The West Central Tribune reports…

The Willmar City Council and staff on Monday said a meeting would be conducted later this week with the company after its letter asking the city to hold off on the construction of an open-access broadband network.

The letter that Charter Communications sent to the city of Willmar requesting that the city hold off on its plans to construct a $24.5 million open-access broadband network was indirectly addressed Monday during the Willmar City Council work session.

Charter provides internet and cable television services in Willmar under the name Spectrum and sent a letter last week offering to commit to the installation of additional fiber-optic lines in the Willmar Industrial Park at no cost to the city. The proposal is described in the Feb. 7 letter as a solution to “saddling taxpayers with needless debt” for building the city-owned network.

A little background…

Currently, only 23 parcels out of 7,000-plus total parcels in the city of Willmar have fiber-optic capabilities — mostly government facilities, schools and some big businesses — according to Box.

Representatives from Broadband Corp. and Silverlight Fiber Network, internet service providers that plan to offer service on Willmar’s open-access broadband network and presented information to the council at Monday’s work session, were in agreement that coaxial technology will be obsolete in 10 to 20 years.

Representatives from Broadband Corp. and Silverlight Fiber Network, internet service providers that plan to offer service on Willmar’s open-access broadband network and presented information to the council at Monday’s work session, were in agreement that coaxial technology will be obsolete in 10 to 20 years.

The majority of the expenses thus far, approximately $400,000, have been for civil engineering services from the city’s contracted engineers at Bolton & Menk, approved by the council in 2024. About $200,000 has been spent on network architecture services from Hometown Fiber, and the remainder was for consultants, legal fees and marketing. The network will be owned by the city and managed by Hometown Fiber. It will allow multiple internet service providers to use the network, paying a fee to the city for its use. The city will use bond money to pay for construction of the network and the fees paid by the internet service providers will be used to pay the debt service on the bonds.

While the construction costs for the Connect Willmar Initiative are estimated to be $24.5 million, the total cost with principal and interest payments on the bonds may be closer to $33 million, Box verified Tuesday afternoon in an email to the West Central Tribune. However, he also noted there are a number of factors that will determine the final overall cost.

“We are not getting in the business of selling the internet,” Box said at Monday’s meeting. “We are in the business of infrastructure. … Because multiple ISPs can use the same network, there’s a greater opportunity for competition. This can lead to better service options, lower prices and more innovation as different providers strive to attract and retain customers.”