Posts Tagged ‘digitalbridge’

Pennsylvania Recommends Most of the State’s Own Applications

Friday, December 11th, 2009

I’m not saying that it’s wrong for a state to recommend its own applications, but it is unusual. Of the 13 “highly recommended” projects in the letter (available here in .pdf format from the Baller Herbst Law Group), 9 were submitted by state agencies, by univiersities, and by public libraries.

An additional 12 applications, including one from DigitalBridge, are on a list of “supported” projects.

The Executive Office of the Commonwealth of Pennsylvania (Office of Administration) submitted four applications worth over $100 million. If accepted, those applications alone could use up most of the funds available for the state. I was surprised to see that two are highly recommended and one is on the supported list.

Muni-Link from CONXX is one from an ISP that I know that did not make the list.

Zito Media, a company I do not know, had one project on the highly recommended list and two on the supported list.

Overall, I think that the state’s task force should be commended for making some tough choices.

The State of Mississippi Endorses DigitalBridge

Monday, November 23rd, 2009

Mississippi Governor Haley Barbour (R) endorsed just a few projects (letter available from the Baller Herbst Law GrouP), including the state’s own sustainable adoption project.

Surprisingly, the state endorsed some DigitalBridge Communications projects. The Ashburn, Va.-based firm filed 64 applications across several midwestern and sourthern states.

I am particularly impressed that Barbour chose not to endorse the largest project in his state, a $250 million project filed by the Mississippi Valley State University. However, it is a historically black college or university (HBCU) and it serves one of the poorest areas of this nation. The project appears to have asked for too much money, but perhaps in the next round, a smaller but similar project will go forward.