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About Us
South Central Alabama Broadband Cooperative District
About Us
The South Central Alabama Broadband Cooperative District (SCABCD) is a Special Purpose Capital Improvement Cooperative District created through a special legislative act codified in the Code of Alabama 1975, as amended in Chapter 11, Section 99B. This act aims to encourage and facilitate cooperative efforts by public entities to develop projects for their own use and for the benefit of their citizens and users. The SCABCD’s purpose is to own and manage a publicly funded, community-owned next generation broadband in Alabama network in South Central Alabama and the Black Belt Region. By leveraging private and public resources, the district aims to bridge the digital divide in these traditionally underserved and unserved communities and attract incremental investments, giving its communities access to broader markets and economic opportunities through “Next Generation Broadband Technology.
South Central Alabama Broadband Cooperative District
FOOTPRINT
The strategy of the SCABCD is to leverage private and public resources to expand the infrastructure to serve the entire district and support and attract businesses to the area.
The South Central Alabama Broadband Cooperative District (SCABCD) proposes to provide access and/or connect anchor institutions, businesses, and premises to a robust, comprehensive, community-owned, privately operated broadband infrastructure. This initiative aims to stimulate the creation and retention of jobs, enhance educational opportunities, promote telemedicine, and bolster economic development by leveraging economic opportunities broadband in Alabama and increasing capital investment in the region. The project envisions a combination of Middle Mile and fiber-to-the-home (FTTH) Comprehensive Community Infrastructure operating over a Converged Broadband Infrastructure Platform Design, which is a hybrid fiber optic with a wireless overlay that will deliver service-provider-independent connectivity to community anchor institutions and critical facilities and Last Mile connections to commercial and residential households in seventeen economically distressed counties in Alabama: Bullock, Butler, Choctaw, Conecuh, Crenshaw, Dallas, Escambia, Green, Hale, Lowndes, Macon, Montgomery, Morengo, Perry, Pickens, Sumpter and Wilcox as well as the Poach Band of Creek Indians.
South Central Alabama Broadband Cooperative District
VISION
To provide secure, reliable affordable and high quality converged telecommunication services anytime, anywhere for an accelerated inclusive socio-economic development.
MISSION
To develop a robust and secure state-of-the-art telecommunication network providing seamless coverage, with a special focus on rural and remote areas, publicly funded broadband in Alabama aims to bridge the digital divide and facilitate socio-economic development. This initiative will create an inclusive knowledge society by proliferating affordable and high-quality broadband services for underserved internet communities in Alabama across South Central Alabama and the Black Belt. Our goal is to reposition the mobile device as an instrument of socio-economic empowerment for citizens, providing efficiencies in broadband network management for Alabama people consistent with urban spaces while living in a rural area.
CORE VALUES
The following core values guide our behavior and help govern how we will work as a Cooperative District in addressing our mission and discharging our duties to provide high-capacity network services in Alabama.
- ACCOUNTABLE ALWAYS: We acknowledge the ownership of the decisions we make and the actions we take and we accept responsibility for the resulting outcomes without exceptions or excuses.
- INTEGRITY FIRST: We will conduct ourselves at all ties in a manner that is ethical, legal, and professional with an unwavering commitment to honesty, fairness and respectfulness.
- INNOVATIVE STEWARDSHIP: WE will challenge the status quo with regard to the wy public services are designed, financed, and delivered to the member communities and will manage our resources with the present and future generations in mind.
- TEAMWORK WITH PURPOSE: We function as a team in partnership with our member jurisdictions and administrative staff. We are committed to creating a superior work environment for District employees who, in turn, are committed to delivering exceptional services to the citizens of our member jurisdictions. We are ambassadors for the District. We demonstrate professionalism in all we do. WE engage in critical thinking and deliberative discussion, and then, act with a sense of urgency to accomplish our goals, while remaining accountable for our actions.
- TRANSPARENCY IN ALL DECISIONS: The process by which deliberations are initiated, decisions are made and actions are taken will always be done with a commitment to full transparency.
Business Strategy and Long Term Goal
The South Central Alabama Broadband Cooperative District’s next-generation high-speed network will consist of approximately 15,386 fiber miles of fiber-optic backbone cable intersecting the majority of cities throughout the 17-county region. This network will provide the backbone over which existing telecommunications providers will transport their services, enabling them to reach customers throughout the area. As a middle-mile/last-mile network, it will operate as a wholesale system offering affordable, high-speed connectivity. By selling wholesale services to telecommunications providers, SCABCD aims to enable access to the 17-county market, currently underserved or unserved, supporting the long-term needs of providers with broadband technology investment in Alabama.
Public-private broadband partnerships will be key, as incumbent telecommunications providers, cable companies, cellular providers, and wireless Internet providers utilize the system to transport their services across the region. The wholesale business model will cater primarily to large telecommunications providers that require high-capacity services across the network.
Using this model as the primary driver of revenues in the early years will allow SCABCD to secure high-capacity, cash-flow-generating services with existing providers rather than relying solely on retail models that result in more moderate, organic growth. SCABCD has already begun engaging providers and seeks to develop interconnection agreements with in the near future as well as pre-sell capacity on the system to secure cash flows immediately once the network is operational.
In addition to the wholesale market, SCABCD will be connecting over 800 plus large anchor institutional customers, including schools, libraries, government facilities, hospitals and related organizations to the network over the first 4 years, providing a secondary source of revenues from the retail market as the network matures. High margin retail services and residential customers will complement volume-based wholesale services to drive profitability higher and diversify revenue streams. In addition to these services, a complementary overlay of wireless services will be enabled throughout the region to be used by both wholesale providers and retail customers.
Long Term Goal
SCABCD will seek additional investment vehicles to provide capital for expansion of its network to serve additional customers throughout the region. This funding will be utilized for additional capital projects for network construction into communities within the region, further growing SCABCD’s retail base of customers, businesses and community anchors, while continuing to service its wholesale market. SCABCD’s long-term goal is to become the primary provider of broadband telecommunications services within the South Central Alabama region and ensure the long- term sustainability of its member communities. In doing so, SCABCD will help secure the long-term success of its region and enable the residents of South Central Alabama to prosper in the new digital economy.