In New York City, the vision of free, high-speed and community-owned internet was once more than just a dream. The People's Choice Communications, a worker- and community-owned internet cooperative, launched in 2020 -- and thanks to subsidies from the Affordable Connectivity Program, it successfully offered fast, cheap internet in the Bronx while the ACP was still active.
"No one believed that we could actually build out the system," said Troy Walcott, president of People's Choice, "and then we built it."
The city's decision to exclude the co-op from the Big Apple Connect program has led to significant staff reductions at People's Choice and put the organization at risk of shuttering. Still, the story of the co-op is an unlikely and rare tale of broadband connectivity in the US, one that begins with Spectrum workers going on strike in 2017.
Locating local internet providers
Building from the ground up
In 2017, 1,800 Spectrum workers walked out because of unmet demands regarding health care and retirement benefits, after Charter Communications' acquisition of Time Warner Cable the previous year (which led to the creation of the Spectrum brand). Forty of those striking workers decided to take matters into their own hands by creating their own internet network, intending to prioritize equity over profits.
Spectrum workers during the 2017 strike. People's Choice Communications
"Instead of giving a lot of profits to, like, CEOs, etcetera," said Walcott, "we take those profits and reinvest back into the system to also help provide service to those areas that normally wouldn't be served by a strictly profit-motive driven ISP."
Locating local internet providers
The model is simple: Workers and subscribers mutually own the network. People's Choice employees build and maintain the network, and residents pay monthly fees and participate in governance.
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