Built for the Storm – Episode 21 of Unbuffered

Christopher Mitchell (00:15)
Welcome to another episode of Unbuffered. I’m Christopher Mitchell at the Institute for Local Self-Reliance. And today we’re digging into one of my favorite stories. I’ve already I’ve already expressed this before to Lee Brown, who

is back with us again today. But Erwin is just one of the stories of a community that I think took an incremental approach that really worked well, and I wish we would see others learn from and experiment with.

but as I said, we have Lee Brown, who is the president and CEO of Erwin Utilities sitting on the left for those of you who are watching. Welcome to the show, Lee.

EUA (00:50)
Thanks, Christopher. Glad to be here.

Christopher Mitchell (00:52)
It’s

it’s great to have you back. It’s been a lot of years and boy, a lot’s happened in that time. but we also have John Fredericks, who is the Director of Information Technology at Erwin Fiber. welcome Erwin. Sorry, that’s the sleep. Welcome, John.

EUA (01:11)
Appreciate it. Thank you for having me.

Christopher Mitchell (01:13)
So Lee, I I think you’ve described before how picturesque the community is. And I just wanna know if you wanna how you wanna s describe the community to folks now that to spoil the the surprise for those who aren’t familiar, you were right in the path of Hurricane Helene and took a big shot in the chin. So how do you describe the community to folks today?

EUA (01:36)
most beautiful places in Tennessee and northeast Tennessee and we’re in a little small community surrounded by the mountains and just a beautiful place and we have a river that comes out of a mountain gorge and comes through our community. Fortunately it does not run through the heart of downtown, but where it does come into our populated parts of our community, it unleashed devastation like we’ve never seen before.

washed homes away, diverted the river, diverted and went through our industrial park and and just about obliterated our our community out there. There was over twelve feet of water washed through their buildings and trees and it just looked like we’d never recover from this. But almost two years later, most of those industries are back to some

state of operation. Some of them are approaching a full operation, but what we thought was the end of that segment of our community is is

is rebuilt and back to work and most of the signs of all that flooding have been cleaned up and and so it’s amazing how quickly things

begin to revegetate after something like that and things are just wiped away. But overall things look look much, much better and we’re in a better state today and have plans to continue to build a lot of our rebuild a lot of our infrastructure back better and that’s going to be over the next five years and and I believe our community will be at a much better place. hate to think that we got there through a a flood, but

We have been intentional to maximize every effort to rebuild and build our community back better and stronger than before.

Christopher Mitchell (03:44)
Excellent. Yeah, and we’ll talk a little bit about that. John, is there anything you want to add in terms of humble bragging about the community?

EUA (03:52)
Yes, actually there was, you know, going going through it, I I remember the Friday rather well. And and I’ll be honest, I was I was humbled by the the power of Mother Nature. You know, what was unleashed that day. It it was truly humbling. I I’ve I’ve seen many flash flood warnings. This was the first time I experienced something to this level, and this level of destruction. And it was something that I I wasn’t prepared for.

But I I over the over the days that followed, in all honesty, I was humbled even more. it was it was it was a good humbling because it was the power of the community, people standing up it and and working on and together to rebuild. It was it was people coming out saying, I’m I’m not waiting for somebody else, I’m not waiting for the government to come in and to fix things, like just neighbors.

helping neighbors. And that was more powerful in my opinion than anything Mother Nature threw at us that Friday. And I think for me that was just the most humbling part. And and one of the things that just makes me proud to be here. I mean, it it’s I was out in the field and I I remember being stopped five or six times by just individuals that were coming in from other states asking where where’s the need? You point me the way

And I’m they had water in their trucks, chainsaws, and and they were here to help. And it was it was just it was wonderful to see this this level of community in our small town, even from those coming in from the outside just coming in to help. You know, that that’s the power of of humanity and and and the power of community. And it was it was really on display that day and and the days, weeks and months that followed.

