BFRR Mailing on Way to Municipalities

We got the following mailing out the door yesterday. It was sent to all municipalities in the region.

Assistance Available to Communities to Obtain High Speed Internet Access


Rural Pennsylvania communities, like [municipality name] are consistently challenged to compete with their more urban neighbors for services that attract people and business to the area, and prevent current residents and existing businesses from leaving. Increasingly, people are basing their decisions about where they live and work based on whether or not high speed internet access (broadband) is available. Many rural communities in Pennsylvania don’t have broadband access at all!

Until recently, there wasn’t much a community in Pennsylvania could do to accelerate broadband deployment in its area. Then, the Governor signed Act 183 and telephone companies across the state have made some aggressive commitments on deploying broadband service.

Act 183 of 2004, commonly referred to as Chapter 30, is a state law instructing some Pennsylvania telephone companies to honor customer petitions to provide Broadband Internet service once certain conditions are met. Specifically:

If 50 customers or 25% of the customers in a designated customer service area, whichever is less, commit to purchase broadband for a minimum of one year, the telephone company must deploy broadband within 365 days.

The Northwest Pennsylvania Regional Planning and Development Commission recently received a grant from the PA Department of Community and Economic Development to assist communities in leveraging the provisions of Act 183 and the BFRR program. The Commission will use the grant to assist communities in Northwest Pennsylvania by:

· Advertising and promoting BFRR assistance
· Recruiting community “sparkplugs” (leaders who will serve as a liaison between the community and the Northwest Commission)
· Coordinating assistance with telephone companies
· Educating the community
· Aggregating broadband customers
· Educating local leadership

The Commission is seeking a sparkplug(s) in the customer service area that includes [municipality name]. Once this person is identified, the Commission will work with them, and the community, to pursue broadband deployment, through the provisions of Act 183, as constructively and expeditiously as possible.

I would be glad to address any questions you might have regarding the BFRR program, and/or other technology initiatives within your community. Please feel free to contact me at your convenience at 814.677.4800 x122 or via e-mail at randyr@nwcommission.org.