Denied applications
The CFNC-Central El Dorado County Regional Broadband Consortium proposed to represent a relatively small area of El Dorado County. This consortium is comprised of Camino Fiber Network Cooperative (CFNC), the El Dorado County Office of Education, and the El Dorado Chamber of Commerce.In its review and rating of the consortium's application, The CPUC's Communications Division noted that the application did not rate high in the required categories and scored below the minimum 70 points, too low to be considered for Commission approval.
According to the CPUC, the consortium’s membership is very limited and not representative of a broader set of constituents in the area. The application included letters of support only from a number of individual consumers, but with no endorsements from other local/regional government entities, anchor institutions, and other community organizations in the region.
In addition, the CPUC said that the consortium members appear to have insufficient broadband planning, design, and network deployment experience, and propose to rely on a technical consulting company to undertake most of the consortium’s activities pertaining to broadband deployment. However, the application did not provide any information on this consulting company’s experience and qualifications. The activities detailed in the Work Plan focused primarily on network engineering and business planning in support of CFNC’s planned fiber to the premises infrastructure project proposals for CASF and other funding sources. While the Work Plan included activities for broadband access and adoption, the expected outcomes from these activities were not clearly laid out.
Additionally, another application for El Dorado County, Gold Country Broadband Consortium proposed to serve a bigger area and scored higher in the rating process. For these reasons, the CPUC voted not to approve the CFNC consortia application for funding on 1 December 2011.
Adapted from the summary prepared by the CPUC Communications Division.
