Bills take aim at UMS’ role in broadband expansion
12/30/09 | 4 comments
state house

Bills take aim at UMS’ role in broadband expansion


By Mal Leary
Capitol News Service

AUGUSTA, Maine — Two bills have been introduced in the Legislature aimed at limiting the University of Maine System’s ability to participate in efforts to expand broadband access in the state, but UMS officials say the bills are not needed.

Sen. Lisa Marrache, D-Waterville, the assistant Senate majority leader, has introduced a bill that would ban the system from using any tuition money to help pay for efforts to expand broadband access.

“People are paying money in to go to college,” she said, “I don’t think any of that money should be used to subsidize the broadband effort that really is competing with the private sector.”

Marrache said constituents raised the issue with her after charges were leveled this summer that UMS is competing with private companies in the broadband business.

Severin Beliveau, an Augusta attorney representing FairPoint, blasted UMS at a meeting of the State Broadband Advisory Council, arguing their participation in a group seeking federal funds was improper competition with the private sector.

“I am concerned at what the university is proposing here, because it is receiving a form of subsidy, no they are in fact receiving a subsidy from taxpayers, in competing with the private sector,” he said.

Jeff Letourneau, associate director of information technology at UMS, said the university is part of a private-public partnership created to provide broadband capacity at a “wholesale” level and the university’s role is minor.

“The grant from the federal government went to GWI [Great Works Internet] and two private investors,” he said. “As for tuition subsidizing our broadband efforts, that does not happen and will not happen.”

U.S. Commerce Secretary Gary Locke visited Orono earlier this month to announce a $25.4 million federal grant for the so-called “Three Ring Binder” project that will construct a 1,100-mile network of high-capacity fiber-optic cable through northern, western and Down East Maine areas.

“This is what is called a middle mile project,” Letourneau said. “This will allow for greater capacity that is available to anyone. It will not be the part of someone’s proprietary network.”

Rep. Stacey Fitts, R-Pittsfield, serves on the Legislature’s Utilities and Energy Committee. He has introduced a bill he said will prevent any “undue” competition by the university with existing broadband providers. He said he is concerned the efforts by the university could have unintended consequences on private companies that already are providing access.

“If the university is able to bypass some of the competitive markets, and cherry pick, it could affect the ability to deliver broadband to others,” he said.

Fitts said the approach being used by UMS and GWI will result in some high-capacity users bypassing FairPoint and other existing providers. He is worried the loss of revenue will hurt efforts to expand access in rural areas of the state to both small businesses and residential customers.

“I know this will cause a lot of discussion in committee,” he said. “But we need to have that discussion.”

Letourneau said the university and other high bandwidth users such as The Jackson Laboratory in Bar Harbor have tried to work with FairPoint to meet their needs at an affordable cost. He said moving huge files, such as video or medical imaging files, takes a lot of bandwidth for the actual time they are transmitted and he said getting charged based on maximum need, not usual need, is too expensive.

“What has happened over the years is that government has invested in broadband access in rural areas because the private sector was not responding to the need,” Letourneau said.

He points to the E-rate program that has provided federal subsides to schools and libraries to have high-speed Internet access and the billions of dollars in grants being made under the stimulus act to expand broadband across the country.

“That’s what the grant was all about that was announced earlier this month,” he said. “It’s providing capacity that is not there now and is affordable.”

In addition, Letourneau said, the Legislature appropriated $3 million in 2007 to the university to help expand its access to broadband and that has helped Jackson Lab improve its connections. He said while most understand the Internet is the superhighway for information, just how that superhighway is used by different users is more difficult to explain.

“It’s like we are going through a fleet leasing company instead of paying FedEx for each delivery,” he said. “This might not only drive an expansion of broadband, but an expansion of broadband that is affordable.”

With the Legislature trying to move legislation quickly this session, hearings on both bills could be scheduled next month.

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4 comments on this item
On 12/29/09 at 9:56 PM, pizanos wrote:         Repeated separate thumbs down will cause comment to be hidden

If the private sector had stepped up to the plate several years ago, UMS would never have been asked by local businesses to become involved in efforts to help advance broadband development in the Bangor Region. Verizon refused to divulge how much capacity it had available and where, so it could manipulate access and revenues, at rates many times higher than elsewhere. In the mean time local business development was being choked off. The argument about competition is a scarlet herring; the real issue is market control.

