RICHLAND COUNTY — A multiyear effort to bring high-speed fiber internet to underserved rural residents in northern Richland County has officially crossed the finish line, delivering connections to hundreds more addresses than originally anticipated.
Ashley Karlen, director of government affairs for Charter Communications, told the Richland County Board of Commissioners Thursday the buildout was completed Oct. 6.
The initiative brought high-speed fiber broadband to 1,167 serviceable locations — surpassing the 748 locations initially contracted under the agreement.
Charter’s overall service footprint for the project encompasses 1,211 passed addresses, according to follow-up data provided by Karlen.
Of those, 44 are vacant lots or undeveloped parcels where fiber was installed, allowing them to receive immediate service if someone builds there in the future.
The expansion marks a major milestone in “last mile” broadband infrastructure.
In telecommunications, the “last mile” refers to the final physical segment of network cabling that delivers internet connectivity from a provider’s regional trunk line directly into individual homes, farms, and businesses.
Because rural properties often sit on large acreages and far back from main roadways, last-mile deployment represents the most expensive and technically demanding phase of rural digital infrastructure.
What was initially planned in 2021 as an $8.1 million initiative grew into an investment of more than $15.2 million by completion, Karlen said.
The project was structured as a public-private partnership using $2 million from the county’s American Rescue Plan Act allocation and nearly $2 million from the Ohio Residential Broadband Expansion Grant program.
Charter absorbed all additional costs through private capital investment, according to Karlen.
“That’s at no additional cost to the state or the county,” Karlen said. “That’s all private investment from Spectrum.”
Karlen said the sharp rise in costs stemmed from permitting hurdles that forced the company to alter its construction strategy.
“When we originally designed the project, a lot of what we were designing was going aerial, meaning we were attaching to the existing utility poles,” Karlen said.
“We ran into just time constraints in terms of getting those permits approved, and so we actually ended up pivoting and doing a lot more underground work than we originally anticipated, and underground construction is typically more expensive than aerial construction,” she said.
The leap in served addresses came from what she called “synergy locations” — properties crews passed along routes between mandated grant targets.
“A lot of times when we’re building, we’ll naturally have to pass locations to get to the locations that were in the grant, so we just go ahead and provide service to them,” Karlen explained.
“It was not in the list of addresses that we had originally agreed upon when we signed the grant agreement with the state of Ohio,” she said.
While a complete demographic list of the final 1,167 active locations is underway, Karlen noted that within the original 748 contracted addresses, 720 were homes and 28 were small businesses.
Reviewing the final numbers, Vero calculated the combined public and private investment at roughly $14,483 per serviceable location.
“That four-digit number just is visually better than seven,” Vero said, noting the impact on north-county residents.
Richland County administrator Andrew Keller commended the long-term collaboration needed to navigate complex federal and state compliance across the five-year timeline.
“Richland County was fortunate to be selected for this project,” Keller said.
“Charter, along with BroadbandOhio, came to us in 2021 and identified an $8.1 million investment in bringing fiber to hundreds of addresses in the northern part of the county. But it would not be possible without the county commissioners dedicating $2 million in (ARPA) gap funding towards this project,” Keller said.
Keller added that keeping the project on course required constant communication. Under federal guidelines, any projects using ARPA funds must be complete by the end of 2026.
“I’ve been a bit high maintenance in following up with Charter because this project has been very important to me,” Keller said. “Ashley has consistently replied with quality follow-up, and together we’ve gotten the job done.”
The completed fiber network provides symmetrical speeds of up to 2 gigabits per second, with all 1,167 serviceable addresses now activated and capable of purchasing service.
