An Update on Cookson Hills Connect: Fiberto-the-Home
By CEO Juli Orme
I wanted to take this opportunity to share a thrilling update on our fiber internet and phone services project, Cookson Hills Connect. Let me begin with a heartfelt “Thank You”! The level of excitement, appreciation, and support from you, our members, has been overwhelming. Your feedback helps keep our team motivated and working hard to provide services to each member as soon as possible. It also serves as a perfect reminder of the important role this project plays in bridging the technology gap that rural Oklahomans face each day.
As we look back on 2022, we are proud of the many ways our rural communities have grown and changed because of our cooperative’s continued commitment to delivering reliable and affordable highspeed internet and telephone services for homes and businesses.
You know by now the many ways fiber transforms daily life, with a world of possibilities at your fingertips for online learning; efficient working from home; convenient telemedicine; endless streaming, gaming, and entertainment options; and face-to-face real-time connections to family and friends.
I’m pleased to let you know that throughout 2022, we have made great progress in bringing Cookson Hill Connect phone systems and fiber internet services to our communities. We leveraged several federal and state funding opportunities to expand our service, and Cookson Hills Connect is now serving over 3,500 homes and businesses throughout our service territory in portions of Sequoyah, Pittsburg, and Haskell counties. All of this in just one year!
We are proud of all that we’ve accomplished in 2022:
• Over 1,300 total miles of fiber line built
• Over 3,500 customers connected
• 7 fiber huts installed that light the fiber for our communities
• 7 fiber subsidiary employees hired
Currently, the project is on track to open our final zones in
Phase 1 during the first half of 2023. We have already completed all the zone openings from our Sallisaw, Muldrow, Akins, Nicut, and Liberty substations. We have also opened zones 1, 3, and 4 on the Vian substation, zone 4 on the Enterprise substation, and zone 1 on our Tenkiller substation.
In 2023 we will begin opening zones in Phase 2 of our project. Below are the remaining feeders/substations for Phase 1 and for the initial part of Phase 2. This schedule is an estimate and is only intended to provide an outline for the coming months based on the most current assessment of our project. This schedule and the order of construction are subject to change as the project continues.
Vian Substation: Fiber installations for feeder 2 will be available in the first quarter of 2023.
Stigler Substation: The makeready construction phase is expected to be complete in the initial areas by the first quarter of 2023, and the first installations are expected to start later in the first quarter or early in the second quarter of 2023.
Tenkiller Substation: Phase 2 will include feeder 2 from our Tenkiller substation. Mainline fiber construction is expected to be completed in the first quarter of 2023 and installations will begin as early as the end of the first quarter of 2023.
Enterprise Substation: Mainline fiber construction is expected to be completed on feeders 1, 2, and 3 in the second quarter of 2023 with installations for those feeders projected to begin early in the third quarter of 2023.
Keota Substation: Mainline construction is expected to begin late in the first quarter of 2023 and be completed sometime in the third quarter of 2023. Installations are projected to begin in the fourth quarter of 2023.
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WATTS INSIDE CHEC Foundation announces new scholarship >> page 2 How Cookson Hills Connect helped a church survive the pandemic >> page 4 MARCH 2023 Published monthly by Cookson Hills Electric Cooperative, Inc.
CELEBRATING 75 YEARS OF SERVICE
We are proud of the many ways our rural communities have grown and changed because of our cooperative’s continued commitment to delivering reliable and affordable high-speed internet and telephone services for homes and businesses.
Cookson Hills Electric Cooperative, Inc.
Headquarters Office PO Box 539 • 1002 E. Main Stigler, OK 74462 • 800-328-2368
Branch Office PO Box 587 • 1800 KOA/Power Drive Sallisaw, OK 74955 • 918-775-2211
Pay-by-Phone: 1-888-678-1937 www.cooksonhills.com
Alternate Emergency Only: 918-552-0016
CHEC Foundation establishes $1,000 scholarships
BOARD OF TRUSTEES
Joe Ogle, President District 6
Rocky Woods, Sr., Vice President District 1
Ronnie Pevehouse, Sec/Treasurer District 7
Dan Callahan, Trustee District 2
John Dillard, Trustee District 3
Dart Drummonds, Trustee District 4
Mike Rose, Trustee District 5
STAFF
Juli Orme, General Manager
Chris Morris, Chief Financial Officer
Mark Blaylock, Director of Operations — Stigler
Marty Huff, Director of Operations — Sallisaw
Ellen Mattison, Manager of Accounting Services
Kristie Cash, Manager of Office Services
Rockey Oldham, Manager of Broadband Services
Jeremy Stubblefield, Chief Technology Officer
Brad Martin, Director of Member/Public Relations and Economic Development
Dallin Shaw, Director of Engineering
Russell V. Barber, General Counsel
Cookson Hills Electric Cooperative, Inc. welcomes members to submit photos, and articles which will be subject to editing. Cookson Hills reserves the right to publish or modify any article. Companies and individuals featured in the Hot Watts newsletter do not necessarily reflect the official policy, position, or view of Cookson Hills.
