The East Texas Council of Governments in partnership with the Ark-Tex Council of Governments and the Academy for Advanced Telecommunications at Texas A&M University is submitting an application for broadband initiatives established pursuant to the American Recovery and Reinvestment Act of 2009. The application is due March 26, 2010. Through funding provided by the federal grant, ETCOG seeks to provide the "middle mile" for high speed connectivity to remote, un-served and underserved areas of the fourteen county region.
Broadband infrastructure capacity, connectivity and services at rural health clinics, in mobile ambulances, public computer centers, emergency facilities, libraries, rural workforce development offices, community centers and senior centers will become more accessible if this grant is awarded.
Rural and underserved citizens in the East Texas region will gain faster and less expensive access to electronic news, weather, and medical and emergency services information. Having access to weather and traffic information during severe weather events will help safeguard lives. Ambulances with mobile data capability will do the same. Students will be better prepared for the job market with access to the internet. New markets will be opened up to our citizens for the exchange of goods and information. Therefore, businesses will be in better positions to compete for jobs globally. Based on the current system design and operational characteristics, local governments and school districts who evaluate the use of this facility versus their current access will realize more capacity for the same or reduced costs if they decide to participate. It will take several more weeks before a firm cost estimate is achieved, but today it is estimated the project cost could range between $25 million to $35 million dollars. If our grant proposal is funded, the project will take approximately 2-3 years to complete.
ETCOG cannot be successful in this project without support from regional stakeholders. We are asking for your help. At a minimum we are asking for a letter or email of support for the concept. (I have enclosed a sample letter that could be placed on your letterhead.)
Additionally, you can provide support in the form of information regarding the network transport and commercial internet services you currently use. As part of the grant submission, we have to supply a local baseline for typical internet speeds and costs in the COG. We then base our pricing structure not to exceed 75% of that baseline. By allowing the COG to collect information about prices and typical speeds purchased and supplied, you will potentially facilitate local competition, increased available bandwidth, and reduced costs in your organizations. If you chose to make use of the COG services in the future, your current costs to acquire network transport and commercial internet connectivity can be aggregated with others in the region to be shown as part of the future operational and sustaining revenue for the funding being sought through the grant.
We are also responsible for meeting the 25 percent local match requirement for the grant.
There are multiple options that qualify as local match. Some of these include cash, aerial and terrestrial easement access, utility pole rights, antenna sites such as a building roof, existing tower access, ground access for new tower construction, equipment location sites in existing buildings, and various in-kind contributions, such as volunteer labor in the grant development, volunteer labor and consult during network construction, donation of equipment, outright donation of land, and many others. All of these have fair market values which can be counted as match.
Our goal is to raise $7-$10 million dollars in local match commitments with your help. Please contact us if you are willing to contribute to the match requirements of this grant. We will be contacting you very soon to review match opportunities with you.
Please contact any one of the following people here at ETCOG to address questions you may have or to submit a letter of support and any additional information:
David Cleveland, Executive Director
david.cleveland@etcog.org