Saddleback Communications’ Fiber Network Serves as Blueprint for Advancing Tribal Broadband

The Salt River Pima-Maricopa Indian Community (SRPMIC) in the greater Phoenix (AZ) area comprises two Native American tribes: the Onk Okimel O’odham (Pima) and the Xalychidom Piipaash (Maricopa). Like many Native American communities, it has limited broadband and telecom options. But Saddleback Communications, a provider of fiber-based voice and data communications to business and residential customers, recently completed a fiber-to-the-home (FTTH) deployment, enabling internet access up to 500 Mbps to all homes in the community. The deployment could serve as a case study for making broadband a reality for tribal communities across the country.

Following the passage of the landmark Telecom Act of 1996, the SRPMIC founded Saddleback in 1998 to upgrade and enhance the quality of telephone, data and internet services for residents and businesses on the reservation. At that time, the company acquired the copper assets from what was then known as US West, now Lumen. Saddleback became a federally regulated telephone company and the sole authorized provider of local telephone services and communications infrastructure to the SRPMIC. Upon becoming Saddleback’s president in 2005, Bill Bryant saw an opportunity to rebuild an aging network with new technology that bypassed any interim steps, such as a hybrid copper/fiber-to-the-node (FTTN) VDSL network.“When you have old infrastructure that’s in less-than-ideal shape, it’s really easy to leapfrog technology,” Bryant says of upgrading from copper to fiber. The opportunity to move to an all-fiber infrastructure also created greater operational efficiencies; reliability issues are commonplace with aging copper networks. Leveraging the FCC’s Universal Service Fund (USF) program, the tribal community migrated to an all-fiber network, realizing a long-term vision.