SUMMARY:

On May 13, 2022, the Internal Services Department (ISD) submitted a second quarterly progress report pursuant to the Board motion titled Investments to Accelerate Digital Equity. Of special note in the report is an update regarding Board Directive 4(b), which discusses a competitive solicitation to acquire Managed Service Providers to implement and manage Community Wireless Networks. This is intended to be a five-year demonstration pilot that provides free broadband internet service through public-private partnerships to thousands of households in underserved communities impacted by the digital divide. The solicitation required that respondents be able to provide high-speed, high-quality internet service to each subscriber residence using wireless technology, fiber or combination of both. The solicitation also required a minimum download speed of 100 Mbps and upload speed of 20 Mbps, with the ability to scale to symmetrical download and upload speeds of 100 Mbps (100/100 Mbps). A total of 11 companies provided submissions by the solicitation deadline.