<div dir="ltr">All:<div><br></div><div>Governments at all levels have often -- regularly -- given subsidies in a variety of forms to drive economic growth. Think building of canals, transcontinental railroad, highways, and other tax forgiveness or rebates.</div><div><br></div><div>Has NM government, again at all levels, considered giving long-term (at least 5 years) broadband access to startups? After all, it's not as though such access would be a major consumable. If the fiber lines are in, what is the real cost to deliver 50-100g service?</div><div><br></div><div>Tom<br><br><br><br><div class="mt-signature"><font color="#999999" class="mt-signature-text">Sent with <a href="https://mailtrack.io/install?source=signature&lang=en&referral=jtjohnson555@gmail.com&idSignature=22" class="mt-install">MailTrack</a></font></div></div><img width="0" height="0" class="mailtrack-img" src="https://mailtrack.io/trace/mail/50d6c0815a6758e591ad5ec6e493e979189d7ccd.png"></div><div class="gmail_extra"><br clear="all"><div><div class="gmail_signature"><div dir="ltr"><div><div dir="ltr"><div><div dir="ltr"><div><div dir="ltr"><div><br>============================================<br>Tom Johnson<br>Institute for Analytic Journalism -- Santa Fe, NM USA<br>505.577.6482(c) 505.473.9646(h)<br><a href="http://www.spj.org" target="_blank">Society of Professional Journalists</a> - <a href="http://www.spj.org/region9.asp" target="_blank">Region 9</a> Director<br><b><font color="#0000ff">Check out <a href="https://www.facebook.com/pages/Its-The-Peoples-Data/1599854626919671" target="_blank">It's The People's Data</a></font></b></div><div><a href="http://www.jtjohnson.com/" target="_blank">http://www.jtjohnson.com</a> <a href="mailto:tom@jtjohnson.com" target="_blank">tom@jtjohnson.com</a><br>============================================</div></div></div></div></div></div></div></div></div></div>
<br><div class="gmail_quote">On Wed, Dec 23, 2015 at 12:12 PM, Richard Lowenberg <span dir="ltr"><<a href="mailto:rl@1st-mile.org" target="_blank">rl@1st-mile.org</a>></span> wrote:<br><blockquote class="gmail_quote" style="margin:0 0 0 .8ex;border-left:1px #ccc solid;padding-left:1ex">NM Jobs Council wants to give business a slice of the broadband pie<br>
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Dec 23, 2015<br>
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<a href="http://www.bizjournals.com/albuquerque/blog/morning-edition/2015/12/nm-jobs-council-wants-to-give-business-a-slice-of.html" rel="noreferrer" target="_blank">http://www.bizjournals.com/albuquerque/blog/morning-edition/2015/12/nm-jobs-council-wants-to-give-business-a-slice-of.html</a><br>
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New Mexico needs to create 140,000 economic base jobs in the next 10 years to get back to pre-recession employment levels, and potentially half of those are at risk if the state doesn’t do something about its lack of adequate broadband.<br>
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That's according to New Mexico Jobs Council estimates, and in response the organization is gearing up for a legislative push for better broadband for New Mexico business.<br>
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New Mexico Jobs Council consultant Mark Laotian is part of an effort to seek upwards of $300,000 in legislative funding for a statewide broadband infrastructure study.<br>
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“There’s federal money pouring in to wire up schools, which the state’s done a really good job on,” said Mark Lautman, a consultant for the council. “What they’re missing is the discussion about businesses.”<br>
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The Jobs Council has drafted a broadband infrastructure bill asking the Legislature for upwards of $300,000 for a detailed study of what it will cost to get the state up to adequate download speeds.<br>
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“We know it’s going to cost tens of millions of dollars to get this done,” said Charles Lehman, another consultant with the council, who added that part of the study will focus on how to secure outside money in addition to state appropriations for the infrastructure work that needs to be done.<br>
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Lautman said that, as a result of discussions with regional stakeholders over the past three years, lack of adequate broadband has surfaced as one of three primary issues affecting job creation in the state. The issue is largely a rural one, though metropolitan areas are also affected, and Lautman said there are pockets in Albuquerque that are “not built out.”<br>
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“As soon as we saw the rankings, there was motivation to start trying to find out if there’s a legislative fix to this,” he said. “Everybody knows that work is getting more dependent on the internet.”<br>
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Lehman cited study estimates indicating that about one-third of businesses in the state don’t have adequate broadband, with that number nearing half in rural areas. Business leaders and economic developers also said they don’t expect the situation to improve unless something is done. About a quarter of them reported losing potential business as a result.<br>
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“Businesses just won’t come here because we don’t have sufficient broadband,” he said.<br>
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Lautman said the study will hopefully help determine some key issues around broadband service in the region, such as minimum speed requirements, carrier diversity, pricing and redundancy.<br>
“All of these are questions about the minimum level of service needed in 10 years for this economy to build out the way we’re saying,” he said.<br>
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The bill, which the council hopes to get introduced in the upcoming legislative session, will also ask for about $600,000 to complete some critical high-priority rural infrastructure development the council says is ready to go.<br>
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Richard Lowenberg, Executive Director<br>
1st-Mile Institute <a href="tel:505-603-5200" value="+15056035200" target="_blank">505-603-5200</a><br>
Box 8001, Santa Fe, NM 87504,<br>
<a href="mailto:rl@1st-mile.org" target="_blank">rl@1st-mile.org</a> <a href="http://www.1st-mile.org" rel="noreferrer" target="_blank">www.1st-mile.org</a><br>
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