East Central Vermont
Community Fiber Network

Welcome to the East Central Vermont Community Fiber Network's public website.

ECFiber In the News
Find links to important stories about ECFiber on our page.

Stories from the Community
See a selection of stories about the need for this project from members of our communities.

Pre-Register to indicate your interest and to show your support for the project. You can see up-to-the-minute pre-registration status at the bottom of this page.

The monthly Governing Board meetings are open to the public and are a very good place to get the most up-to-date information. Meeting dates are listed above.

With financing plans well underway, we have decided to proceed with a pilot project. At its regularly scheduled meeting, the EC Fiber Governing Board gave the go ahead to investigate the deployment of a pilot Fiber to the Home project within its territory. The Executive staff immediately set out to identify suitable target areas to begin deployment.

“We have identified several unserved areas that will help to prove our concept,” said Project director Tim Nulty. “Engineering crews started the pre construction process the morning after the vote. We’re very excited to get to work. This has been a long time coming.” Nulty hopes to make the first pole applications within a couple of weeks.

“Delivering cost effective high quality reliable broadband to rural America is a challenge,” said Ron Cassel, coordinator of the build-out. “We decided that we needed an innovative approach to that challenge. We have built a successful model in our labs, but there is no better test than a real life deployment. That’s when the rubber hits the road. We now have a solid roll-out plan in place, and hope to be installing our first customers in a few months!”

The pilot project will provide a solid foundation for the capital lease used to build out the rest of the network, providing 100% coverage in 23 towns in East Central Vermont. While the intent of the project is to prove that the larger project is viable, according to Nulty, “it will be able to stand on its own if we don’t raise another dime of capital.”

The pilot project will be financed with privately-raised funds.

Pomfret resident Loredo Sola, who chairs the Governing Board, was moved by the vote. “This is an historic day for ECFiber, for Vermont, and for rural America. This is the first project of its kind, and will become a model for the rest of the country.”

All of Vermont’s gubernatorial candidates were invited to the meeting; Matt Dunne attended. He applauded ECFiber for its vision, and especially for getting 23 towns to agree to such a complex and important undertaking. He said that the response to the ECFiber effort demonstrates the level of desire for true broadband coverage.

The graph below shows the current status of pre-registrations by town.

Disclaimer: The data used to generate this graph is constantly changing, and reflects an approximation of the current status of pre-registrations. Every effort is made to make it accurate, but there may be errors.

The household counts are from the 2000 census.