Christopher Mitchell (05:46)
Yeah, I think for anyone who’s lived through that, you definitely get a sense that there is a tremendous need for kind of like unorganized volunteer efforts as well as organized volunteer efforts, as well as state and federal action and kind of if it

if it goes well, they all have their place. And and I hope that’s what you all experienced. I do wanna I think it might make sense to talk just briefly for people that haven’t gone back. I think Lee, you were on twice before.

And and we talked about what you were building at that point, but let’s talk about where you were before the the hurricane came through. when I last talked to you, we you had finished the build out of almost the entire community and it started on the last pitch within the city limits, I should say. and then Erwin Utilities serves a significantly large number of people outside of city limits, serving most of the county. And and you were focused on wrapping up the city at that point, I think. So where did you go? And and I should even say.

Take a step back further to remind people that you did it in an incremental basis. And so maybe just like the high points. And then if people really want the details, they can go listen to that that previous show from 2020.

EUA (06:54)
Sure, Chris. Thanks. you know, our story goes back to 2014 when we put our business plan together and got everything approved and actually was able to begin construction in late twenty four and connect our first customer in March of 2015. And we had a plan to build out, you know, incrementally, like you said, and the last time we talked we were down to

getting a lot of the underground neighborhoods that we intentionally left because it would slow us down. And so we got all that wrapped up. And you know, the beauty about what we did, it let us learn and grow and have cycles of improvement along each phase that we built out, control our cost, begin to be able to build some revenue streams as we went along.

we learned a lot over those first few phases and and really put together a great process to follow for the rest of the time. we always look for ways to improve, but one of the the greatest things is you know we’ve we were able to build this and continue all of our growth without any

significant debt. We had a small interdepartmental loan to start with, but w we basically have built this thing from the ground up without any long term debt, which is a good spot to be in today.

Christopher Mitchell (08:36)
I can imagine. And one of the ways that that worked, I think, is the tremendous reception from the community. we see some of these networks can break even at forty percent a take rate, but it strikes me that that’s significantly

below what you were experiencing.

EUA (08:53)
and today I believe our residential take rate is about sixty-seven percent. Is that correct, John? Yeah, total take rate’s sixty-eight percent and our residential is sixty-two percent. Okay. So yes, we

we have experienced great success and we want to continue to see that take rate increase as well.

Christopher Mitchell (09:18)
Okay, so did you able were you able to then expand to more of the county over the the intervening years or had you been keeping an eye out, waiting like so many other people to see what the federal government would finally do with the money?

EUA (09:34)
Chris, we are bound by state law that we can only serve within our electric footprint. So the last time we talked we were wrapping up the last bit of that. So we are not able to go anywhere outside of our electric footprint. We’ve made one attempt to do that, but it was gonna take an act of our state legislator to

to allow that and we just didn’t get across the finish line with that. So we’re ’til something changes, we’re we’re a hundred percent built out.

Christopher Mitchell (10:14)
I’m sorry, I misremembered then. I had thought that you had built out only within the town limits, but you had your entire electric footprint. That’s wonderful.

EUA (10:23)
Yes, we have everyone connected and have had everybody connected for about five years.

Christopher Mitchell (10:34)
Okay. That’s truly wonderful. It’s just I mean, it’s is a testament to having a good plan, seeing it through, and being responsible for the community. So so I salute that. And then I feel like Mother Nature came along and decided to upset your Apple cart. Do you wanna walk us through what happened there from a perspective of on the infrastructure?

EUA (10:55)
Sure. th the worst flood in recorded history came on September the twenty seventh, twenty twenty four and we lost

225 power poles that that took all of our electric infrastructure and fiber infrastructure with them. there was a few locations where the the power line paralleled the highway and the river and the

roadway, the poles, all of the land where the poles were were installed, all of it washed away. So we had a real challenge ahead of us to replace

replace all that infrastructure, but perseverance paid off and over over some time everything got put back or l of course we had to wait until the till the highway was reconstructed and

enable to put our poles and power lines and fiber back up, but everything’s back in good operation today.

