Purpose

Work with local agencies and community councils to expand affordable “future-proof” broadband access for rural Klickitat County and the surrounding areas.

Latest Update:

November 06, 2024 SCC Meeting: Broadband Committee Report: Roger reported continuing progress as the 1000 residential unit groups, such as the one Snowden shares with Husum and Appleton, are going out to IPS’s for bid.  The County, specifically Keaton Curtice, with the KC Economic Development Department, is in charge of managing the bidding process.  Washington State has $1.2 billion dollars to fund getting fiber to provide high speed, affordable internet to our doorsteps.  The large ISP’s may not bid because of the grant money requirement that they be willing to share their infrastructure (at fair market value) with other providers; however local start-up ISP Klicknet qualifies and will be bidding on our “Snowden” package.  Klicknet’s Shane Milburn told Roger that a letter of endorsement from the SCC would be a big help towards their winning the bid.  Bidding is open for 60 days and began in October.  In discussion it was generally agreed that before being willing to write a letter of support for any ISP, we would need more information, including: what is Klicknet’s performance record, as in Trout Lake? What can the County tell us about the status of the bidding process, and other bidders?

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Klick Networks, LLC, recently provided an email update on their progress providing Internet service in the Trout Lake area. Residents are invited to check for availability of Internet service by address, and learn about services and pricing at the Klick Networks website:

Be among the first in town to enjoy the benefits of fiber internet – sign up now! Visit our revamped website to check availability by address, learn about services and prices, and to sign up for a site survey. Service activation will happen after we complete the site survey.

The map below shows our current service area in green. We plan to expand service to the areas shaded blue in 2025.

We are committed to bringing you the best possible internet experience and look forward to serving you soon. If you have any questions, drop us an email or give us a call.

Thank you,
Shane & Melissa —
Klick Networks, LLC
www.klicknetworks.com
509-703-6575
support@klicknetworks.com 

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Klickitat County Broadband Newsletter is now available! Issues 1 and 2 of the newsletter can be found here: https://www.klickitatcounty.org/1260/Broadband. To subscribe to the email newsletter, send your request to BroadbandnewsKC@gmail.com. ( 09.09.2024)

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October 02, 2024 SCC Meeting: Broadband Committee Report: Roger reported that “something strange” seems to be going on with the State Broadband Office, as expressed in their Zoom meetings; and he has nothing new to report.

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CenturyLink Petition Update: Bea reported that on September 09, the Washington State Utilities and Transportation Commission DENIED CenturyLink’s petition to be re-classified.  If the CL petition had been approved, CL would drop their rural customers on landlines, leaving many of us isolated and unable to communicate with family, friends, services, and emergency response.  Bea explained that while this is good news, CenturyLink has the opportunity to reword their “Settlement Agreement” and try again, but for now we rural residents dependent upon them are safe (with thanks to the WUTC for doing their job); and hopefully we will have other options for improved broadband before they try again.

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September 04, 2024 SCC Meeting: Broadband Committee Report: Roger reported that a year ago we knew that Washington State was going to get $1.6 billion federal dollars to provide affordable highspeed internet to rural residents, but we needed to engage a “public entity” to seek local grants for us.  We had approached the Klickitat County Public Utilities District (KCPUD) as it is their mandate to help bring vital utility service to difficult to serve rural residents; however they have remained emphatically uninterested.  Klickitat County Commissioners however got the message and created a Broadband Officer within their Economic Development Department, and won grant money to fund a feasibility study on bringing affordable, reliable high speed internet to rural Klickitat County. (“Affordable” is defined as about $50 per month.) The State Broadband office sought public feedback to improve data on Federal Communications Commission (FCC) internet access maps and have by now organized rural communities into groups of 1,000 both easy and hard to serve residences that will be bid on by ISPs to provide service.  The State intends to provide fiber to every door, however recognizing that for some rural situations that will be impossible, and service will have to be “piggy backed” in.  The federal money is to subsidize infra-structure only; on-going service will be paid for by customers of the ISPs.  CenturyLink Petition Update: The Broadband report generated discussion of the pending CenturyLink (CL) petition to the Washington State Utilities and Transportation Committee (WUTC) to be de-regulated so CL can drop their pesky, unprofitable rural customers (many of us!) leaving us without landlines, and in many cases also without internet or any immediate connection to family, friends, services, medical or emergency response.  The WUTC held hearings in July, and Bea reported that their decision is to be announced by September 09, 2024.  CL will then have 60 days to announce whether they accept or will challenge the decision. 

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August 07, 2024 SCC Meeting: Broadband Committee Report: Roger reported the Washington State Broadband Office is “starting to move” again now that the internet accessibility map challenge period is over.  The Broadband Office is grouping households into groups of 1,000 each – and Roger said that Snowden is undivided, and lumped together with Lyle and Appleton. (see map) The next step is to invite ISP’s to bid on providing internet service.

