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W W W. M A I N E B I Z . B I Z 21 F E B R UA R Y 1 9 , 2 0 1 8 N early 100 Franklin County res- idents gathered in Farmington on a recent cold night, some from more than 50 miles away, to hear the results of a study about how the county can increase rural broadband. Charlie Woodworth, executive director of the Greater Franklin Development Council, says it's the county's biggest growth issue. "If we're going to have a future, we need to grow, we have to attract young families, people have to be able to work," he says. "Yes it affects education, health care, but it all distills down to economic development. It's critical for rural Maine." It's not just Franklin County. Lack of broadband — cable, satellite, fiber, DSL — is affecting areas from real estate sales and tourism to in-and-out migration in rural areas across Maine. At a Jan. 10 legislative hearing on a $100 million bond issue that would help fund broadband initiatives, rep- resentatives of 16 organizations and businesses testified in support, includ- ing MaineHealth and Eastern Maine Healthcare Systems, AARP and the Maine Farmland Trust. Rep. Seth Berry, D-Bowdoinham, says he recognizes $100 million is a lot of money. "But I wanted to make a strong case that access to rural high-speed internet is as important as access to roads and bridges," he says. "So I made a proposal on the same scale as what we pay for highways." Berry's District 55 includes Bowdo- inham, Bowdoin and Richmond, but parts of it don't have internet access. "I'd love it if we could get to the point where we're talking about competition, getting the best deals," he says. "But right now we're talking about people not having any access at all." 'That's how l live' Bob Carlton, a self-employed forestry consultant, spends a lot of time in the woods, but he still needs high-speed internet to do his job. e Freeman Township resident has DSL, but it's too slow for much of the work he has to do. "I never do anything big or impor- tant [on the computer] in the middle of the day," he says. He has to out- source maps that he would normally do himself. He tried to take online courses for required certification, but internet crashes forced him to travel for training. In Oquossoc, restaurant owner Kate Williamson says lack of internet is an everyday conversation among business owners, tourists and residents of the Rangeley Lakes region. She's owned e Gingerbread House for 21 years, and over the last four or five years, the issue has esca- lated. "[Visitors] will say, 'I'd stay three weeks, but I have to work and can't because I don't have internet,'" she says. Williamson, a member of the Rangeley Economic Opportunity Commission, says a constant effort has improved internet in some areas, but not at a pace to match the need. "We're a tourist destination, that's how I live, and so do a lot of restau- rants and businesses," she says. "e population alone can't support the businesses here. We want them here for three weeks, not a week, but if they can't [get internet], they leave. We see it over and over." At the Jan. 31 meeting in Farmington, there were stories of middle and high school students trying to get internet to do their homework while sitting in a car outside McDonald's, which residents say has more reliable wifi than many homes. e lack of access affects health care, jobs that go unfilled and Realtors who can't sell property because it's not connected. At the Legislature's Committee on Appropriations and Financial affairs bond hearing, the theme was the same. Ellen Stern Griswold of the Maine Farmland Trust testified that Maine's 8,000 farms are a key economic Rural broadband wavers Facing up to rural Maine's biggest economic development issue B y M a u r e e n M i l l i k e n F O C U S C O M M U N I C AT I O N S & T E C H N O L O G Y C O N T I N U E D O N F O L L OW I N G PA G E » Rural Broadband by the numbers 10Mbps: The amount of megabits download and upload The ConnectME Authority Board defines as effective broadband. Areas that have maximum available broadband speeds of at least 10 Mbps down and up are considered served. 1.5Mbps: Areas with available broadband speeds that are lower than 1.5 Mbps download are considered unserved. Areas where the maximum available service is between 1.5Mbps download and 10Mbps down and up are considered underserved. S O U R C E : 2016–18 ConnectME strategic plan WIRED BROADBAND FEDERAL AND STATE FUNDING TO CONNECT MAINE — Roads with 10Mbps symmetrical or better — Roads with 1.5–10Mbps download and 768Kbps–10Mbps upload — Roads with no service — Locations with no reported households or businesses — 3 Ring Binder fiber network Maine households and busi- nesses (or street addresses) that have access to at least 10Mbps down and 10Mbps up Maine households in 2015 that had access to service with 100 Mbps down (high-speed internet) Homes nationally in 2015 that have access to service with 100 Mbps down 11,000 Gov. Paul LePage's Broadband Capacity Building Task Force esti- mate of new jobs in Maine over the next decade that increased rural broadband can create. $485 million Broadband Capacity Building Task Force estimate of added income in Maine that rural broadband in income. component, with $13.8 billion in total sales, $5.1 billion value-added, and contributing 78,656 jobs. "One of the biggest impediments we see to farmers growing and diver- sifying their businesses is the lack of access to reliable, high-speed internet service," she said. Large businesses are also affected. Online furniture retailer Wayfair, which employs 700 in Bangor and Brunswick, has piloted a work-from- home program "that is exceeding expectations," says Mike O'Hanlon, 2010 2018 $1.425M $1.078M 12% 10% 65%

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