Christopher Mitchell (12:16)
And did you I’m always curious, I mean, for people have a sense, did you lose population around that time? I I really have a sense if you’re if you’re growing, shrinking, pretty s pretty average unusual, but this this is always super important for utilities.

EUA (12:32)
So our community, we are somewhat of a bedroom community to Johnson City, Tennessee and Asheville, North Carolina, but our population growth has been mostly stagnant and even a little on the decline over the last ten to fifteen years. We had begun to see just the slightest increase in in our population growth.

And then we saw about a hundred and twenty-eight customers erased with that flood and both residential and and our manufacturing business customers as well. And so we we were on the downhill side today, just last month we had positive growth.

numbers in all of our departments. We’re a multi-service utility with power, fiber, water and wastewater. And so last year, last month, excuse me, we had positive growth from the the pre Helene, pre-disaster customer accounts that we had.

Christopher Mitchell (13:52)
So how did the having the fiber infrastructure I’m just curious, was it useful that you had it or was it just so such devastation so quickly you didn’t really have a chance to get any advantages from it? how did it imp impact your the whole experience with the disaster?

EUA (14:10)
So I would say that you know, we were able to quickly restore our fiber services where the power lines were not damaged or destroyed. and that was a big help to all of the community.

But we did some creative things along the way to improvise till we could get things back up. But one of the most interesting stories, I had people calling me from other

providers outside of our service area wanting to know if we could come and fix their fiber. And it wasn’t it wasn’t the provider, it was just on the customer’s end wanting us to come and try to fix fix things.

People are more concerned today about their fiber connection than power or water or wastewater. It’s like we don’t care about the power, just come come get my fiber back. And y’all worry about the power whenever.

But John, I don’t know if you’ve got anything you want to add. You know, the way we built out the system from the very beginning. So, you know, it was very, it was very purpose-built, right? So the the planning that went into it, you know, Lee talked about being, you know, a small amount of debt, but but nothing large having to be taken out in order to build the system and having those cycles of improvement. Improvement, one of the things that we did.

w it was very purpose purposely done is is to factor in reliability across the network. So one of those segments that Lee mentioned about the road, the power poles, the fiber being washed away, part of that segment was what provides our DIA, our direct Internet access, and and that’s built on a ring. And so that segment was completely gone.

But the ring, because of the resilience that we had in the redundancy that we built into it, we didn’t actually lose any of our DIA services, any of our direct Internet access. And that kept going. I mean, ev even from the onset. So that was never lost. And so our customer base at at large did not lose services because of Helene. I mean there was power outages and things like that, but the connectivity in

the community was still there. And while there was still things down, so we had cell towers that had lost communication. they don’t have fiber backhaul from us, but they were down. People were still able to utilize our network in order to get out, whether it would be through you know, their home services for those that that were still, you know, had power and that that connectivity, but also through

you know, the Wi-Fi hotspots that we have throughout our community in our downtown area and several of our parks and and ball fields. And so it was that availability still allowed people to be able to communicate because in in sections, you know, where cell service was completely wiped out, there was no ability to communicate outside of that. So having that redundancy and resiliency built into the network and again done so very purposely

we were able to to maintain communication streams even during, you know, the major part of the disaster.

Christopher Mitchell (17:48)
Yeah, if you had been in building the network, if you had just been focused on how to do it at as

low cost as possible, then you likely would not have had that because that’s the sort of thing that you can look like it’s a frivolous or unneeded investment, you know, on a on a clear, sunny day, right?

EUA (18:07)
Absolutely. And that’s that’s something that we see. You know, there’s there’s two philosophies. There’s, you know, do it quick, do it fast, and do it cheap. And then there’s do it right. And you know, that that comes that that culture comes from the top down. And it’s something that we believe in. Reliability, we safety and making sure that we do it right, that we do it safely, that you know, our our our employees

go home at night, you know, that what we do is is important. And it’s it’s not how quick we get it done. It’s how well do we do it and how well are we serving our community and our our neighbors.