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On 12/29/09 at 9:56 PM, Bangorian wrote:         Repeated separate thumbs down will cause comment to be hidden

For the university to be competitive, it needs state of the art technology. With all of the waste at UMO, I'm rather surprised that people are choosing to focus on this, instead of other cost savings measures.

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On 12/30/09 at 9:02 AM, MaineGrad wrote:         Repeated separate thumbs down will cause comment to be hidden

The University of Maine (not UMO..) is the largest campus and has the greatest opportunity for efficiency and should be put under the financial microscope. However, the real issue is the State of Maine's insistance that the UMS is necessary. There is no justification, other than vested interests, in keeping more than one campus open. The original planners of the University put the thing in Orono because it was mid way between the top and bottom of the State (equally inconvenient for most). Given the fact that we have a community college system im place and a god awful number of University College locations (40+) the justification for keeping 6 out of the seven campuses open comes down to political will. We complain about taxes and yet turn around and The University of Maine (not UMO..) is the largest campus and has the greatest opportunity for efficiency and should be put under the financial microscope. However, the real issue is the State of Maine's insistence that the UMS is necessary. There is no justification, other than vested interests, in keeping more than one campus open. The original planners of the University put the thing in Orono because it was mid way between the top and bottom of the State (equally inconvenient for most). Given the fact that we have a community college system in place and a god awful number of University College locations (40+) the justification for keeping 6 out of the seven campuses open comes down to political will. We complain about taxes and yet turn around and scream bloody murder about the impact of closing a campus on the local community.... hello.... that’s "welfare state" thinking. I know I'm barking up an impossible tree, the political will to take on unpopular tasks of that magnitude doesn't exist but it frustrates me to no end that inertia is the only thing that keeps us over taxed and behind the economic eight ball. The University System is a shining example of how the State of Maine keeps us on the dole and removes the possibility of real economic reform within Maine. The location, the people, and most of the values are "The Way Life Should Be" but I can't see many of us eking out a living here if we don't hold those who spend our tax dollars accountable to implementing the efficient solutions. Welcome to the PEFA vacation and resort community formerly know as the working State of Maine.scream bloody murder about the impact of closing a campus on the local community.... hello.... thats "welfare state" thinking. I know I'm barking up an impossible tree, the political will to take on unpopular tasks of that magnitude doesn't exist but it frustrates me to no end that inertia is the only thing that keeps us over taxed and behind the economic eight ball. The University System is a shining example of how the State of Maine keeps us on the dole and removes the possibility of real ecomomic reform within Maine. The location, the people, and most of the values are "The Way Life Should Be" but I can't see many of us eeking out a living here if we don't hold those who spend our tax dollars acountable to implementing the efficient solutions. Wecome to the PEFA vacation and resort community formerly know as the working State of Maine.

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On 12/31/09 at 11:48 AM, beiserka wrote:         Repeated separate thumbs down will cause comment to be hidden

Broadband availability is spotty to non-existent in much of Maine. Efforts to change it are moving at a glacial pace in many of the affected areas. Fairpoint with its eroding base of customers has to focus on survival rather than providing Maine with next-generation telecommunications capacity. Efforts to goose the process, from whatever quarter, are welcome in the face of the failure of commercial entities to address the myriad gaps and shortcomings in current service.

That being said, the fact that the Three-Ring Binder Project focuses on middle-mile service is crucial. Most of the business of most of the established vendors consists of last-mile service -- connecting home and business premises to high-speed backbone networks. The Project vastly decreases the distance from premises to the high speed link. In 1100 miles it will traverse some 100 Maine towns. If immediately neighboring communities are counted, the potential impact appears even greater. This new proximity makes the last-mile problem, the issue of the cost of providing big bandwidth in small towns, a much smaller problem for a large regions of the state. It lowers the cost of entry into the last-mile market, encouraging existing firms and newly emerged competitors to expand their services with the new network as backbone.

A key measure of success for the Project will be the extent and speed with which private enterprise utilizes it to provide world-class connectivity to Mainers, Maine businesses and Maine institutions. I hope I am right in seeing this as a jumpstart to a more vital telecommunications industry in Maine. I know for sure that political fights about how to divide a static market that serves so many Mainers poorly are a waste of energy.

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