Advocates for a public, high-speed municipal network for Northampton Massachusetts
At the City Council meeting on February 4, 2021, Northampton Mayor David Narkewicz provided an update to the Council on the municipal network study. You can watch the mayor’s update below. Among the mayor’s key points: The mayor announced that Design Nine was selected to do a marketing survey and, if the survey results warrant …
An article in yesterday’s Daily Hampshire Gazette revealed that Design Nine (https://designnine.com/) was selected as the vendor to perform the feasibility study for municipal broadband in Northampton. (The attached article is not currently available on the Gazette’s website, so a scanned copy is shown below.) Members of our coalition served as advisors to the Mayor …
It’s no surprise that Comcast is raising its rates again. But you’d be hard pressed to know it before your new bill arrives. You can see their new rates here. Their new rates are effective December 1, 2020, which means you will probably see bills with the new rates toward the end of December or …
As some of you may know, Northampton is in the process of studying whether to build a community network for both residents and businesses. I was all satisfied with how everything was going until I saw a scary article a few hours ago on reddit’s home networking group. Up until now, Comcast customers have enjoyed …
It’s been a while since we posted an update. As you know, City staff have been overwhelmed with work dealing with the covid-19 pandemic. The good news is that the municipal network is still one of the activities moving forward. Funds for a study were approved by the City Council in June 2019. A solicitation to …
So we got a question on Facebook: Would Starlink make a municipal network unnecessary? It’s a good question. Starlink is a project of SpaceX, and SpaceX is much in the news these days. This private space company recently succeeded in sending a manned crew to and from the International Space Station, the first private company …
As reported in today’s Gazette, yesterday’s City Council meeting was dominated by discussion of the police department’s budget, resulting in a meeting over seven hours long. However, at 2:25 AM the City Council did unanimously approve the creation of a municipal light plant (MLP) for Northampton. An MLP would be a legal framework for creating …
Mayor David Narkewicz has submitted a proposal to the Northampton City Council for its meeting tomorrow, Thursday, June 4, 2020. It requests that the City Council vote on the creation of a Municipal Light Plant for the city. A Municipal Light Plant is a legal framework for a municipality to offer services like a high-speed …
With so many people working from home or just home due to the coronavirus pandemic, Internet service providers have been affected. This New York Times story discusses some of the impact it is having slowing Internet service to the home as network demand skyrockets. It’s affecting people in Northampton too. One on our coalition noticed …
You can read the RFP and bid on it if you want here. Due date for bids is March 12, 2020. Our thanks to the City for including our concerns and keeping us in the loop.