Christopher Mitchell (18:50)
I I’m curious, do you have a sense of did you talk to any of the folks who you have an in-depth conversation with anyone who said I need Internet access and get the electricity whenever you can? Because I’m always confused if they have a hand cranked laptop or you know, I’m I’m presuming some folks have solar and batteries, but but presumably not everyone. So what what’s going what what is the use case in terms of people wanting to have Internet access first and worrying about electricity secondarily?

EUA (19:20)
So the you know a couple of things, you know, we we do have an area where generators are common. So we have we have a lot of our customers who do have generators. So they’re able to maintain power to several devices, and one of those would be their their PC. But then also for mobile, so if the cell towers are down, but their router and Wi-Fi is up and working, then they can get it, even if if the rest of the house is without power. And

You know, to to Lee’s point, it is something that that people are very concerned with. We had a a section of our community that was without power and water services along with fiber for an extended amount of time. And we were able to get power first because you know the poles come, then the electric lines, and then we’ll follow up with our our fiber lines. And as our water crews were working, several

Several of them were stopped by folks not wondering when the water was gonna be restored so they could do showers and things. But when was the fiber coming back? So it it’s you know, it it’s very important.

Christopher Mitchell (20:30)
Yeah, I it’s remarkable. I feel like I don’t know, when I talk to policymakers and other folks, I I don’t feel like they get it. and I’m sure for some folks it’s different reasons. For some folks it’s a sense of security and being able knowing that they’d be able to call

an emergency service, you know, if they have a medical condition or if they or if there’s any, you know, reason and you know, potential breakdown of social order, things like that. For other folks it’s entertainment, I think, you know, for

For other folks, it’s a utility of of needing to check in someplace with family members, maybe. So I just I always find it interesting because I think for people who haven’t been through that situation, they don’t appreciate how much you take communicating for granted and just how high that up is in a and a priority for people.

EUA (21:12)
Well and and I think you hit on it. And the most basic form of that is connection, right? And we we talk about connecting our customers to fiber, but it’s it’s the connections that they have that they use through our systems. So, you know, social media is very big, you know, calling w whether it be cell phone or Wi-Fi calling, you know, it’s that communication stream. And and to have those communication streams, you’ve got to be connected.

And and that’s how they’re they’re connecting to people this way. You know, years ago it was it was picking up the phone, right? People were on on the phone, on party lines, if if that dates me any. And it it’s it’s a different way, but it’s it’s still the underlying piece is that human connection. And this is that core foundation for that. It’s how people are are connecting to each other. And so it is it is very important to them.

Christopher Mitchell (22:13)
Now I want to make we have time to to cover any additional things you wanna cover, but I do wanna pry a little bit. I believe I heard you’re gonna build back better your and so I I don’t know if you built out GPON originally and now you’re able to or if you just learned some tricks along the way, but but how are you when you were putting things back up? Did you change anything?

EUA (22:33)
So on the on the fiber side, where we’re looking at at going better. So it we’re obviously looking at any opportunity to be more resilient for any sort of disaster, whether it be flooding, windstorms, you know, animals, any anything like that. We’re we’re always looking at what we can do to make the network more resilient and more fault tolerant. So one of the things is looking at

You know, the the existing topology was more of a hub and spoke. And really we’re looking at at converting that hub and spoke to more of a ring topology, moving network functions closer to the edge, closer to the customer, so that no one area that’s that’s hit with some major disaster takes out a large set of customers. The idea is to is to make that more localized so that we’re more resilient and then we can have faster.

time to restoration. And another one of those things are just the the applications that we can layer on top of our our system. So you mentioned GPON is yes, that that’s how we rolled out and we are

looking at rolling out XGSPON. But I think everything that we see that people want because when we when we go to do an install, it’s not how fast can we get in and get the service installed and get out to the next one.

