BRATTLEBORO — With six weeks to go, it is now certain that the Shumlin administration's self-imposed deadline of universal broadband Internet coverage for Vermont by Dec. 31, 2013 will not be met.
But the state is much closer to that goal than it was in January 2011, when Gov. Peter Shumlin first unveiled his plan.
At a news conference on Nov. 20, Shumlin said that less than 1 percent of the homes in Vermont - about 3,000 in all - still lack high-speed Internet service. Of those homes without service, solutions have been identified for the vast majority, though connection dates remain elusive.
At least $174 million of federal funds, millions more of state money, and an untold amount of private investment by telecom providers has been poured into the effort since 2010. According to a congressional aide, Vermont's share of stimulus funding for broadband buildout surpassed all others when measured by funding per capita.
So the question still hangs out there in the unserved areas of Windham County: “How soon will we receive broadband coverage?”
VTel, Southern Vermont Cable, and FairPoint are the three main recipients of government funding that are working with the Vermont Telecommunications Authority (VTA) to provide broadband in Windham County.
VTel is using its Wireless Open World (WOW) service to provide 4G LTE (Long Term Evolution) broadband service. It has proposed building towers for its transmitting antennas in Guilford, Marlboro, Newfane, and Vernon, and piggybacking on existing antennas in Putney, Townshend, and Westiminster.
However, VTel's network is a work in progress, and company officials say it may not be completed until mid-2015, which happens to be the federal deadline for completing the network as per their requirements.
And in some towns, Jamaica and Stratton among them, no suitable sites for VTel's towers have yet been found.
FairPoint, the the state's primary landline telephone provider, has been expanding its high-speed network. It says it has invested nearly $100 million in its network in Vermont and has added 1,100 miles of new fiber, providing high-speed access to 90 percent of its service area.
According to Sabina Haskell, director of regional public relations for FairPoint, the company upgraded central office switching centers in Bellows Falls, Jacksonville, Newfane, and Wilmington in March of this year.
Haskell said FairPoint has also expanded coverage in selected areas of Brattleboro, Dummerston, Halifax, Putney, Townshend, Wardsboro, Westminster, Whitingham, and Wilmington.
“We've pretty much finished off the majority of the work this year,” she said. “There are a few homes in Wilmington that we're still working on getting coverage to, and we should have that done by next June.”
FairPoint received last week a grant of $104,000 from VTA to bring the company's DSL service along portions of Boyd Hill Road, Old Mill Lane, Rader Road, and Riley Boyd Road.
Southern Vermont Cable (www.svcable.net) got $117,737 from VTA to extend its service in Dummerston along all or portions of the following roads: Dutton Farm, Emery Hill, Kipling, Knapp East, Miller, Nourse Hollow, Park Laughton, Spaulding Hill, and Tucker Reed.
Earlier this year, Southern Vermont Cable got $135,804 from VTA to extend service in Newfane along all or portions of Newfane Hill Road and Grout Road. In Putney, SVC made its service available on East Putney Ferry Road.
SVC President Ernie Scialabba said last week that the two projects will entail “a minimal amount of infrastructure work; most of the cost is in the new construction, which will be fiber to the home.”
He said all of SVC's services, including television and phone service, will be available to new customers once the work is done.
“In the Newfane-Putney grant areas, we expect to have service available by the end of January, depending on weather,” Scialabba said. “Dummerston should be finished by the end of June.”
How fast is fast?
As people come to expect more from technology and use more devices to connect to the World Wide Web, infrastructure struggles to keep pace. The state's working definition of “high-speed,” in particular, is up for debate.
Jim Porter, director of telecommunications for the Public Service Department, said state regulators take cues from the federal government's standards for grant funding, which is typically 4 megabits per second (Mbps) upload and 1 Mbps download speed.
When asked the minimum speed that qualifies as “high-speed” in Vermont however, Porter responded with a different federal standard:
“I think the FCC continues to define 768 Kbps/200Kbps service as broadband service,” Porter said, describing rates about one-fifth of the higher standard.
In fact, the FCC upgraded its definition of “broadband” to the 4/1 standard in its Sixth Broadband Progress Report, in 2010. At the time, the commission admitted that the upgrade was already “long overdue.”
Fairpoint claims download speeds of 15 Mbps of its top “Vantage Point” service. SVC's broadband service has a top speed of 6-7 Mbps. VTel's Wireless Open World is not operational, but its fiber optic wire customers in its telephone coverage area in Windsor County have download speeds of up to 1 gigabyte per second.
Pricing the service is variable. VTel charges $34.95 per month for its Gig-E service. SVC's top service costs $44.95 monthly, although it's cheaper when bundled with phone and television service. For Fairpoint's 3 Mbps service, the cost is $34.99 per month.
The Vermont way
Connection gaps, debatable speed of the network that does exist, and unclear comparative cost of Internet services are not enough to dampen the enthusiasm of David Weinstein, a senior policy analyst for Sen. Bernie Sanders. He said federal funding agencies see Vermont as ahead of the curve.
Three strategies set Vermont apart, Weinstein said:
First is the strategy of concentrating high-speed service to “anchor” institutions, such as schools, hospitals, banks, public offices and major businesses. Second, a “wireless canopy” strategy helps reach rural areas by bypassing phone, cable and fiber optic networks. Finally, coordinating broadband technology with “smart-grid” infrastructure establishes Vermont as a pioneer among other states.
“Some of the projects certainly are are moving along a little bit slower than we had hoped - not unusual,” Weinstein said. But federally funded telecom infrastructure projects “are starting to pay dividends,” he said. “When this is all built out, we'll have one of the fastest speed networks in the entire country.”
In the meantime, Secretary of Administration Jeb Spaulding is more than satisfied with Vermont's progress so far.
“I think most Vermonters would be very impressed that we're getting over 99 percent coverage by the end of 2013,” Spaulding said. “I think (the governor) is excited and thankful and gratified for the progress we have made, and I think for all intents and purposes, we have hit his target.”
That said, Spaulding said, the work is not done.
“This is not a marathon. This race doesn't end,” Spaulding said. He acknowledged that improved speed and affordability, plus greater digital literacy, are constant goals.