Snowden and Nearby Areas (in Blue), Grouped as 1,000 Households for bid by ISP to provide Internet Service. 
(Map WA State Dept. of Commerce Broadband Office 2024)

CenturyLink Update: (08.07.2024) Bea reported that the WA ST Utilities and Transportation Commission (WUTC) hearing on CenturyLink’s (CL) petition to be de-regulated to “Competitive Market” status was held on zoom on July 19. If the petition is approved, CenturyLink will drop most of their rural land line customers, leaving many people dangerously isolated, without phone or internet services.  Much of the Hearing was querying CL about how robust and humane their proffered Settlement Agreement, and their 4 step Discontinuance Process would be to the 1,000s of households losing their landlines. CL’s arguments seemed to be based on the premise that it was “only” less that 10% of all their customers would be affected, and people just have to accept that times are changing and learn to use cell phones. CL lawyers said that their decisions are based on “business”. When the WUTC Commissioners asked tough questions about protecting vulnerable customers, and the trustworthiness of CL’s proposed Settlement, and Discontinuance Plan, CL and the WUTC staff lawyer that fashioned the plans merely said they had confidence in their plans, without giving specifics. (An August 08 email from the WUTC  says there was a Final Hearing on July 26, and the final decision of the WUTC on the CenturyLink petition will be made public no later than September 09, 2024.)

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CenturyLink UPDATE July 21, 2024: CenturyLink provided the Washington State Utilities and Transportation Commission (WUTC) a “Settlement Agreement”, the terms under which they seek to gain approval for their petition to be de-regulated to “Competitive Market” status, and the ability to “discontinue” (expensive and often dissatisfied) rural customers at will. On July 19 there was a formal hearing with sworn testimony before the WUTC at which CL lawyers defended the Settlement Agreement and answered questions from the WUTC.

Additional information on the filing may be found at www.utc.wa.gov by selecting “Dockets Search” and entering the docket number 240029 into the search bar.  You will need to click on documents in the upper right side of the screen. The settlement agreement is about halfway down.  Once a decision is made it will be available on this same search, and we will also post on this website asap. The WUTC is expected to make a final determination by September 09, 2024.

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July 03, 2024 SCC Meeting: Broadband Committee Report: Roger reported that at the Washington State Broadband Office public meeting in June, the Office claimed to be ahead of schedule in their efforts to bring affordable state-standard internet service to all rural Washington households.  The Office will prioritize using fiber connection wherever possible, and will keep fees around $50 per month.  The Broadband office is currently sorting households into 1,000 unit groups that have a mix of both easy and hard to serve customers, to make the units evenly profitable for service providers. The units are not yet open for bidding.  At that time the Office anticipates some reluctance for the large ISP’s to bid on contracts where they will be required to share the publicly funded infrastructure they install, and not be allowed to have a monopoly.

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CenturyLink’s Petition to the Washington State Utilities and Transportation Commission (WUTC) to be reclassified as “fully competitive” is a serious threat to their rural Washington State Internet and phone customers.

Read summaries of the 2 WUTC Public Comment Hearings held on May 16 and June 6, and other documents related to CenturyLink’s petition.

Read CenturyLink’s Public Notice to Washington State Customers, and Notice of Virtual Public Comment Hearings.

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May 01, 2024 SCC Meeting: Broadband Committee Report: Roger reported that the Washington State Broadband Office is busy challenging the speed test data on the Federal maps, and has no additional updates.  Jenn reported that Dawn Stover sent out an alert that CenturyLink, currently the sole landline and internet provider for many residents in the Snowden area, is currently seeking to get approval to become the more relaxed status of “market provider”. This status would enable CenturyLink to drop customers, and/or raise their rates at will.  This is a very serious threat to all their rural customers.  There will be a public zoom hearing on CenturyLink’s request held before The Washington State Utilities and Transportation Board on May 16.  You must sign up by May 15 to attend the hearing. All written comments must be received by May 15. (This information is presented in very small print on our latest CenturyLink bill.) It is of utmost importance to get the word out about this threat to our communities’ safety and well-being.  More information about this matter, and instructions on how to submit comments and how to participate in the hearing will be posted on the SCC website and Facebook page.