It’s about it’s about coming in and making sure that we get the service in, that our customer understands how to use the service, that we help them get their devices that that that matter connected to the service. So it it’s not just give the fish, right? It’s teach them how to fish so that they can take that and and grow with it and be comfortable with it. And then have us, you know, as that support if if they’re needed.

And so part of that is understanding what what our customers are doing. And what we have found is it’s it’s not about how fast the service is, and and really speed is is not a a true measure of of fiber services. Because if you think about it, once you get on the interstate, it if the speed limit’s 80 miles an hour, it’s 80 miles an hour. What what really changes is the capacity.

So we don’t talk about our packages in terms of speed. We really talk about it in terms of bandwidth or capacity. How much can you do? So if you’re doing a lot of streaming and gaming and working from home, remote learning, those are the things that it’s like, okay, we we need a package with more capacity for you.

Christopher Mitchell (25:16)
Mm-hmm.

EUA (25:16)
So it’s it’s building on that. And so what we see is it’s not about speed, it’s about the experience.

And so we’re we’re very hyper focused on making sure that the experience that our customer receives is top-notch. So no buffering, you know, that that latency is low. And with all of that, you have the speed, you know, it it but the capacity is where it’s at. And so some of the other experiences that I’m referring to is is out of this. We also saw a need that when cellular service is down.

You know, people really rely on on Wi-Fi to be able to use Wi-Fi calling on their cell phones. So one of the products that we’re we’re in the last stages of rolling out is SmartTown. And SmartTown allows us, specifically, we’re we’re focused on our first responders to be able to leverage our managed Wi-Fi network throughout our whole system. So it’s it’s a separate network that rides on all of our managed routers.

That’s separate from our customer side, but it allows first responders to be able to utilize that because there’s several areas within our community that have cellular dead spots and that their emergency radios don’t reach. And so this was something, you know, especially after Helene, we just felt very passionate about making sure that our first responders had access to that. And then the final stages of it are actually rolling it out to all of our customers.

And so that was one of the ways that we’ve we’ve built back better in that we’ve identified, you know, our true need for the community. And it’s not something that that we’re we’re we’re leveraging from a monetary

standpoint. We’re not charging for this. This is something that we’re offering free to all of our first responders and to all of our customers because it’s important. I mean that that connection is important.

Christopher Mitchell (27:15)
Yeah, I remember when the and I know that we have rivalries and things like that, but during disasters, I remember when Comcast would open up all of their Wi-Fi and it makes a difference for people. And being able to do that takes a lot of work and preparation. And that’s a pretty big deal to be able to do that. And then not just that, but to make sure that first responders feel comfortable using it because they’re pretty particular about communications in my experience. So

I imagine it’s it’s not just a matter of flicking a few switches, but doing a lot of testing and things like that.

EUA (27:51)
It is and it’s something that you know we we keep the dialogue open. We’re we’re we participate in all of the emergency management meetings. You know, it’s it’s not just we’re we’re not just a company that isolates ourselves that we do this and that if you don’t follow what we’re doing, then you know, take your ball and go home. It’s we we go out and we search out what people need and and make sure that we’re there at the table to help. I I can think about

During, you know, the the the days and months after Helene, you know, something that that we did as an organization is is calling our electric customers that you know were severely impacted, maybe lost a home or or severely damaged, and helped get them connected to the resources that were available to help them. You know, because one of the vetting sources is to say that.

you know, they truly did lose this. And as the electric company, we were able to say, yes, in fact, they did, not only from our documentation, from from just going out and assessing the damage to our assets, but just, you know, from from understanding what our customers need, we could relay that in a much quicker way and and get that information to those that can make the decision and and go, well, here’s a trusted source. And so that allowed our customers to get

the the aid that they needed in in a faster way. And and, you know, I I wasn’t directly involved with that. That was primarily our customer service team, but you know, I I’m proud to be at a an organization where that sort of thing is is just that’s what we do, not, you know, well that’s somebody else’s job.

