Indio says $8 million federal grant will bring cheaper fiber service to three mobile home parks

Don Ueno, a member of the City of Indio engineering department, told the Mobile Home Fair Practices Commission the city received an $8,000,000 federal grant to expand fiber infrastructure into underserved communities, including mobile home parks. "For some of you that don't know, the city received an $8,000,000 grant to bring broadband to disadvantaged and underserved communities," Ueno said, and he identified Arabian Gardens, Towne Mobile Homes and Indian Wells as initial sites the city has agreements with.

Ueno said the city used grant funds to build a backbone along major arterials such as Jefferson, Highway 111 and Jackson, and the next phase is lateral connections from those arterials into parks. He said the city selected a private partner, Onward, to extend service and that Onward plans customer installations beginning about October and continuing into March. "Onward is gonna be cheaper than the usual Frontier, Verizon," Ueno said, and the city estimates Onward will offer comparable 100 Mbps–1 Gbps service at about $30 per month, down from typical local rates of $35–$40.

Commissioners asked whether the funding was federal (Ueno: yes) and how many parks would be served; Ueno confirmed agreements with three parks and said the city had approached additional parks but some locations were infeasible due to distance from the backbone. He added that residents would not be required to subscribe but would have the option to connect at the reduced price. Staff also encouraged residents to look for Onward communications and provided the company's site (getonward.com) for verification.

The commission did not take any formal action on the broadband update; Ueno said he would remain available for follow-up questions.