Thanks to Christopher Mitchell (of ILSR) for sending me the heads up on the recent FTTH meeting in St Paul.

According to an article in the Pioneer Press (St. Paul wants its Net built for speed), “On Wednesday [Sep 26], the City Council unanimously approved an advisory committee’s proposal to seek partners for a publicly owned fiber-optic cable network for high-speed Internet access that could carry everything from e-mail to video to phone calls.”

So from the article I read some good news – it looks as if the plan is to build an open network, which opens the door to a choice of providers down the road.

And I read some not-so-good news – it isn’t clear how this would be financed, which isn’t always a great sign.

But it looks like the plan is to get the St Paul Schools and the Ramsey and state government to join in before it moves head. I think getting those guys on board will definitely help. First they will wire the government offices then branch off into residential and commercial customers.

The cost has been estimated at $150-200 million.

Currently big providers in the area (Qwest and Comcast) are understandably negative about the idea citing 2 typical reasons: 1) government shouldn’t get involved in an existing market and 2) it’s a big risk for a government to make.

You can see the Report on the Future of Broadband [in St Paul] online.

If you’re interested in more information – Andrea, Director of Technology and Communication for the City of St. Paul is talking at the Rondo Community Outreach Library from 5-7pm on October 9th. (Learn more on the MN COGI web site.)

(Sadly the commute to St Paul is too much for me. I have someone who was going to try to make the meeting for me and take notes – but if any readers out there want to stop back with notes of their own from the meeting that would be great!!)