City of Bloomington: Regional Partnership to Create City-wide Fiber-to-the-Home Network

The Challenge

In the 21st century, high speed internet service is nearly as important as other utilities in residents’ daily lives like water, electric, and sewer services. As a globally connected community of remote workers, at-home students, and movers and shakers, access to high speed internet has proven to be an essential investment towards improving inclusion, digital equity, and residents' daily lives. 

For several years, the City of Bloomington has sought a partner to develop, build and operate a Fiber to the Premise (FTTP) system allowing multiple service providers to use the same infrastructure. 

“Today’s workers need reliable digital connections to thrive. How many home-bound seniors need high-speed internet for better health care? How many working parents need affordable access to get a high school diploma or a new skill from home to raise their earnings?” - Mayor John Hamilton

The City of Bloomington is meeting the challenge of providing wider access for residents’ needs; such as school, work, telehealth, home security, and entertainment. Residents across Bloomington have spoken up about slow speeds and spotty access to this critical service, and soon residents will be able to access high-speed internet connection that rivals competitors and increases digital equity. 

The Idea

In order to meet this challenge, the City of Bloomington has partnered with Meridiam to collaborate on a groundbreaking digital equity program, to advance opportunities for low-income and digitally-disadvantaged households to access top-quality internet services. This high-speed fiber network will reach at least 85% of Bloomington residences. 

The City of Bloomington will allow for more community control over the fiber network.

In an article with the Herald Times, City of Bloomington ITS Director Rick Dietz stated,

“The current providers are not meeting our objectives and we believe that greater competition will help.”

The Costs

The contract allows for Meridiam to invest more than $50 million in Bloomington and over $90 million in total (Columbus and Shelbyville) to bring high -speed internet access to nearly every neighborhood and resident in the City. This open-access-model fiber network will include an emphasis on digital equity, and the City of Bloomington will partner with Meridiam on this initiative with up to $1 million in investment. An expenditure agreement reimburses Meridiam over a 20-year period, 95 percent of the $10.9 million in personal property taxes on conduit and fiber, of which will be paid by Meridiam during that time. 

The Benefits

World-class fiber broadband service: This innovation will allow for a future-proof internet service providing Bloomington residents and businesses with speedy download and upload speeds at costs comparable to other providers.

Nation-leading digital equity program: The digital equity initiative will provide income-qualifying households with 250 Megabits per second symmetrical internet service for $30 per month. The City and Meridiam will together provide the “drop” connection to qualifying households at no cost, which combined with the Biden Administration’s new $30 Affordable Connectivity Program means eligible low-income residents can receive high bandwidth fiber-based internet service at zero net cost.

Open-access network; Through a contract with the initial ISP, Meridiam’s network will offer service of at least 1 Gigabit per second symmetrical speed (equal upload and download) everywhere the Meridiam network reaches. The cost of service rates with the initial ISP will be competitive locally and regionally. 

Regional impact: In addition to Bloomington, the overall fiber project includes Columbus, Shelbyville and Bartholomew County.

"When the history of how the United States transitioned from the single-digit broadband speeds a decade ago to gigabit networks is written, it will be clear that cities played a key catalytic role,”

stated Blair Levin, Executive Director of the 2010 National Broadband Plan and nonresident senior fellow at the Brookings Metropolitan policy program.

“Bloomington's announcement, with its elements of an open-access next-generation network and digital equity, will likely deserve its own chapter. Progress requires bold experiments that chart new paths, exactly what Bloomington is doing."

Metadata

Department(s): Office of the Mayor, Information & Technology Services, Office of the Controller

Department Point(s) of Contact: Mayor John Hamilton mayor@bloomington.in.gov, Rick Dietz - ITS Director, dietzr@bloomington.in.gov, Beth Cate - Legal Counsel beth.cate@bloomington.in.gov, Alex Crowley - Economic and Sustainable Development Director crowleya@bloomington.in.gov, Jeffrey Underwood - Controller underwoj@bloomington.in.gov

Partner(s): Meridiam, City of Columbus Indiana, City of Shelbyville Indiana

Partner Points of Contact: N/A

Type of Innovation: Technical/Software, Process Improvement 

Date Implemented: July 2022