Next Century Cities is busy organizing another get-together for broadband advocates, community leaders, and policy gurus. “Connected New England: Local Solutions for Broadband Development” will happen on November 8th in Hartford, Connecticut. Save the date!

Burlington Telecom (BT), the Fiber-to-the-Home (FTTH) ISP in Burlington, Vermont, has been celebrating two pieces of recent good news. The ISP received praise from customers in a BT survey, and became the first fiber provider in its region to be “fiber certified.”

Local fall referendums are still a few months away, but at least four additional Colorado communities have decided to put local broadband authority on the ballot.

California

How Silicon Valley can use community input to bridge the big broadband gap by Mohammad Shakouri and Jon Walton, Silicon Valley Business Journal

Georgia

Spanish Fork, Utah, was recently highlighted in a promotional video touting the successes of its municipal Internet service.

Lobbyists from the cable and telecom industry succeeded in using the legislature to firm up their rural Massachusetts monopolies this session. Communities that rely on state funds for local publicly owned broadband infrastructure projects now face restrictions on the reach of their high-speed networks.

A Long Trip Through the Legislature

Great Lakes Energy (GLE), Michigan’s largest electric cooperative and third largest energy utility, is constructing a Fiber-to-the-Home (FTTH) network to bring gigabit connectivity to its 125

If you’ve never visited the Great Lakes Region in the autumn, you’ve missed out. Now is your chance to redeem yourself and to increase your knowledge for your community.

Interest in broadband as a utility continues to rise across the country and in places where elected officials need a show of support, grassroots groups are stepping up. Recently in Portland, Oregon, a group of locals launched Municipal Broadband PDX, an effort to grow an already increasing momentum in the Rose City.

California

Oxnard sees high-speed Internet expansion as an economic development tool by Wendy Leung, VC Star

Colorado

Dorchester County, Maryland, shored up better connectivity for local businesses this past June, utilizing a cooperative network to further fiber infrastructure and to light a business on an island chain in need of some fast Internet connectivity.

Sometimes best ideas are brewed up over a pint, and Michaelston-y-Fedw Internet proves that.