The City Council has requested a presentation from the Washington Rural Broadband Cooperative (WA-RBC) at the March 2nd Council Meeting.

According to the project website, the WA-RBC would create a high bandwidth network to deliver 10 gigabit service to community anchor points (schools, tribal centers, libraries, and chambers of commerce) throughout Snohomish, Skagit, and Whatcom counties.

The WA-RBC project is a partnership between the Tulalip Tribes of Washington and Cascadeo Corporation. This proposal seeks to leverage significant investments already made by the Tulalip Tribes in a data center and fiber optic infrastructure that can extend to other tribes and rural communities.

The WA-RBC has requested $12.4 million in grants to complete Phase 1 of this project which interconnects 14 community access points (CAPs) providing access to critical services to over 50,000 households plus businesses, schools, and governments.

This includes access between tribes and communities  with ease of expansion throughout the State of Washington. The primary intent of this project is to serve as a not-for-profit, neutral, backbone bringing tremendous provider choice to the unserved and underserved citizens within the State of Washington.

The City of Snohomish has been working with the Snohomish County Information Services Department and with the Snohomish School District regarding the ability for City connections to the existing fiber optic network developed by the District and plans for expansion by the County.

The opportunity to integrate this County/District system with what the WA-RBC may develop is not completely clear. The County IS Departments project manager for this program has been invited to attend in order to learn more about the WA-RBCs program.