(2/15) The Thurmont commissioner received an hour and forty-minute presentation regarding a proposed town-owned internet service for local residents and businesses at their February 9 meeting.
Commissioner Martin Burns spearheaded the establishment of an internet commission to explore options and costs that would be applicable to founding a Thurmont-owned and operated highspeed internet service for the community.
Internet Commission member Dan Kosek said that one advantage Thurmont has is that it "actually owns its own electrical distribution," which includes the poles, the wires that run between them, and the distribution of power to the town, "which gives us a (existing) path through town to do a fiber build-out when that’s appropriate."
Additionally, he said there are three tall water-towers in the municipality, "so we have nice, tall venues to use wireless services from (to serve as distribution towers)."
Kosek further noted that the current, primary internet-providers to customers in Thurmont include Comcast and Verizon, adding … one of the downsides of using available, commercial providers is using Comcast service as an example, customers often are receiving half, or less-than-half, of the gigabits or megabits for which the customers are paying.
Kopek stated that creating a fiber-optic network is expensive, so the commission explored a less- expensive strategy which would provide businesses and residents with a service in the interim that is fast and would allow the town to build a strictly fiber-optic network over time.
He suggested the start-up could be in the form of a wireless system running on the frequency once restricted for use by the former Citizen Band Radio Service (CBRS). This would enable the town to provide in-town wireless internet service to residences and businesses without having to run cable-lines to the location of the customers. There would be a receiver installed outside of each customer’s home or business-location, and a wire that would run from that receiver to the computer’s modem.
The profits generated could then be used toward paying for the fiber build-out (which could take up to several years to complete) Kopek said.
The proposal, if pursued, would begin with a pilot-program which, would hopefully be comprised of 235 residential and businesses-users, which would entail the acquisition of the equipment, with the pilot-system to be operated by a contractor, at an estimated $235,000, which could be recovered in under three-years through user-fees. The proposed user-fees that would be charged would run from $50 to $80 per-month for residential, and $75 to $180 per-month for businesses, based on the amounts of megabits provided.
Although the commissioners took no formal action on the proposed service, Mayor Kinnaird thanked the presenters for their efforts, noting that after reviewing the information … the board will likely have more questions.
