Bolinas is on a short list for areas across the state that could receive grant money from the California Public Utilities Commission as part of the agency’s effort to improve broadband internet infrastructure in underserved areas.
A draft white paper, titled “High Impact Areas for Broadband Availability” and published in February, identified 13 areas thought to “represent the best ‘bang for the buck’ for deploying broadband internet infrastructure to more California households.” Aside from Cobb in Lake County, most of the other areas are in Southern California.
The commission is seeking public comment until March 15 on its process for selecting the areas, including whether existing internet providers already serve the areas or could commit to serving them, or if other communities were overlooked.
“Bolinas made the list of the 13 ‘high impact areas’ in our white paper because it fit the methodology staff chose for this particular analysis,” Constance Gordon, a public information officer for the commission, said. “The census blocks in Bolinas that staff identified have higher household density than many unserved and underserved areas in the state. The residents living in those blocks have access to internet service at very slow speeds, with some being unserved, and staff didn’t see as many terrain issues as it did in other communities they looked at, which suggests that it may be relatively less expensive to serve Bolinas when compared to other communities in the state with mountainous terrain.”
The grant money, about $34 million, is what remains from the C.P.U.C.’s now-defunct program known as the California Advanced Services Fund. The program, which doled out funds to underserved areas since 2008, was not renewed for 2017.
During a special meeting last week, the BCPUD’s board approved a comment letter that commended the draft paper and urged the commission to include Bolinas in its review of infrastructure grant proposals.
Under the rules of the program, only broadband service providers can apply for grants. The Bolinas district’s newly formed internet committee will recommend the district put out a request for proposals from internet providers at its regular meeting next Wednesday.
The white paper stated that the best internet service currently available in Bolinas is six megabits per second download. In its letter to the commission, the Bolinas board detailed further woes.
“It is not at all unusual, as confirmed by one of our BCPUD directors using speedtest.net, for speeds in the evening to be less than 3 megabits per second download and less than 1 megabit per second upload,” Jack Siedman, president of the board, wrote in the letter. “Moreover, there is an internet access problem even more serious than download speed in Bolinas: BCPUD has been informed by many community members over the past year that they have been unable to obtain DSL service at all due to lack of local capacity.”
In 2014, under the guidance of then-Supervisor Steve Kinsey, the Marin Broadband Task Force was formed to improve broadband across the county. The task force added seven West Marin communities to the C.P.U.C.’s list of potential recipients of grants from the California Advanced Services Fund. Nicasio collaborated with Inyo Networks and in July 2016, the C.P.U.C. awarded Inyo a nearly $1.5 million grant to develop a fiber optic network in conjunction with the Nicasio Landowners Association. The company and the association are raising about $1 million within the community to match the grant and are expecting to begin work later this year.
To read the draft white paper, visit bit.ly/2mGUTs8.