Last year, two power companies providing electricity to Brown County residents announced plans to bring high-speed fiber internet to their homes.
Those projects by South Central Indiana REMC and Jackson County REMC are still in the works, with some fiber “drops” to homes expected to happen at the end of this year.
SCI REMC is planning a five-year fiber-to-the-home construction project that would provide gigabit internet to approximately 24,000 homes in Brown and six other nearby counties, according to its Next Level Connections grant application through the Indiana Office of Community and Rural Affairs.
The company had applied for a $4,831,839 grant to help with the $20 million cost to bring fiber to more than 6,000 members in Brown County, said Tammy Haeinlein, SCI REMC public relations specialist.
When Next Level Connections grant recipients were announced last month, SCI REMC was not on that list.
However, that won’t stop the Brown County project.
Haeinlein said SCI REMC is working to clarify why its application was denied, and it’s working with the Indiana Office of Community and Rural Affairs to create a path for future funding.
Bumps in the road
SCI REMC’s application for Next Level Connections funding from the state received five challenges from internet providers that already serve customers in Brown County.
Only one of those challenges, from AT&T, was found to be invalid. Other challenges came from CenturyLink, Comcast, Mainstream Fiber Networks LLC and Smithville Communications.
An internet provider is able to challenge a grant application through OCRA if the company is already providing service at or above the applied-for speed, or if it can provide documentation that shows it plans to provide that service by July 2021, according to the grant website.
From SCI REMC’s perspective, Brown County doesn’t have that service now.
“For our portion of Brown County, we have illustrated the ‘unserved’ reality by surveying our electric members and asking each of them to run a speed test from home,” SCI REMC’s grant application reads.
“Participation was amazing. As a result, we were able to collect a large sample of actual speed-test data from our members.”
The application included a map of addresses that tested at download speeds of less than 10 Mbps.
“We also received thousands of comments about that poor state of existing service and the excitement about this project,” the application said.
The Democrat reached out to Mainstream Fiber Networks and Smithville Communications to ask why they challenged the SCI-REMC grant and what speeds they were hoping to offer or were already providing in the county.
Those calls were not returned by deadline.
SEE A MAP OF SCI REMC’S ZONES BY CLICKING HERE.
Construction update
Despite losing out on a share of nearly $5 million in grant funding, SCI REMC continues to work on bringing broadband internet to Brown County.
There are five zones in the northwestern part of the county that SCI REMC is working in now. SCI REMC calls them Needmore 102, 103 and 104 and Bean Blossom 101 and 102.
The Needmore zones include areas like Waycross, portions of State Road 45, Annandale Estates, Bear Creek Road, Slippery Elm Shoot Road, Helmsburg Road, Oak Grove Road, State Road 46 West, Plum Creek Road, East North Shore Drive and East Shore Drive.
According to a recent construction update, SCI REMC crews are “making significant progress constructing our fiber backbone all the way from Martinsville to the Needmore area.”
This “backbone” section is required before service can be brought to the Needmore zones.
“The good news is that we expect this construction to be completed by the end of September,” the update states.
Building the fiber network within the three Needmore zones is almost complete, with crews actively installing drops to homes.
Once a drop has been installed at a home, those customers will receive an email when the system is ready and the backbone is complete to schedule an in-home installation. That work is forecast to begin in early October.
SCI REMC customers are encouraged to register for broadband service if they have not done so yet.
“The scheduling and construction process is significantly accelerated if members register before contractors leave the area,” the update states.
The Bean Blossom 101 zone includes Fruitdale and both sides of State Road 135 North to the county line. It covers a “very large and rural area,” the construction update states.
The construction of the fiber distribution network in that zone is expected to begin soon, with fiber drops to the home expected to start this December. SCI REMC expects to be completed with this zone by the middle of next year.
Bean Blossom 102 includes portions of Greasy Creek, Gatesville, Hoover, Clay Lick and Upper Salt Creek roads. The distribution network has begun in this zone.
“Due to the size of this zone, we are breaking the area into smaller phases to provide service as soon as possible,” the updates states.
The hope is to begin installing drops to the home in November for the first phase, with the goal of providing everyone currently registered to receive service by April next year.
Jackson County REMC
Last year, Mark McKinney, general manager and CEO of Jackson County REMC, said the plan was to add broadband service to Brown County in phase two of his company’s Jackson Connect project.
Jackson County REMC serves about 1,200 power customers in Brown County, with the majority living in Van Buren Township and three in Washington Township. Extending fiber internet service to Brown County was estimated to cost about $3.5 million.
Jackson County REMC also applied for a Next Level Connections OCRA grant and its grant application also was denied. Jackson County REMC’s application received three challenges, from Mainstream, SEI Data Inc./SEI Communications and Frontier Communications. All of those challenges were found to be valid, according to OCRA’s website.
Jackson Connect is working to bring broadband internet of speeds up to 1Gbps to all 20,000 members in its electric service service territory. In the grant application, Jackson Connect cited the “major impact” that providing internet would have on the quality of life for the rural residents the company serves, including allowing people to work from home, get access to telemedicine and device, and fill the “homework gap” for students who do not have internet access at home and are assigned homework online.
The grant also mentioned providing internet for students to complete assignments on E-learning days when schools are closed due to inclement weather.
“There is a 4:1 return on investment for broadband in our rural community. The use and reliance on the internet will only increase in the future. Rural communities should not be left behind,” the application stated.
As of this month, Jackson County REMC does not have anyone connected to internet, but “we are very close to opening that area,” said Nicole Ault, the public relations specialist for Jackson County REMC.
“We are estimating all our members who live in Brown County will be able to schedule their first pre-drop appointment later this fall and into winter,” she said.
Once that appointment is done, customers can expect to have service in eight to 12 weeks. Ault encouraged members to call the Jackson Connect office at 812-358-4458, visit its Facebook page or see the website at JacksonConnect.net for updates.
Despite not receiving grant funding, the Jackson Connect project is fully funded. Jackson County REMC also applied for state and federal grants, but is has not been awarded any.
Initially the project was expected to take five years for the mainline construction. Ault said it’s ahead of schedule, and the hope is to have the mainline construction finished by the summer of 2021, “barring any unforeseen circumstances.”
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Visit join.sciremc.com to read construction updates and see a map showing the broadband construction zones in Brown County that SCI REMC is working on.
Updates on the Jackson County REMC broadband project can be found by calling the office at 812-358-4458 or visiting the company’s Facebook page or website at JacksonConnect.net.
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