In June, 2005, voters in Lafayette chose to invest in a municipal FTTH network, now known as the only municipal gigabit network in the state, LUS Fiber. To celebrate the milestone, City-Parish President Joey Durel has declared July LUS Fiber Month. Current customers’ Internet access has been boosted up to gigabit speed at no extra charge for July and the city will celebrate with a series of events this week. The entire community is invited to participate onsite but most of the events will be broadcast live so if you are not there, you can be part of the celebration. See the list of events below.
In the past ten years, the network has attracted thousands of new jobs, created better educational opportunities, and helped bridge the digital divide. Just last fall, three high tech companies committed to bringing approximately 1,300 new jobs to the “Silicon Bayou.” The presence of the network, the University of Louisiana’s local top-ranked computer science program, and its quality grads were two more key factors for choosing Lafayette. In April, Standard & Poor gave LUS Fiber an A+ bond rating based on the system’s “sustained strong fixed charge coverage and liquidity levels, and the communication system’s improved cash flow.”
The July issue of the local Independent tells the story of the network. According to Terry Huval, Director of LUS Fiber, the self-reliant streak has always been part of Lafayette’s culture – in 1996 the city celebrated its 100th year vote to create its own electric and water system. The Independent article describes that culture as it permeated the vision shared by City-Parish President Joey Durel and Huval.
“The vision was simple: Lafayette was already benefiting from a very successful electric, water and wastewater system, and LUS could leverage its expertise to offer Internet and other telecommunications services, if that is what our community wanted,” he says. “After we threw out the idea, the entrepreneurial, wildcatter spirit of Lafayette seemed to take it from there.”
Even with a vision, it took strong community organizing to overcome incumbent efforts to derail any municipal network project. John St. Julien was at the front of those efforts; he spoke with Chris in episode #19 of the Community Broadband Bits podcast about organizing strategies and fending off attacks from incumbent providers. Mobilizing to improve connectivity with a fiber network brought together individuals from every demographic in the community. Business leaders worked with community activists because they all needed better connectivity.
Fighting misinformation and lies from incumbents became a valuable tool, reports the Independent:
The citizen group was able to settle into reaction mode: Once the dumb, clunky messages came out, they took to their emails and blog and pointed out every single lie. It wasn’t just an opportunity to educate; it was an opportunity to draw on local pride and, again, that spirit of audacity. “It was a lot of fun to watch, waiting for them to say something else ridiculous and outrageous,” John St. Julien remembers.
Those clunky messages eventually backfired and, with anti-incumbent sentiment strong, the voters chose to serve themselves with a publicly owned, accountable, reliable municipal network.
Achieving success has not been easy as LUS Fiber has had to contend with lawsuits, delays, restrictive state laws, and twisted criticisms over the past ten years. While Lafayette has much to celebrate, Huval reflected in the Independent article on what more could have been accomplished if the situation were different:
We entered this arena as underdogs.
We had to fight for every success we achieved. We were forced to accept a law that was going to make our entry into this business far more difficult. We incurred lawsuit delay after lawsuit delay — delays that impacted our entry into this competitive market for three years. I know of no local government telecom system that has had to go through the extreme challenges we encountered.
If we would not have had all these early legal impediments, we would have been on-line faster and drawn in far more customers, more quickly. If we could have captured the level of strong enthusiasm in those early years, there is no doubt our revenues would have been stronger, and we could have been even more creative and aggressive. … Under the circumstances, there was not much we could have done differently and still reach a successful business result.
We concur. Lafayette’s success is all the more powerful given the tremendous obstacles they had to overcome. But they overcame them and kept a sense of humor throughout. We have greatly enjoyed every opportunity to interact with everyone we have met from Lafayette – from Joey Durel, Terry Huval, and John St Julien to recent transplant Geoff Daily to the folks making poboys at Olde Tyme Grocery.
Thanks to the city utility, local Cox customers report that the company appears to be reacting to the competition with more reasonable rates and better customer service. LUS Fiber is in the black and revenues are projected to reach $50 million per year in the next nine years. While LUS Fiber and the people of Lafayette are celebrating success as measured by time on the calendar, they can also celebrate their own grit and determination.
Durel to the Independent:
I knew this had the possibility of transforming Lafayette — that 25 years later, Lafayette would be a better place because of this…Even if fiber just breaks even, but we create thousands of new jobs because of it, that’s a win.
Watch video below from KLFY Channel 10 reported on the network earlier this month, highlighting one of the telemedicine applications made possible by LUS Fiber.
Schedule of events:
Reddit Ask Me Anything (AMA) With City-Parish President Joey Durel and LUS Fiber Director Terry Huval
Tuesday, July 14th – 1:30 – 3:30 p.m.
Get answers to your questions as we host an AMA session. Join us by going to http://reddit.com/r/iama
Fiber for Breakfast
Wednesday, July 15 – 7:00 – 10:30 a.m. CST
Live Remote Broadcast on KATC-TV LUS Fiber Customer Service Center – 1875 W. Pinhook Road Join us for a live remote braodcast on KATC-TV and a breakfast bite.
George Porter, Jr. & the Runnin Pardners The Park at the Horse Farm
Levitt Amp Concert Series feat.
Wednesday, July 15 – 6:30 – 8:00 p.m.
Come out and celebrate with LUS Fiber – a night of great music and fun, in a venue steeped with history.
LUS Fiber joins City-Parish President Joey Durel for “Lafayette Live” on KPEL
Thursday, July 16 – 7:30 – 8:00 p .m.
City-Parish President Joey Durel is joined by LUS Fiber Director Terry Huval during “Lafayette Live” on 96.5 KPEL. Be sure to tune-in as they reminisce the 2005 Election and the ten-year road that followed.
Our report, Broadband at the Speed of Light: How Three Communities Built Next-Generation Networks dives deep into Lafayette’s accomplishment. But in terms of our enthusiasm for what Lafayette has accomplished, well … Kermit is a pretty good proxy for how we feel:
This article is apart of MuniNetworks. The original piece can be found here
