Though the core business purpose of Ozarks Electric Cooperative is to provide reliable, affordable electricity, our larger mission is to make our corner of the world a better place. With that in mind, we knew building and bringing fiber broadband to our community was the right choice with OzarksGo. 

“We want to work to build trust, community, jobs and a better world,” says Kayla Clark, vice president of Member Relations for Ozarks. “The principles of a cooperative guide us in our efforts to provide fiber to our community.” 

Building Trust
Electricity has become such a necessary part of life that we often don’t even think about it until we don’t have it. Access to high-speed internet has become the next essential item communities need. OzarksGo has helped businesses become more efficient, people do more work from home and kids complete schoolwork from home. For us, providing reliable, affordable service is a chance to connect with our members. And we want our members to trust us.

Building Community
Ozarks loves our communities. We also care about the members and customers we serve. By helping build and maintain strong communities through our Ozarks Cares program, we can help improve the lives of our members. Each year, Ozarks Cares gives back thousands of dollars to help local nonprofits and thousands of volunteer hours. We are committed to our people. 

Building Jobs
Ozarks employs currently over 300 employees. We have 246 employees on the electric side and 61 employees on the OzarksGo side. This is beyond what our projected growth was in 2016 when OzarksGo began with only five employees. 

Building a Better World
Ozarks believes in offering our members the best possible service, the best possible experience and the best possible care. We are members, too, and are visible in the communities we serve. We live in the same areas, our children attend the same schools and we shop at the same stores. As a cooperative, we strive to work alongside the membership to ensure that everyone understands that we’re more than just an electric company. We are working with you to build a better a world, and OzarksGo fiber is a part of that.

Broadband access is critical to local economies and small businesses, particularly in rural and underserved communities. This is why Lake Region Electric Cooperative (LREC) stepped up to the plate to build fiber optic broadband where no one else was willing to build, similar to electric service 80 years ago.

Rachel Dallis, attorney at law, started her law office in 2018 in downtown Tahlequah before moving to her current location near the Cherokee County Courthouse in 2020.

“I knew how great Lake Region fiber internet was because I had it at home for several years outside of Hulbert. When I first opened my business in Tahlequah, I had another provider, and it was unreliable; it would go out on rainy days, and the speeds were nowhere comparable to Lake Region,” Dallis said.

Lake Region is witnessing daily requests for internet service in larger communities. A faster, more reliable technology internet provider is still needed in many communities currently with other subpar internet service providers. Lake Region is weighing the cost of building mainline infrastructure into Tahlequah’s dense population to pick up more customers per mile of line while helping to offset the cost of building fiber into rural, less populated territory.

“I wasn’t expecting Tahlequah not to have fast, reliable internet for my business when I first opened. I needed a reliable, fast internet connection if I wanted my new law office to become successful,” Dallis said.

Tahlequah is no small town. It is home to a regional public university, two large hospitals, and home of the Cherokee Nation headquarters. Many residents and businesses that call Tahlequah home still lack access to fast, reliable, fiber optic internet technology. The broadband infrastructure movement across the nation and all the funding coming from the government must also consider towns like Tahlequah, lacking this critical infrastructure for the future.

The fiber network Lake Region installs today will be able to handle the increased demand for more bandwidth in the future. As that demand grows, only the network equipment would need to be upgraded over time, not the actual fiber cables.

Fiber optic internet brings opportunities to communities. Not just the opportunity for buffer-free video streaming but opportunities for businesses to expand and for our communities to attract new businesses. Our communities can also attract new residents, who may telecommute, and can only live here because of the power of fast internet.

As they endeavor to educate students, area schools focus on useful, practical applications for technology. Is there a more noble objective than educating our children and keeping them safe while they learn?

BOLT Fiber Optics has made it a priority to work closely with area schools, ensuring these institutions have access to the resources they need to both educate and protect the students to whom they are entrusted.

Westville Public Schools is one of BOLT’s longtime customers. Ryan Swank serves as both the school’s assistant superintendent and its director of instructional technology.

“Although we can teach without technology, everyone—teachers, staff, and students—is dependent on quality internet access and devices. Education would look very different without it,” Swank said.

And that dependence, said Swank, is not limited to the classroom.

“Everything depends on reliable internet in this day and time,” he said. “Our phone system, security cameras, door access, vape sensors, student and staff devices, fire alarm systems, data backups, auditorium sound system, cafeteria, freezer control systems, heating and air climate control, and virus protection are just a few of the reasons we need reliable internet access and quality support equipment.”

Important selling considerations for Swank include multi-layered security, service, support and product longevity.

“It is impossible for me to be the expert on every aspect of technology so I need to make sure I have access to experts when I need it,” said Swank. “And when you are responsible for taxpayer funds, you want to be a good steward of those funds.”

