Quote:According to this article and what I think I'm reading, it sounds like they started out using private built lines in 2001 (which would mean someone else paid for the infrastructure) for DSL. Then they upgraded to fiber network with a service bond which is paid by the revenue they generate with the new fiber optic system?

 

Where are you getting this from?  

“We couldn't get a DSL line at City Hall and this was back in 2001,” Knapp explained in the Institute for Self-Reliance Video. “We literally called the phone company and said, ‘We want broadband,’ and they said, ‘Sorry, we don't have it.’”


 

Quote: 

Construction of SandyNet’s fiber network began in June 2014 after about three years of research and negotiation with construction companies. Sandy was able to get the revenue bond because “we had all that experience of 10-plus years running an ISP, and we were able to do some pretty accurate revenue projections,” Knapp said.

<p style="color:rgb(38,48,52);font-family:Arial, sans-serif;">To break even, SandyNet calculated that it needed 35 percent of the community to subscribe. It blew past that and as a result had to borrow an additional $500,000 on top of the original $7.5 million to cover the extra construction costs. Debt service will be paid off over the next 20 years.

<p style="color:rgb(38,48,52);font-family:Arial, sans-serif;">SandyNet now has more than 50 miles of fiber, all underground, and it passes every residential property in the 3.14-square mile city. SandyNet offered free installation to residents who signed up during construction, and about 2,000 took the service up on the offer.

<p style="color:rgb(38,48,52);font-family:Arial, sans-serif;">The first customers were brought online in September 2014. When we spoke to Knapp on July 22, about 1,400 homes were hooked up, with new ones being added at the rate of about 50 per week. Residents that haven’t already signed up will have to pay a $350 one-time construction fee “to help offset the cost of getting fiber from the distribution network up to the side of the house,” Knapp said.

<p style="color:rgb(38,48,52);font-family:Arial, sans-serif;">The last few feet of construction are the most difficult.

<p style="color:rgb(38,48,52);font-family:Arial, sans-serif;">“What we found is… the last 50 feet to get to the house is the most difficult part. You've got to go around irrigation systems, you're tearing up people’s landscaping. It's not the most fun,” Knapp said.

<p style="color:rgb(38,48,52);font-family:Arial, sans-serif;">The city is doing all this with a very small staff. While Sandy hired a construction company to build the network, Knapp and his staff of four other employees manage SandyNet and do IT support for the city government’s internal systems.

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<p style="color:rgb(38,48,52);font-family:Arial, sans-serif;">Also keep in mind they do this in the UK as well, of which our major telecomm companies LOVE (they just don't love it enough to want it here)

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