Frontier: construction under way for Berkeley County MBPS fiber project; phased customer sign-ups to start in July

Lisonbee Ellis, senior vice president for business development at Frontier, told the Berkeley County Commission on May 8 that Frontier’s MBPS grant project in Berkeley County will cover about 285 miles of fiber and was budgeted at roughly $18 million.

Ellis said Frontier is contributing about $10 million to the project, the grant award was roughly $6.3 million and the county contributed $1 million; the MBPS-funded portion covers 2,531 grant-eligible locations. "The total project involves about 285 miles of fiber. The cost of the project is $18,000,000. We're contributing $10,000,000 to that," Ellis said.

Nut graf: Frontier told commissioners that months of permitting and state grant paperwork delayed a start to field construction but that work was now under way. The company said it will open locations for customer orders on a rolling basis — roughly 500 addresses per month beginning in July 2025 — and targets project completion under its grant timetable in late 2026.

Frontier said it received a notice to proceed in March 2025 after a lengthy review by the state broadband office and that detailed engineering, permitting and material ordering were completed while the company awaited permits. Mark McKenzie, Frontier’s chief engineer for West Virginia, said the company had targeted about 500 locations to open for sale in July and expected regular monthly rollouts thereafter: "We have about 500 locations that we have targeted that will go open for sale in July of this year, and that schedule will continue about 500 per month through the rest of 2025." McKenzie said winter months could slow the schedule.

Ellis and McKenzie described how Frontier will use a combination of overhead and underground construction, explained that a "drop" (the fiber from the street to a home) is installed after a customer orders service, and said Frontier covers the drop cost. Ellis said Frontier and partner crews will use door hangers and marketing to notify residents in areas where construction is imminent, but she cautioned that construction schedules are fluid and can shift for weather, permitting or resourcing reasons.

Ellis also told commissioners about Frontier’s broader West Virginia footprint: since 2021 the company has invested about $1 billion in the state and has passed roughly 300,000 locations there; Frontier said it had already passed about 8 million locations nationally as part of a multistate fiber build-out. The presentation included a note that Frontier and Verizon have announced a transaction under which Verizon would acquire Frontier; Ellis said the companies expect required regulatory approvals and that Verizon has publicly committed to honoring Frontier’s grant obligations if the deal closes.

Ending: Frontier asked the commission to remain a local point of contact during construction; county staff said they would receive periodic updates to share with the commission and with constituents. No formal commission action was required at the briefing.