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April 03, 2024 SCC Meeting: Guest Speaker: Keaton Curtice, Klickitat County Economic Development Specialist. Keaton began his presentation by announcing that Jenne Patterson’s Broadband Newsletter is now active online; and that Jenne is the County’s “real broadband expert”. The County expects to “kick off broadband service” in 2025.  The County is coordinating State broadband funds with the ISPs bidding to provide expanded broadband service.  However, Keaton explained that the larger ISP’s, who rate highly as contenders for grant money because of the long-standing scale and capacity at which they operate, are reluctant to bid to provide “open access” internet, as required by the State grants. Open access means the ISP that builds the infrastructure (with public funding) would be required to allow other providers to lease their infrastructure. This would prevent monopolies and allow residents to choose the ISP that best suits them.  A small, local start-up is Klicknetworks, based near Klickitat.  They have an arrangement to build an internet hub in Trout Lake, which will give them a chance to prove their capability, and hopefully inspire more confidence in the State Broadband Office.  In the group’s discussion, there was general agreement from the community at the meeting, that large ISPs have received public funding in the past to provide quality internet access to Snowden residents, and they have repeatedly built something that provides little or no improvement to residents, then sell the new service to another company. The larger companies have repeatedly shown no interest in improving rural, difficult to serve residents, and appear to be only interested in making  money. Further, as Klicknetworks’ owners and operators have visited the Snowden Community Council, many people at this meeting shared confidence in Klicknet to be adaptable to Snowden’s rugged terrain and committed to improving or providing internet service at State and Federal broadband standards. Keaton said we can write letters of support for Klicknetworks to the BoCC; but we all must wait for Klicknetworks to prove themselves in Trout Lake.

Broadband Committee Report: Roger said that Keaton Curtice’s presentation pretty well summed up where we currently stand in our efforts to get State-standard broadband to Snowden, and all of Klickitat County.  Ideas to support Klicknetwork in attracting government funding (assuming they are successful in Trout Lake) included getting a petition before the BoCC, and having talking points and a support letter template on our website to encourage individuals to write their own letter of support.

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March 06, 2024 SCC Meeting: Broadband Committee Report: Roger said there wasn’t a lot to report, as there was no recent State’s Broadband Office monthly meeting available. He reviewed the good news that the State goal for Klickitat County is that high speed internet will be available to every household, for a monthly cost of around $50.  To achieve this, the state will create groupings of one thousand households, including both difficult and easy to serve sites. (Snowden will be divided into several different groups, as it is largely a “difficult to serve” area.)  ISPs will bid to provide service to these groups, prioritizing using fiber where possible but recognizing that the rugged terrain will require using hybrid technologies, such as using fixed wireless and creating hubs and repeaters. ISPs will be required to provide open access service, that is sharing their publicly funded infrastructure with other providers.  Discussion highlighted that the KC Public Utilities District is willing to let local ISP Klick-net lease their utility poles for installing internet infrastructure, though they are otherwise unwilling to help their clientele acquire high speed affordable internet service.  (25 of 28 Washington State PUDs DO support providing high speed internet to their citizenry.)

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February 07, 2024 SCC Meeting: Congratulation Snowden! Your participation in speed tests and surveys paid off!

Broadband Committee Report: Committee Chair Roger attended the State Broadband Office monthly zoom meeting in January.  He reported the good news that, because of the robust response of the citizens of Klickitat County to various speed tests and internet accessibility surveys, the Washington State Broadband Office received a total of $1.23 billion dollars; proportionally much more than many other states received. This sum adds 71,000 rural households to the previously designated 167,000 that are listed as unserved by State standards. (State standards include that internet service is “future-proof” as technology continues to become more powerful, and affordable.)

The State’s plan for applying this money to expanding broadband in underserved rural areas includes creating discrete districts of 1,000 households each, that include both easy and difficult to serve households, so that serving these areas will be fairly profitable to ISPs that serve them.  Roger saw maps that divided up Snowden (a difficult service area) to have part with Husum, part with White Salmon etc.  The State prefers to support fiber infrastructure, but recognizes that some difficult terrain and geology will require alternative methods.  The State Broadband policy requires that internet service will be provided affordably and expects customers to pay no more than $45-$50 a month.  Roger also reported that Cherry Lane Fire Station is designated as a Broadband Community Anchor Institution to receive gigabyte service.  (Yes, you could park in the Cherry Lane parking lot, and have robust internet connectivity. And – we will be able to have live/zoom SCC meetings there!)

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January 03, 2024 SCC Meeting: Broadband Committee Report: Roger assumed Committee Chairmanship after Jenne’s departure.  The Committee also includes Eric Wilson.  Charles Pluckhahn, who has a background in telecommunications, volunteered to be on the Committee also.  Roger stated he would be establishing communications with County Economic Development/Broad Band staff Keaton Curtice, with KlickNet, and the MCCED/KCBAT.

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Milestones

• Promoted importance of Klickitat County Broadband Feasibility Study
• Instrumental in the formation of the first Klickitat County Broadband Action Team (KC BAT)