There has been a lot of exciting progress to bring fast, reliable Internet service to our 20 member communities! Here is a quick summary:
- Where is CVFiber planning service? — We have active projects targeting East Montpelier/Calais, Moretown, and Roxbury/Northfield.
- Seeking Volunteers — We need your help! Read here for more details.
- Contracts & RFPs — We have two open RFPs: Project Management Services; and Pole Inventory.
- Funding: American Rescue Plan Act — We don’t know yet exactly what the implications of this federal money will become, but it seems highly likely we will unlock some additional funds for build out in 2022 as a result.
Where is CVFiber planning service?
CVFiber is in the planning process of building in three regions before the end of this year: East Montpelier/Calais, Moretown, and Roxbury/Northfield. If you live in one of the planned regions, we will send additional information to you as long as you have taken our website survey and agreed that we may contact you! If you haven’t taken the survey, you can do so here: https://cvfiber.net/survey
The Moretown and Roxbury/Northfield phases of build are funded thanks to the CARES act extension that extended COVID relief funds through the end of this year. The East Montpelier/Calais phase will be built in partnership with Vermont Electric Power Company (VELCO) and Washington Electric Cooperative (WEC).
Seeking Volunteers
The CVFiber Governing Board is looking for community volunteers with subject matter expertise to serve on its committees.
CVFiber has four primary working committees, Communications, Finance, Planning and Development, and Policy.
The Communications Committee is seeking volunteers who have public relations, marketing, fundraising campaigns, or other expertise to assist in its work as set out in its charter at https://cvfiber.net/communications/. Specific current need is for someone to help write and disseminate press releases and stories to place in local news outlets.
The Finance Committee is seeking volunteers who have accounting, financial engineering, fundraising strategy, grant writing, legal, or other expertise to assist in its work as set out in its charter at https://cvfiber.net/finance/
The Planning and Development Committee is seeking volunteers who have project management, GIS, strategic planning, utility engineering, broadband networking, or other expertise to assist in focused tasks to support areas set out in its charter at https://cvfiber.net/planning-development/. Specific current need is someone with experience building a public facing dashboard that will show our progress building out our network. Skill set needed: ArcGIS Online Dashboard and Story Map building experience.
The Policy Committee is seeking volunteers who have expertise in organizational development, procedures, policy, legal, or other expertise to assist in its work as set out in its charter at https://cvfiber.net/policy/.
Each committee typically meets monthly, virtually, for one to two hours, but more often as the need requires. Some work will be necessary between meetings.
Contracts & RFPs
We continue to have two outstanding RFPs for services:
- Project Management Services – The search is ongoing.
- Pole Inventory – We are working to narrow the field on all of the RFPs received by providing answers to asked questions. We anticipate selecting a small number of finalists and moving into a Request for Bids process that will require sharing some under-NDA information.
Funding: American Rescue Plan Act
Thanks to the American Rescue Plan Act, there is going to be a large amount of federal money flowing to states. One of the approved ways states can use this money is to invest in broadband. We anticipate CVFiber will get access to some of the funds, but it is too early to have any idea about how much will become available, when, or what strings it may have attached. Stay tuned for further updates.
As always, thank you to everyone who helps push the idea of fast Internet service for our rural neighbors forward!