BOLT offers quality, fiber optic broadband services, hardware sales, and network maintenance. Assisting area schools with the process of securing valuable E-Rate funding is also a priority. While BOLT is based in northeast Oklahoma, it serves the complex technology needs of schools across the state.

“Every job is unique,” confirmed Zack Blevins, a project manager for BOLT specializing in security technology. “I spend time with superintendents, principals, and resource officers. We go over their expectations and concerns and do a site survey and design a custom solution that best fits that school district.”

For Westville Schools, BOLT has been the one-stop-shop for technology for more than two decades.

“Our school district has been doing business with BOLT for over 25 years,” Swank said. “They have always been there if we need anything at our school. I would give them my highest recommendation when it comes to security, service, and support.”

The cooperative business model is special. This model is based on 7 Cooperative Principles that propel cooperatives to be member focused, locally controlled and democratically governed.

These seven principles provide guidance to all 30 electric cooperatives in Oklahoma: 

1. Voluntary and Open Membership 
2. Democratic Member Control
3. Members’ Economic Participation
4. Autonomy and Independence
5. Education, Training and Information
6. Cooperation Among Cooperatives
7. Concern for Community 

This model is important because it provides the foundation in which electric cooperatives operate. By nature, cooperatives exist to be difference makers and to invest in the communities they serve. They strive to enhance quality of life in every way they can.

Electric cooperatives are aware of the digital divide in Oklahoma and have taken meaningful steps to be a part of the solution.

Ten distribution electric cooperatives that are members of the Oklahoma Association of Electric Cooperatives (OAEC) have formed fiber subsidiaries to provide broadband access in their service areas. These cooperatives have banded together to form the Cooperative Broadband Coalition (CBC) to advance the mission of rural broadband and to collectively represent the interests of those they serve.

The CBC is an independent organization that is affiliated with the statewide association, OAEC, which is voluntarily supported by 30 member-systems: 27 distribution electric cooperatives and three generation and transmission electric cooperatives.

While conditions are unique for every electric cooperative, the co-ops that have been able to form a fiber subsidiary were able to do so based on accessibility of grants and other favorable economic conditions. A few other electric cooperatives are evaluating the possibility to form a fiber subsidiary while others partner with existing providers, when feasible, to extend service to their rural membership. This is the cooperative difference. We invite you to learn more at: cooperativebroadband.coop

In essence, all cooperatives – including electric cooperatives – exist to serve. The premise of a cooperative is neighbors helping neighbors working towards a common goal. The cooperative business model allowed rural electric cooperatives to flourish around the country, bringing electric power where no one else would. Through this model, rural electrification became a reality. 

Today, access to rural broadband is a stark need; several electric cooperatives in Oklahoma and throughout the country are rising to the occasion to meet this necessity. A national study, the 2022 Rural Electric Cooperative Broadband Benchmarking Report, shows that rural broadband’s success is driven by co-ops’ desire to help the communities they serve. 

“At least 80% of the electric co-ops that participated in the study are seeing an increase in population, businesses or jobs in the communities where they delivered high-speed internet access. Electric co-ops listed community service and economic development as their main motivations for deploying broadband,” according to the report.

Oklahoma’s electric cooperatives power lives and empower communities. This commitment is evident in the 10 electric cooperatives that have gone beyond, providing reliable fiber broadband to the communities they serve. 

These cooperatives, members of the Cooperative Broadband Coalition, are enhancing quality of life in rural Oklahoma and making a positive difference every day. This is the cooperative way. Learn more at: https://cooperativebroadband.coop

In 1998, KAMO Power and its 17 distribution cooperative members faced a daunting problem: an aging radio-based communications infrastructure connecting nearly 300 substations and 30 office buildings required a complete replacement to meet exponential data growth to operate a 21^st century power grid. The optimum solution was to construct fiber on the approximately 3,000 miles of high voltage transmission line that KAMO operated. But the cost of constructing such a system seemed out of reach.

Following months of consideration, the KAMO Board of Trustees created K-Powernet, LLC. This subsidiary would market excess capacity in the fiber optic network that would contribute to the overall cost of the network and bring additional benefits to rural residents in Oklahoma and Missouri. Today, this network serves the needs of many schools, health care providers and cellular networks throughout the service area.

The immense bandwidth of the network enabled KAMO to also provide private cloud services for its members including hosted servers, backup services and layers of Internet security service. These services enable distribution cooperatives to utilize state of the art technology at a lower cost.

But the real growth of the network and largest benefit to rural residents in Oklahoma and Missouri has come through K-Powernet’s ability to connect its member cooperatives’ fiber-to-the-home networks to the global Internet. With connections to major carrier hubs in Kansas City, Tulsa, and Oklahoma City, K-Powernet completes a vital link in a network being built to tens of thousands of homes and businesses by member cooperatives.

