All or nothing for Digital 299 tomorrow

22 March 2017 by Steve Blum
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Update, 23 March 2017: the CPUC voted 4 to 1 to approve the Digital 299 grant this morning.

The Digital 299 middle mile fiber system will either get all of the $47 million that its backers are requesting from the California Advanced Services Fund, or it won’t be subsidised at all. The California Public Utilities Commission will make that choice tomorrow, assuming the current schedule holds, when it considers whether or not to fund a 300-mile fiber route that would begin near Redding, where it would connect to existing fiber lines along the I-5 corridor, and run through Trinity County and terminate on the Humboldt County coast, at Eureka and Trinidad.

When it was proposed in August 2015, the applicant – Inyo Networks – asked for a $51 million grant, based on the assessment that the project area was unserved, in other words, there was no broadband service available at all. That would have made the project eligible for 70% funding from CASF. However, after it had been under review for a year and a half – despite the fact that commission rules call for that work to be completed in three and a half months – that figure was trimmed back to $41 million. CPUC staff rated most of the territory as underserved – eligible for only 60% funding – and accepted late objections from Frontier Communications and Charter Communications which resulted in the majority of the included last mile service area being taken out and a reduction in the middle mile subsidy, respectively.

When the Commission first considered the project last month, Inyo Networks and supporters from the Humboldt area asked for $6 million more for the project, as well as easier completion bond requirements. At the time, commissioner Carla Peterman said she’d draft an alternate resolution that would do that. Instead, the original resolution was rewritten – it was published last week, but I missed it – to raise the grant amount and relax bonding specs. That means that there will only be one resolution on the table – the lower cost option is gone, absent a move by commissioners to revive it.

The big question now is whether it can muster three votes. At last month’s meeting, president Michael Picker said he’s “likely to vote against this under any circumstances”, and rookie commissioner Martha Guzman Aceves expressed similar skepticism. That means fellow rookie Clifford Rechtschaffen, Liane Randolph and Peterman will all have to vote yes. Otherwise, Digital 299 dies.