Local efforts
Spokesman Rick Jenkinson said the company expects to boost that to over 90 percent within 12 months after broadband gaps are filled in areas including Boston and former Cablevision-served suburbs, Springfield, the Cape Cod communities of Orleans and Brewster, and smaller towns in the upper Pioneer Valley. "We've been deploying and spending that money with no tax incentives," Jenkinson said.
Likewise, even as fixed-wireless broadband has proven to be a financial disaster for companies such as now-bankrupt Teligent and Winstar, some small local companies are pressing ahead with wireless broadband here, vowing not to make the mistake of building a network far ahead of landing customers.
At the state level, the Massachusetts Technology Collaborative, a quasi-public state agency based in Westborough, has decided the best role it can play is in promoting "aggregation," or identifying and assembling groups of businesses and organizations that want broadband in unserved areas of the state to entice vendors.
In Berkshire County, the group helped back an effort that has led Global Crossing and Springfield-based Equal Access Networks to begin installing broadband connections at a fraction of the cost of Verizon lines.
A similar effort in Franklin and Hampshire counties got a huge boost through commitments from four area colleges (Amherst, Hampshire, Mount Holyoke and Smith) to use the network.
While still grappling with whether tax breaks, subsidies, or regulatory changes are needed, the collaborative's Tom Hubbard said "aggregation projects can help fill the gaps."
He said this is especially true if state government begins using its leverage in negotiating telecom service contracts for offices in remote corners of the state as vehicles for unserved businesses and organizations to get broadband.
RSS