Company Info & Press

About the Cooperative
Citizens is a regional full service communications provider offering land-line telephone, VoIP, IPTV Video, web and e-mail hosting, DSL, and FTTP (Fiber to the Premise: Business Ethernet and FTTH, Fiber to the Home), serving 7 counties in Southwest Virginia.

 

In addition, Citizens operates a 248 mile regional open access fiber network in 6 Virginia counties including 8 industrial parks. Along this network, Citizens provides wholesale transport and Internet bandwidth to a variety of service providers. Citizens is partnering with other open access networks in Virginia like Mid Atlantic Broadband Cooperative (MBC) and Bristol Virginia Utilities (BVU) to provide high-capacity optical transport services that are necessary to assist in the economic revitalization efforts of Southwest and Southside Virginia.

 

Expanding the Citizens Open Access Network

In 2010, Citizens in partnership with the New River Valley Network Wireless Authority (NRVNWA) obtained a federal broadband grant from NTIA (National Telecommunications and Information Administration) to build an 186 mile middle mile open access network through 7 counties. This project will pass several industrial parks and over 60 Community Anchor Institutions (CAIs) including over 30 K-12 schools. This expansion will tie into Citizens existing open access fiber network in three locations as well as provide critical diverse connections to Mid Atlantic Broadband Cooperative (MBC) and Bristol Virginia Utilities (BVU). This project is scheduled to break ground this summer and will leverage $396,622 of VTC funds for a project costing $11,560,803. For more information on this project please visit the BTOP section of our website.

 

Leveraging VTC grants
Citizens has received three grants from the Virginia Tobacco Commission (VTC) for a total of $5,959,122. These funds have been leveraged with other funding and assets, including $6,498,471 from Citizens, to build out a 200Gbps, 434 mile open access fiber network totaling $22,525,353.

 

 

 

 

FLOYD 540-745-2111 FT. CHISWELL 276-637-6485 TOLL FREE 1-800-941-0426 SUPPORT 1-800-741-9525