FORT BRAGG, CA., 11/25/24 —The Fort Bragg City Council will consider buying internet service provider Mendocino Community Network (MCN) from the Mendocino Unified School Board District at tonight’s city council meeting.
The district’s school board voted 6-0 earlier this month to accept the city’s offer of $500,000 with a promise to keep all employees and services.
MCN was launched in 1994 by the school district with the help of a grant from NASA to teach students about the then-new internet. Today, it is the leading locally owned internet provider on the Mendocino Coast, serving over 1,500 customers. In recent years, the district has wanted to unload MCN to focus on its educational mission. That’s when the city of Fort Bragg stepped in.
Recently, the city was awarded a $10.3 million grant from the state to fund efforts to expand broadband access to underserved parts of the coast. The acquisition of MCN will help the city achieve its broadband expansion goal. The city will also ensure continuity; MCN staff will retain their jobs and current customers will not have service disrupted.
The school board vote was preliminary to get started on hammering out the details of the sale, a school board director said at a special meeting on Nov. 14 at Mendocino High School. The final vote will be taken in a few months.
“MCN has had a charmed life in lots of ways,” said school board director Michael Schaeffer, who was part of a committee that brought the city offer to the school board. “It started with dial-up when nobody had dial-up. We did really well with it and got a lot of people online. Then MCN was threatened by DSL, and MCN got on board, and we got into a position where we could offer DSL through Fusion and Sonic. Now we are in a place where we cannot take any new customers in those services. Our new customers are wireless customers.” He said it could be six months before the acquisition process is complete, and there will be chances for input in both public processes.
The MCN purchase is the first item on the agenda (under “Conduct of business”) for the Fort Bragg City Council meeting tonight. The meeting starts at 6:30 p.m. at Fort Bragg Town Hall, 363 Main St., or online on Zoom here.
Unfortunately MCN is hamstrung by the unethical practices of AT&T who refuses to maintain their copper phone lines, limiting the quality of service outside of the immediate village. AT&T already tried to break their obligation to be the provider of last resort for tens of thousands of California rural phone customers but in a rare instance of actual public service the PUC denied them that option. AT&T will let their lines dangle from trees and their service boxes flood with rainwater. They’re no better than PG&E with their level of care for their customers or the general public.