Looking forward, KAMO will continue to invest in K-Powernet ensuring that rural residents will not be left behind in the Internet age. We continue to make major investments in this network year after year to increase capacity, reliability and resilience for future generations.

Electric cooperatives are difference makers. Wherever they are, you can count on the electric cooperative to make a positive difference and to serve as a pillar in the community. Because of their commitment to power lives and empower communities, electric cooperatives are, in many cases, well suited to provide reliable broadband for the unserved.

 

Co-ops keep members first, and that is why several of them have invested in establishing fiber subsidiaries that are bringing access to reliable broadband to parts of rural Oklahoma. Ensuring their members have quality of life is a priority. 

The vision of the Cooperative Broadband Coalition is to generate a brighter future for Oklahoma by broadening the access of reliable and affordable high-speed internet to all Oklahomans.

In other to fulfill its mission, the Cooperative Broadband Coalition exists to bridge the inequality of access to information, education and economic opportunity by expanding dependable, affordable internet to all rural Oklahomans. This is the cooperative difference.

A man and his daughter are driving the backroads of a rural river valley town. Dirt kicks up in the truck’s wake as the duo listens to a Cardinals baseball game on the radio. The man looks over at his daughter, staring out the rolled-down window. She is looking across the pasture toward the local cooperative’s utility poles, all lined in a neat row, providing electricity to their friends and neighbors. The daughter looks back at the man and says, “Dad, I’m moving out here when I grow up.” That statement hits the man in his heart. He knows that his daughter can have it all—a rural way of life and access to the world, all at his fingertips. That is because their local cooperative makes it possible.

In 1937, when 90 percent of rural homes across the River Valley were denied access to investor-owned electric lines, Arkansas Valley Electric built the line and turned the lights on in those rural homes making a promise to keep the lights on and provide rural Arkansans and Oklahomans with the necessary technology to thrive. 

For 85 years, Arkansas Valley Electric Cooperative has been invested in the communities it serves on a personal level. Cooperative members know the serviceman fixing their security light, the lineman restoring power after a storm, or the member services representative taking their payment or answering the phone when they call the office. 

In 2017, Arkansas Valley Electric realized that the same people who were left in the dark in the 1930s were once again being left in the dark. So, the cooperative reimagined the 80-year-old promise and once again began providing rural homes across the River Valley a 21st-century necessity—high-speed broadband internet. 

In 2018, Arkansas Valley Electric began “the fiber project,” with their subsidiary, Wave Rural Connect, created a six-year infrastructure build-out that ultimately gives every cooperative member access to life-changing internet. Members describe their experiences with Wave Rural Connect as “life-changing,” “more cost-efficient,” and “filling the gap that is greatly underserved.”

Broadband means more to rural America than streaming television or scrolling social media. Broadband means access to higher education, telemedicine, and employment opportunities. Now, because of the cooperative promise to serve their communities, rural residents will no longer have to choose between living where they want and having access to modern-day technology. 

Cooperatives saw a need 85 years ago, and they answered the call. Today, they continue to serve their communities to ensure that rural Americans have access to the life they deserve.

“Meet them where they are” is a phrase typically used by teachers as a way to help meet a student’s emotional and academic needs, but Cookson Hills Connect has taken that term and added a more literal approach by meeting rural households and businesses where they are, geographically. It is well-known that rural Oklahomans have been left behind in terms of reliable internet choices, and Cookson Hills Connect, a subsidiary of Cookson Hills Electric Cooperative, is solving this problem one subscriber at a time.

While only six months into the project, Cookson Hills Connect has already brought fiber to over 600 members and has over 1,000 service orders placed for new subscribers.

“In the 1930s and 1940s, the electric cooperatives were up for the challenge to meet the ever-growing needs of the rural areas by foraging the way to build out a robust electrical grid to those that seemed to have been forgotten.  And here we are once again, foraging the way with a robust fiber to the home broadband network to the areas that seem to have been forgotten once again. Our business structure doesn’t require us to meet the demands of investors. It allows us to meet the needs of rural Oklahomans. It’s about seeing a need and meeting that need.” said Juli Orme, CEO of Cookson Hills.

As the need for fast, reliable internet in rural Oklahoma becomes more critical with each passing day, Cookson Hills Connect plays an instrumental role in bridging the digital divide for Oklahomans through the commitment to “meet them where they are.”

Electric cooperatives with fiber subsidiaries are the only broadband provider with up to a 50% adoption rate because they are truly serving underserved areas.

This is what we call the COOPERATIVE DIFFERENCE.