Christopher Mitchell (29:41)
Right, and I I wanted to no I’m something that I think is useful to think about is just that if there was one power company across Tennessee, you know, like a a giant investor owned utility, they would claim

that they would have these efficiencies and that a lot of you would lose your jobs and they would employ fewer people. And then when these things happen, they would be totally unable to respond. And I just feel like

I don’t think people always appreciate how valuable it is to have local authorities who know what to do, are empowered to do it, care about doing it, and have the you just have the ability to do it. And and that’s, you know, it’s something that you hope to God you’ll never need. But like it’s just really important to keep that into account when we’re talking about core essential infrastructure. So

I think we’ve we’ve talked about that a lot. I wanna make sure, Lee, was there another anything else you wanted to share? I think there might have been another customer support story that I that I was gonna try and wring out of you.

EUA (30:43)
Sure, that’s everything we’ve talked about just really defines, you know, our company and and our commitment to serving our our community, our customers, and trying to meet their needs every day and then certainly when disaster calls. But so many of our customers that were affected that that lost their homes.

Some of our customers even lost the property where their home was. They they had nothing left to put a camper on a modular home or even think about building a new home. And one little lady, Miss Lee, she lived out on the river and she is she is 90 years old, and the neighbors and one of the local churches.

you know, took care of her and made sure she had a place to stay and and they were in the process of building her a new home, but not down on the river up here in town. And they said, Miss Leedy, do you do you think you’d be happy up here in Erwin? And she said

Not if I can’t have my Erwin fiber. And they said, Miss Lee, we’ll make sure that that you’ll have Erwin fiber when you move in. And she said, yes, I could do that. And we asked her about Erwin Fiber and and she said, When I find something good, I stick with it. And I’m sticking with Erwin Fiber. And and that’s just a testament to

what all of our staff has done to take care of the community and our customers and and and go the extra step or take the extra 30 minutes or an hour when we do an installer, they have a problem. you know, we live in a community where we have a lot of retired people and they didn’t grow up with technology. And they need somebody that will be patient and work with them.

and try to help them make the best use of today’s technology at the level that they can and and be comfortable doing so. And our team has done such a great job of that. I hear stories all the time where we’ve helped folks and they’re just so appreciative. And and I’m just thankful, as John said, to be in a community where we can do that, be part of an organization that puts trying to meet customers, not customers’ needs above profit.

Christopher Mitchell (33:32)
Yeah, I I think you’ve put it very well. And that these are the stories I think of when I hear discussions about privatization, when people are thinking, like we couldn’t make some amount of money and they they just never appreciate what is lost in terms of every the everyday interactions and all those things that that someone else wouldn’t be putting back into the community. So I’m so glad that

you know, things have worked out to the extent that they have. We obviously are deeply sorry for those who have lost property and loved ones and all the destruction that comes of it. But it’s it’s also a moment to see how blessed you can be, you know, living among great neighbors and and people that can get things going again. So, you know, we’re all gonna get kicked in the teeth and and it’s it’s great if you can be in a community where people help you recover.

EUA (34:21)
That is so true.

Christopher Mitchell (34:23)
well I wanna thank you both for people who are watching. Hope you don’t notice any of the glitches, but we had a couple and I really appreciate Lee and John sticking with me through it. So thank you so much for being on the show today.

EUA (34:36)
Thank you, Chris. Thank you.

Jordan Pittman (34:39)
Thanks for listening to this episode of the Unbuffered Podcast. We have transcripts for this and other episodes available at ILSR.org/podcast. While you’re there, check out our

other podcasts from ILSR, including Building Local Power, Local Energy Rules, and the Composting for Community Podcasts. Email us at [email protected] with your ideas for the show. Follow us on Bluesky. Our handle is @communitynets.

You can catch the latest research from all of our initiatives by subscribing to our monthly newsletter at ILSR.org While you’re there, please take a moment to donate. Your support in any amount helps keep us going. Unbuffered is produced by Christopher Mitchell with editing provided by me, Jordan Pittman. Until next time, thanks for listening.

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