Last year we noted how “scrappy” Island residents in Maine were taking matters into their own hands and building their own fiber broadband networks despite massive financial and logistic challenges. One such community, Isle au Haut, says it has completed its fiber deployment with ample help from locals – and federal and state grants.

After a decade of planning, several dozen residents of the island (with a summer population of around 300) recently celebrated a ribbon cutting ceremony on June 28, alongside build partners that included the Island Institute, Axiom Technologies, and Hawkeye Fiber Optics.

The deployment required the construction of a new six mile undersea fiber run, the creation of a new central switch station near the town landing, and last mile fiber deployment to residents currently connected to the power grid. All overseen by the The Isle Au Haut Broadband Committee, first established back in 2018.

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In 2022, Isle au Haut was awarded a grant from the National Telecommunications and Information Administration, (NTIA) with matching funds contributed by the State of Maine and the Maine Connectivity Authority.

Peppered by winding country roads and remote islands, Maine exemplifies the challenges in even deployment of affordable broadband. But thanks to tenacious island communities and forward-thinking state leadership, a growing roster of community-owned broadband networks are leading the charge toward affordable access in the Pine Tree State.

Peggy Schaffer, former executive director of the state of Maine's broadband mapping and expansion effort, ConnectMaine, has played a starring role in shoring up Maine’s broadband mapping data after years of federal dysfunction.

Schaffer’s well versed in the broad array of challenges faced by remote Maine communities, and says she’s long been impressed by the “scrappy” nature of Maine’s community-owned island deployments, which have faced down and overcome no limit of onerous challenges in an  ongoing quest to finally bridge the state’s long standing digital divide.

Maine is currently ranked 49th in the U.S. in terms of resident access to gigabit-capable broadband service. Like so much of the country, the state is heavily dominated by regional monopolies that failed to uniformly deliver affordable, next-generation broadband, despite decades of federal subsidies, regulatory favors, and tax breaks.

Now local Maine communities are taking matters into their own hands, beginning with long-neglected island residents no stranger to unique logistical challenges.

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‘It’s A Story Of Perseverance’