Clarksville, TN – Federal Communications Commission Chairman, Ajit Pai, announced in a statement that the FCC plans to reverse Title II enacted in 2015. Title II is commonly known as net neutrality and was put in place to ensure that there is equal and neutral access to the Internet by consumers.
This, in turn, means that companies that provide Internet access to consumers should not block nor throttle access to any sites that their customer wishes access to within the confines of the Internet service package and its bandwidth that they subscribe to.
The reversal of this FCC order will now allow some companies the ability, with notice and full disclosure to their customers, the right to charge additional fees, throttle content and use other means to manage their customers access to bandwidth and the Internet.
CDE Lightband has followed this process closely and wishes to share our position on Title II and net neutrality. CDE Lightband, unlike many of our counterparts in the business, provides for a true fiber to the premise experience with our customers. We provide them with dedicated bandwidth that is symmetrical for both uploaded and downloaded content.
Prior to the enacting of Title II, CDE Lightband, entered the broadband business with the intent to provide our customers with an Internet experience unsurpassed in the region. Our commitment is to our customers and to providing them with access to the bandwidth they subscribe to.
During the two years that Title II has been in place we have maintained that core focus. With the repeal of Title II and net neutrality we plan to continue along our original business model of providing an equal and open Internet experience, allowing our customers to use the bandwidth we can provide to its full capacity.
In short, if you are a CDE Lightband customer your service will not change with the repeal of net neutrality.
Our network is designed to support the needs of our customers with system architecture and redundancies to protect your service experience. Currently, there is no plan to change our pricing. In fact, our pricing has stayed the same since launching services in 2007 while over that time we have increased the available bandwidth by five times.
We hope you continue to enjoy your service with CDE Lightband and we convey our thanks for choosing us as your broadband services provider.
Thank you,
Brian Taylor
General Manager
About CDE Lightband
CDE Lightband is a municipally-owned public power and broadband service provider serving 67,000 electric and 19,000 broadband customers with the city limits of Clarksville, TN.
CDE Lightband provides reliable utilities delivered at the speed of light. Our service area, consisting of 100 square miles within the municipal boundaries, includes 892 miles of power lines and 960 miles of fiber optic cable.
Our world-class Fiber Optic Network keeps electric costs low and allows us to deliver exceptional products and constant innovation. The network provides savings of over $1 million annually in operating costs and provides over $5 million annually in income for electrical grid improvements that result in half as many large scale power outages compared to peer cities.
Additionally, access to our network increases home values by 3% or an average of over $5,000, according to the Fiber to the Home Council. Based in large part on access to the superior digital products provided by CDE Lightband, Clarksville has been designated a first 50 “Next Century City.”
CDE Lightband offers Electricity, Internet, Digital TV and Telephone services with blazing fast speed and superior performance … with the additional convenience of 24/7 local support and bundling all your utilities into a single bill.
Our staff includes 200 full-time employees, a management team with over 100 years of combined industry expertise and governance provided by a board of five local business leaders.
For more information, visit their website at www.cdelightband.com
