It is no secret that internet availability throughout Torrance County can be fairly spotty.
Help, however, is on the way.
In a somewhat under-the-radar move last year, Resound won a $15.7-million grant to develop the internet across the county. And its goal is to do so by the end of the year.
But the company needs help from the local community to really get the ball rolling, Tamara Rosenberg, Resound state broadband coordinator, told the county commission at its meeting last week.
“It’s called the Rural Digital Opportunity Fund,” she said of the funding source. “And those funds are specifically meant for areas that are unserved or underserved. Then we have a map that the FCC has given us that says exactly where they want us to deploy. But we do have a certain amount of flexibility. And what we need to do is work with your community directly so that we understand which areas we really should be targeting and covering and which areas maybe aren’t as important, because, like I said, we do have a little bit of flexibility. So we can sort of ensure that these areas are getting covered, the most-needy areas are getting covered.”
Oftentimes in rural areas, Rosenberg said, if one spot within a certain radius is covered, the entire area is considered served.
“Broadband providers were able to self-report to the FCC, so they could have one home in an entire area that has broadband access, and that area would be considered served,” she explained to commissioners.
Commissioner Ryan Schwebach said that significantly clarified the situation.
“This is, I’m literally telling you, everything that has gone on in my own community,” he said. “That explained more to me, in that single sentence, on why broadband is the way it is.”
It was really a reporting issue that now has to be overcome, said Pam Waggoner, Resound director of community outreach.
“So if you’re in a census block, the normal census block that you pull up, and there’s 100 houses, and if one house had service, it all was considered service at that time, meaning all 100 houses were considered served,” she said. “So that’s how the (internet service providers) reported and the ISPs didn’t do anything wrong. That’s how they were supposed to report. So, needless to say, there’s a lot of unserved and underserved residents and businesses in New Mexico because that’s how the (grant) money was distributed out.”
And the only way that can be overturned is to make a Broadband Equity, Access and Deployment challenge of that particular designation, Rosenberg said. That, of course, takes resources.
“Basically, the best thing that could happen to Torrance County is to put together a broadband committee,” she said in a later interview. “And what we do is work with the broadband committee, it can be as few as one or two people usually with a point person dedicated to broadband who oftentimes is an (information technology) person.”
Additionally, she said, the county should immediately apply for a state-funded Grant Writing, Engineering and Planning Program grant of up to $100,000 to help begin planning those BEAD challenges.
“You look at the local community maps and FCC maps, and it will show an area has coverage and you know as a consumer it does not, you have to do a challenge,” Rosenberg said. “There is a whole bunch that probably needs to be challenged in Torrance County. It’s kind of, somebody needs to organize that. A grant would help pay for someone to organize a BEAD challenge, or it could pay for someone to do a feasibility study so you know exactly where you need to go, specific areas.”
While Resound isn’t committed to a specific delivery technology, she said the company most likely will focus on fixed wireless within Torrance County because of the dispersed nature of the population.
“We have next generation fixed wireless that really helps us go much farther,” Rosenberg said. “I know when we say fixed wireless, a lot of people are like, ‘Oh,’ but what we actually have is these systems that are actually designed for up to 20 miles. But we usually use them for about three to five miles so that we can ensure that we have reliability, and that we build in redundancy, and we can ensure the speeds.”
New Mexico is one of seven states Resound is working in, but getting this state completed tops the list.
“We plan on completing all of New Mexico in 2024,” she said. “That is the goal. We don’t have to complete them in 2024. By the standards of the FCC, our obligation gives us more time. We have seven states that we’re doing this in and New Mexico is the priority state. We want to complete New Mexico and then focus on the other states. There really is a sense of urgency for New Mexico locations.”