The city of Cortez first leased its fiber operations to Montrose-based Clearnetworx in 2023, and it’s installing lines to more than 4,500 addresses within city limits.
So far, over 1,100 people in Cortez have signed up for fiber and 500 are actively using it.
By July, the build-out should be complete.
“It’s a big undertaking, but it’s been super-fun,” said Madison Clark, marketing director at Clearnetworx.
As it stands, there’s just one area left on the east side of the city that’s awaiting construction.
The rest of Cortez either has fiber now or is under construction, which means Clearnetworx’s sister construction company Deeply Digital or a local contractor is out installing fiber lines, said Clark.
“We’re kind of in the last spring with Cortez. There’s new zones coming up every month,” said Casey Irving, the director of business development at Clearnetworx. “It’s exciting.”
Clearnetworx is running about a year behind schedule, but they’re “making really good progress,” said Cortez City Manager Drew Sanders.
Irving said they’re behind because it took a year to integrate the fiber Cortez already had into a new system, a project they expected to take six months, at most. Plus, they’re hanging or burying new lines all over the city.
“We’re building out a new utility that didn’t exist before,” said Irving. “It takes a lot of time.”
Clark explained that the lines are installed aerially or underground.
The former is the most time efficient of the two, as they’re hung from existing utility poles. Burying lines underground tends to require more labor and time.
In downtown areas, lines are usually installed aerially.
In Cortez, from East Empire to East Seventh Street, west of North Mildred Road, lines are being installed aerially, said Clark. In areas without poles, lines are buried.
As far as how long construction takes, “it’s hard to give a time frame” because of the two different methods, said Clark.
“Just know it’s a construction and utility project that takes time,” Clark said. “Trust we’re working as hard and as fast as we can.”
Since the early 2000s, Cortez “had been passively taking the opportunity to install fiber lines with road projects, slowly building out our fiber network,” said Mayor Rachel Medina.
Over a 20-year period, Cortez invested about $1.6 million into building a fiber network that benefited its schools, city and county buildings.
“During the pandemic, people were working from home and realizing that people can’t live without the internet,” Medina said. “It’s truly a utility. It’s not necessarily treated like that but it is, and that’s why we wanted to push it forward.”
In 2021, after Sanders was hired on, the city hired a consultant to estimate how much it’d cost to fully build out its fiber network. It put out a request for bids and decided to partner with Clearnetworx after realizing it would cost $14 million.
“That could’ve been disastrous for the city,” Sanders said. “And it would’ve cost way more with inflation and paying back bonds.”
Clearnetworx paid the city $1.8 million for its existing network and is covering costs to complete the build-out.
“It turned out to be a very good partnership with them,” said Sanders.
Fiber will be available outside city limits, too.
In partnering with Cortez, Clearnetworx got access to building and installing fiber to the county, too.
“They’re trying to build a strong system, so they made the investment,” said Sanders.
Irving echoed this point.
He said that “middle mile connectivity,” which is fiber in-between communities, creates a more reliable and resilient network overall.
Plus, it brings access to rural areas.
“Ideally everyone will have access to fiber, even if you live outside city limits,” said Irving.
To make fiber build-outs happen in more rural areas, Irving said they “leverage grant money.”
Last year, the state awarded Clearnetworx upward of $30 million to fund fiber projects in rural parts Southwest Colorado, the most money the region “has ever seen” for such projects, he said.
That money is supporting two projects already underway in Montezuma County that will connect Cortez to Mancos and Mancos to Dolores.
Right now, Clearnetworx is doing the permitting, preconstruction work to make those projects – possibly – start on-the-ground in late summer or fall this year. That would ideally open the door for more rural areas in the county to access fiber by spring summer next year, said Irving.
Zooming out, Clearnetworx is working to supply fiber and build a resilient, interconnected network across the Western Slope.
“Fiber has a 50-year life span,” said Irving. “It’s a future-proof solution to keep up with technology needs for years to come.”
