{"id":36370,"date":"2023-01-10T22:29:46","date_gmt":"2023-01-11T05:29:46","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/dh.durangoherald.com\/tj\/government-leaders-in-s-w-colorado-ask-polis-to-take-action-on-broadband-access\/"},"modified":"2026-03-31T02:30:57","modified_gmt":"2026-03-31T08:30:57","slug":"government-leaders-in-s-w-colorado-ask-polis-to-take-action-on-broadband-access","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/dh.durangoherald.com\/tj\/government-leaders-in-s-w-colorado-ask-polis-to-take-action-on-broadband-access\/","title":{"rendered":"Government leaders in S.W. Colorado ask Polis to take action on broadband access"},"content":{"rendered":"\n

\"Fiber
Fiber optic cable is installed in Dolores in 2012. The city of Cortez has been in talks with ALLO Communications to expand on the fiber network project in town.<\/span>Journal file<\/span><\/figcaption><\/figure>\n<\/p>

La Plata County commissioners have joined 15 other counties on the Western Slope as well as the Ute Mountain Ute Indian Tribe in approving a letter to Gov. Jared Polis requesting help in removing barriers that prevent access to broadband internet infrastructure running through the region.<\/p>\n

Local governments are protesting the lack of access to critical broadband infrastructure that the telecommunications company Arcadian Infracom is installing between Denver and Phoenix along state right of way and calling on Polis to intervene.<\/p>\n

\u201cWe are asking for your help to remove roadblocks and resolve delays in accessing State-owned fiber,\u201d the letter reads.<\/p>\n

In Colorado, Arcadian has entered into a contract with the Colorado Department of Transportation to install about 345 miles of cable from Denver to the New Mexico line, partially along CDOT right of way. Construction is underway to run cable over Wolf Creek Pass, through Pagosa and ultimately along U.S. Highway 160 veering south at the interchange with U.S. Highway 550 south of Durango.<\/p>\n

The terms of Arcadian\u2019s contract with CDOT prohibits using the infrastructure for anything other than \u201cgovernmental, noncommercial, purposes.\u201d It is this clause of the contract with which county and Indigenous governments take issue.<\/p>\n

In Southwest Colorado, the exclusivity of the contract jeopardizes projects to connect rural homes and communities to the broadband \u201cbackbone\u201d that are underway or will begin soon. Commissioner Matt Salka said the $4 million Colorado Highway 151 project<\/a> to connect the region between Chimney Rock and Ignacio with high-speed internet is one such example. If middle-mile projects cannot tie into the backbone, the service provided to those rural zones will be compromised.<\/p>\n

\u201cThis deal should not have happened from day one, in my opinion,\u201d Salka said.<\/p>\n

Archuletta County has received a $1.1 million grant to install infrastructure for a \u201clocal backbone\u201d and a carrier neutral location at the hospital in Pagosa Springs, both if which are placed in jeopardy by the contract with Arcadian.<\/p>\n

\u201cWe can install it, but it won\u2019t be effective for its true purpose until that is resolved with CDOT,\u201d said Archuleta County Broadband Services Technical Manager Eric Hittle.<\/p>\n

Salka\u2019s goal is to secure middle-mile access and redundancy. That would allow internet service providers to provide high-speed internet to homes and businesses at a competitive market price and ensure that entire communities are not cut off from access in the event that one line is severed. While other private companies, such as CenturyLink, can provide broadband internet to some communities, the lack of redundancy is a problem.<\/p>\n

He wrote the letter with assistance from the Southwest Regional Broadband Coordinating Committee and presented it to the 16 counties of the Colorado Counties Inc. Western District. Archuleta, Delta, Dolores, Garfield, Gunnison, Hinsdale, La Plata, Mesa, Moffat, Montezuma, Montrose, Ouray, Rio Blanco, Routt, San Juan and San Miguel counties unanimously approved the letter and are all sending it to the governor. The Ute Mountain Ute Tribe signed the letter as well, and the Southern Ute Indian Tribe is likely to approve it this week.<\/p>\n

Polis signed an executive order<\/a> in February 2022 committing the state to connecting 99% of Colorado households to broadband by 2027.<\/p>\n

\"A
A map showing Arcadian\u2019s plans to run fiber-optic cable from Denver to Phoenix. Much of the cable is being installed on Colorado Department of Transportation right of way, including over Wolf Creek Pass. (Courtesy of Arcadian Infracom)<\/span>cca<\/span><\/figcaption><\/figure>\n<\/p>

\u201cWe\u2019re all trying to work toward accomplishing the governor\u2019s goal, as well as providing high-speed, reliable internet to our businesses and houses,\u201d Salka said.<\/p>\n

The letter calls the deal with Arcadian a \u201cmarket failure,\u201d and says that county governments are engaged in \u201cunprecedented intergovernmental cooperation to improve broadband throughout Western Colorado.\u201d<\/p>\n

Despite conversations between regional governments and CDOT, the letter laments that little progress has been made with respect to accessing the fiber optic cable.<\/p>\n

Salka stressed that the county would be willing to contribute funds toward the project and insists that the county should be able to tie into infrastructure that runs through the region. La Plata County earmarked $2.5 million of the funds it received from the American Rescue Plan Act for broadband development.<\/p>\n

\u201cWhat we\u2019re trying to protect is future projects moving forward and also asking for a change in this agreement,\u201d he said.<\/p>\n

rschafir@durangoherald.com<\/a><\/em><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

internet providers won\u2019t have access to fiber backbone running through region<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":36371,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_acf_changed":false,"footnotes":""},"categories":[],"tags":[576,819,28,275,1680,2068,2069],"naviga_topic":[],"class_list":["post-36370","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","tag-colorado-department-of-transportation","tag-gov-jared-polis","tag-headlines","tag-internet","tag-la-plata-county-commissioners","tag-telecommunication-equipment","tag-telecommunication-service"],"acf":[],"author_name":"dh_admin","_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/dh.durangoherald.com\/tj\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/36370","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/dh.durangoherald.com\/tj\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/dh.durangoherald.com\/tj\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/dh.durangoherald.com\/tj\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/dh.durangoherald.com\/tj\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=36370"}],"version-history":[{"count":1,"href":"https:\/\/dh.durangoherald.com\/tj\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/36370\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":83317,"href":"https:\/\/dh.durangoherald.com\/tj\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/36370\/revisions\/83317"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/dh.durangoherald.com\/tj\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/36371"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/dh.durangoherald.com\/tj\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=36370"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/dh.durangoherald.com\/tj\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=36370"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/dh.durangoherald.com\/tj\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=36370"},{"taxonomy":"naviga_topic","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/dh.durangoherald.com\/tj\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/naviga_topic?post=36370"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}