The Eastern Shore of Virginia Broadband Authority (ESVBA) has re¬duced its Internet rates as much as 35 percent and 20 percent on Ethernet transport circuits.
This is the second reduction in two years. Initial construction of the ESVBA was funded with feder¬al and state grants, and federal ap¬propriations administered by NASA. Since these grant funds have been expended, the ESVBA operates sole¬ly on revenue that it receives from broadband services provided to its customers.
According to ESVBA Executive Di¬rector Nicholas Pascaretti, “The ESVBA is always seeking ways to keeps its rates affordable and competitive while maintaining funds for network expan¬sion, upgrades, and maintenance. Net¬work reliability and resilience are crit¬ical to ESVBA’s customers.
“ESVBA recognized a need to lower our rates for smaller customers,” Pas¬caretti said. “By keeping operating costs low, we were able to achieve this goal and maintain the level of ser¬vice which our customers expect and deserve.”
Pascaretti further stated, “The ESVBA will continue to seek ways to extend the fiber network and to assist independent service providers on the network to affordably reach more and more customers.”
The ESVBA is a public author¬ity created jointly by Accomack and Northampton counties to construct the “backbone” of the fiber-optic net¬work that runs from the Chesapeake Bay-Bridge Tunnel along Lankford Highway into Maryland. Construct¬ed with grants from the state & fed¬eral government, the backbone is now complete.
It offers connections to businesses and Internet service providers.
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