ARROWSIC, Maine — Gov. Janet Mills joined U.S. Department of Agriculture (USDA) Deputy Under Secretary DJ Lavoy on Thursday in announcing a multi-million-dollar investment in broadband for several Maine communities.
The investment is being made through the ReConnect Pilot Program and is aimed at increasing e-connectivity and bringing high-speed internet to over 4,500 homes across rural Maine. This includes homes in island, coastal, Downeast, and Western Maine communities.
LaVoy announced the following projects:
• The Town of Arrowsic will use a $604,254 ReConnect Program grant and a $604,254 in ReConnect Program loan to construct a fiber-optic broadband network with speeds up to 100 megabytes per second (Mbps) to connect 237 households, 20 pre-subscribed businesses, and four pre-subscribed farms.
• Monhegan Plantation will use a $626,298 ReConnect Program grant to connect the entire island community in Lincoln County, which is home to a school, power district, municipal office, museum, post office, library, and several inns and small businesses. The project’s service area includes 40 households, an educational facility, a critical community facility, 11 pre-subscribed farms, and 15 pre-subscribed businesses.
• The Town of Roque Bluffs will use an $893,170 ReConnect Program grant to construct a fiber-optic network to connect 166 households, 22 pre-subscribed farms, and 16 pre-subscribed businesses in Washington County. The network will connect to the Downeast Ring of Maine's "three-ring binder" network backbone in Machias, 4.5 miles from the town line on Roque Bluffs Road.
• The Biddeford Internet Corporation will use a $3.5 million ReConnect Program grant and a $3.5 million ReConnect Program loan to expand its current gigabit Fiber-to-the-Premise (FTTP) network to connect 4,084 households, 30 pre-subscribed farms, 28 educational facilities, 23 pre-subscribed businesses, 15 health care centers, and 12 critical community facilities in Hebron, Sumner, Hartford, Buckfield, Canton, North Turner, Turner, South Paris, and West Paris.
“High-speed internet is no longer a luxury; it is an economic necessity,” Gov. Mills said. “This significant federal investment builds on the work done by the state to help connect our small, rural communities to high-speed internet and open new doors of opportunity for their residents. As we work to strengthen and diversify our economy, building out our broadband capacity will play an important role and this funding represents another welcome step forward.”
According to the USDA's website, the ReConnect Program offers unique federal financing and funding options in the form of loans, grants, and loan/grant combinations to facilitate broadband deployment in areas of rural America that don’t currently have sufficient access to broadband.
Thursday's announcement took place at the Arrowsic Fire Department.
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