanon, N.H.
With the acquisitions, GAW now serves more than 1,600 customers in Vermont, New Hampshire, Massachusetts and Connecticut.
“It gives us an opportunity to merge our resources with other companies [that were doing] similar things as we are,” Garza said.
Now a privately held company with 20 employees, GAW is based in Agawam, Mass. Garza said it is trying to balance servicing the rural customers that gave the company its start with competing in urban areas in Massachusetts and Connecticut.
“If you're in business because you're the only guy there, you don't deserve to be in business,” said Garza. “We love servicing rural customers and love seeing the faces of people who haven't had broadband light up when we tell them we can bring itto them. But for us to grow as a company, we have to be competitive in urban as well as rural markets.”
Garza admitted that merging other operations into GAW - such as LastMileNet, the wireless Internet service provider that had serviced the Londonderry area before its sale to GAW - has meant some difficulties.
“We ended up dealing with the legacies of the companies we bought; not just the networks, but the expectations,” said Garza. “It hasn't been easy.”
Hopes and realities
It might sound like sour grapes coming from the mouth of a CEO whose company got shut out of the federal stimulus bonanza, but Garza said that Vermonters who are expecting universal broadband service in the next couple of years will be bitterly disappointed.
“Ninety percent of the federal money is being spent on what's called 'middle mile' service. That's the wireless towers and the fiber network, and it is totally different from what we do as a 'last mile' provider,” said Garza. “There's no requirement for any of the recipients of the federal money to deliver last-mile service. That's why it's going to take longer to bring broadband to Vermont than people think.”
Garza is more hopeful about the VTA's Backroads Broadband project, “since that actually deals with last-mile service.”
The state program will subsidize the service to customers of companies that make broadband available to 100 percent of an area unserved by high-speed Internet.
But one of the reasons why GAW declined to be part of it is that the project “doesn't fully deal with the capital part of the equation,” Garza said. “Having money makes broadband expansion possible, especially in those last mile towns, and it's tough for a small company like ours to compete against the big companies.”
He added that “the numbers matter, but our expansion isn't just based on numbers. We also make decisions based on who needs the service more, because we still think it's an important part of our business to bring service to people who can't get it any other way. Not many people want to do the hard work of the last mile. It's easier to put up towers and string wire than to go house-to-house.”
Garza also said Vermonters shouldn't give up hope on getting broadband soon.
“The most important thing you can do is stay after your government officials,” he said. “The more they are challenged, the more accountability there will be and the better the money will be spent. It would be great if Great Auk was the company that provides the last mile, but it's more important that the companies that did get the money spend it properly.”