Community Broadband Network

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In the 2023 Strategic Leadership Plan adopted by the County Council, it was identified that community broadband is a priority to improve economic vitality of the county.

Headed by Community Broadband Manager Jerry Smith, Los Alamos County is tasked to provide community broadband as a basic essential service that will enable reliable high-speed internet services throughout the county at competitive pricing. 

Bookmark this page to stay up to date on the efforts Los Alamos County is making to improve internet connectivity. Together with staff, council, and community input, steps are being taken to provide better broadband options for you.

Latest Updates

2024, Nov. 19: The Los Alamos County Council awarded two contracts to Bonfire Engineering & Construction LLC to 1) Design and build a county-owned Fiber-to-the-Premise (FTTP) open access network for $35 million and 2) Manage the FTTP open-access network for $15.9 million.  View the PowerPoint Presentation(PDF, 435KB) and the November 19, 2024 Council meeting. (We will provide a timeline, FAQs and additional information soon.)

2024, Jan. 12: The Community Broadband Network project request for proposal (RFP), including Phase 2 of this 2-step "Design, Build, Operate" opportunity has closed. Information is on the County Closed Bids and RFPs page. 

 

2023, Jan. 24: Presentation to the County Council on the results of the residential broadband survey(PDF, 1MB)  and presentation of the DRAFT Broadband Strategic Plan(PDF, 14MB). View the January 24, 2023 Council meeting. The Council  adopted a policy declaring broadband an essential utility and prioritizes five characteristics for a Community Broadband Network:

  1. Likelihood of implementation.
  2. Open access.
  3. County ownership or option to acquire ownership.
  4. Fiber-to-the-premises availability.
  5. Prompt implementation.
Community Broadband Forum

Los Alamos County held a Community Broadband Forum on Wednesday, Oct. 19, 2022 at 5:30 p.m. at the White Rock Fire Station 3.  If you missed it, you can watch it here.

 

Broadband 101:

Vocabulary we often use to talk about broadband includes "last mile" and "middle mile." Last mile simply refers to the internet cables (copper, coax cable, or fiber optic) coming from the street into your home. Middle mile, for Los Alamos, refers to the internet feed coming into the County from the outside. Progress is slow, but daily work on these two items is resulting in steady movement forward. Funding opportunities don't always pan out and take a while to move through their own due process. At some point in the future, the county will have made some decisions related to options on how to proceed with broadband related projects. Once those decisions have been made, project plans will be communicated here, so everyone can follow the timeline progress.

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