Fiber Internet Project
You deserve great Internet & phone.
We’re bringing you Fiber!
We have secured more than $31 million to use to upgrade our current service area to fiber-to-the-home. You may have many questions about the fiber project or the benefits of fiber. Our intent is to answer those questions for you with the info on this page.
For easy skimming, we have presented info in question/answer format.
Project timeline - updated August 16, 2023
The project has been separated into 11 regions, and 3 phases. You may see the 11 regions on the color coded map on this page.
We anticipate doing 4 regions (5 communities) each in 2023 and 2024, and the final 3 regions (7 communities-East Glacier, Babb, St. Mary, Milk River, Duck Lake, Blackfoot & Meriwether) in 2025.
This timeline is dependent on getting all necessary approvals, including cultural approvals, so construction can proceed.
We plan to get started with the first 4 regions (phase 1) this construction season (May-Sept 2023). Those regions are:
Two Medicine
Heart Butte
Starr School
Flat Iron
Browning
If approvals and construction go to plan, we hope to have enough construction completed in ‘23 to start connecting customers to the fiber network in late 2023, and continue through winter.
Fiber projects are heavily impacted by satisfactory weather. Main line fiber and ‘drops’ to homes need to be done before the ground is frozen. Connecting customers can be done in the winter since no construction is needed to do installations.
If construction falls behind our anticipated plan, we will begin in the spring where we left off in late fall. Over winter we will work hard to secure necessary approvals to keep the project on track.
We expect phases 2 & 3 will follow the same cadence in 2024 and 2025 respectively.
Fiber Internet is WORTH the wait, but we are eager to get it to you as soon as possible.
Why all this fuss about fiber?
You’ll get virtually unlimited bandwidth/speed.
Internet is often described by how ‘fast’ it is; speed is a shortcut word to understand bandwidth.
More ‘speed’ is really a wider ‘road’ providing more bandwidth to use.
A wider road allows more devices to do more road hogging tasks, like stream video and FaceTime.
Siyeh Fiber is the product everyone wants to have.
Fiber allows the same ‘speed’ for both upload and download. That matters A LOT for video chat, telemedicine, and gaming.
Your fiber network will have speeds from 100Mb (both upload & download) to 1,000Mb (1 Gigabit).
Fiber is extremely reliable, and can be enhance to 10Gig (or more) with upgraded electronics.
The foundation for future communications - fiber optics
The newest and best way to deliver communications services is with fiber optic technology.
Fiber allows for ultra-fast, ultra-reliable, unlimited Internet. (more on Internet speeds later)
Constructing a fiber network the size we are undertaking is expensive and it requires time.
As you know the tribe formed Siyeh Development to assist building economic opportunities for tribe members and our region.
One of the ways they have done that is by gaining control of the license to provide communication services to our region. Siyeh Communications was formed to operate the FCC licensed communications company, and properly invest the funds that are available to bring communications services to our areas.
Building the future with a $31.5 million grant for the fiber project
The next step taken was to apply for and receive a grant to allow Siyeh Communications to build a ‘fiber-to-the-home’ network to every home and business in our coverage area.
That $31.5 million award was made in 2022, and engineering and construction plans are underway.
As you might guess, a project of this size will take between 3 and 4 years to fully complete.
What technology brings me my Internet today?
Most of our customers get their Internet over copper wires buried in the ground, and we use a technology called DSL to deliver your Internet. It is good, but fiber is extraordinary!
A few customers may try to get Internet via their cellular provider, but it can be very spotty and sporadic. Fiber is SO MUCH better!
These choices don’t compare to fiber; Only fiber can provide the bandwidth (ultra-fast speed), and reliability you deserve.
