According to the Rochester Post-Bulletin, Jaguar Communications, a competitive local exchange carrier based in Owatonna, will soon be offering FTTH in Hayfield, Minnesota.

It’s interesting to compare Hayfield’s path with a community such as Lake County. In Lake County, there is a community push. In Hayfield, Jaguar has taken the lead. I want to include a couple of paragraphs from the Post-Bulletin story, I think they’ve done a great job of describing the trials and tribulations a commercial provider may have to overcome before getting permission:

The final installation of the network is surprisingly easy; the planning to get to this point took years.

A new utility company must obtain permission from many state and federal agencies as well as each county, township and municipality in its territory.

In appearances at Claremont city council meetings, Hayfield city council meetings and Dodge County planning and zoning meetings, representatives from Jaguar have estimated they have dealt with more than 100 agencies or entities to get to this point.

I’m not advocating a community versus commercial approach or vice versa – I think the answer will be different for each community – but it sure seems that with both approaches the road could be smoother.

Hearing Jaguar’s story reminds me of the many conversations with the Ultra High-Speed Broadband Task Force on the role of government. It’s a challenging conversation for the Task Force – but clearly even if you can’t define it – government does play a role in broadband deployment.