Cookson Hills Electric Cooperative, Inc. is an equal opportunity provider and employer.
If you find your account number hidden in this issue of the Hot Watts, you’ll receive a $25 credit on your electric bill.
The Board of Directors of the Cookson Hills Electric Foundation offers five $1,000 scholarships each year. The scholarships are awarded to high school students eligible for graduation and whose parents or guardians reside in the counties served by Cookson Hills Electric Cooperative. Other criteria include:
• A grade point average of 2.5 or better
• Good character
• Good citizenship
• Financial need
• An ambition to obtain further education
The college or technical school of choice must be a stateaccredited school offering an
associate’s or bachelor’s degree. Scholarship money will be awarded in two installments if the following criteria are met:
1. 2.5 GPA or better during the first semester.
2. Students have a minimum of 12 academic hours per semester.
Please return the application (found at www.cooksonhills. com) along with two letters of recommendation by March 3, 2023, to the following address:
Scholarship Committee
Cookson Hills Electric Foundation
Attn: Ann Jones PO Box 539 Stigler, OK 74462
bit.ly/CHEConFB (case-sensitive) 2 | March 2023
CEO Fiber Project Update
Our sole reason for offering telephone and high-speed internet services through Cookson Hills Connect is to meet the needs of members like you. We are working as quickly as possible to reach all our members with telephone and world-class fiber internet to provide faster, more reliable, and more affordable options to stay connected online.
Telephone services are available starting at $29.95 a month and fiber-fast internet packages start as low as $54.95 a month for speeds of up to 100 Mbps. We also offer a 250 Mbps option for $74.95 a month, and our fastest package with Gigabit speed is available for only $84.95 per month. Maybe the most exciting part is that our internet services all feature symmetrical uploading and downloading speeds – with no contracts, no data caps, and no throttling back on speed!
As you can see on our Cookson Hills Connect Facebook page, we are listing substations and feeders to reference where the fiber project work is taking place. Every Cookson Hills Electric Cooperative member can find which substation and feeder provide their electricity by looking at their electric bill. This will help you better determine when service becomes available at your specific location. We will be sending an email and a postcard to each member with a notification when fiber installation to your home is available. These notifications will have instructions on how to schedule your installation service, so please be watching for these communications.
Feel free to reach out to us at any time with questions or concerns. You can visit our website at www.cooksonhillsconnect. com or give us a call at 1-800-328-2368, Monday through Friday from 8 a.m. to 5:00 p.m. [106913]
Cookson Hills Electric Cooperative and Cookson Hills Connect are committed to the Oklahoma communities we serve. We appreciate everyone’s patience as we continue our broadband journey and look forward to connecting thousands more customers in 2023 – we can’t wait to hit the 5,000 subscribers milestone! Thank you as always for your support. Best wishes!
www.cooksonhills.com | 3 New zones open now! Substation Feeder 2 – ENT 4 4 – TEN 1 5 – SAL 1, 2, 3, 4 6 – MUL 1, 2, 3, 4 12 – NIC 1, 2, 3 13 – VIA 1, 3, 4 14 – LIB 1, 2 15 – AKI 1, 2, 3 Substation and feeder numbers can be found on your electric bill. Summer rates will begin with March usage and will run through November usage. Visit www.cooksonhills.com for energy efficiency tips and ways to save.
Last chance for high school seniors to apply for CHEC scholarships Visit www.cooksonhills.com or call 1-800-328-2368
Rural, Matters
How Cookson Hills Connect helped West Liberty Baptist Church survive the pandemic
Some eight miles from the nearest town lies a small church down a quiet country road in Haskell County. Surrounded by rolling hills with pastures, and sitting next to a small cemetery, West Liberty Baptist Church has been a fixture of this area since 1894, and people have been worshiping there ever since.
The Covid pandemic forced everyone to look at new ways to continue doing old things and this included churches. How were people going to find ways to connect during a pandemic with extended times of quarantine? The immediate and obvious solution for most was technologydriven, and more specifically, utilizing the internet to fill the enormous gap caused by this worldwide event. While this was a difficult challenge for almost everyone, it was a nearly impossible obstacle for those in rural areas who didn’t have access to fast, reliable internet services. Up until the pandemic, those living in rural areas typically viewed the lack of high-speed internet as an inconvenience that folks just learned to live with, but the internet has since transitioned from a luxury to an essential utility that rivals running water and electricity.
With safety on the minds of everyone, country churches like West Liberty struggled to find ways to continue holding worship services. “At the time of the Covid-19 outbreak, we didn’t have access to highspeed internet at the church and neither did most of our members who largely reside in rural areas, and
that was a real problem for us,” said Josh Cate, Pastor of West Liberty. “We just didn’t have a mechanism in place to be able to share our worship services with those who were unable to attend in person. There were a lot of unknowns at the time, and a global pandemic wasn’t something most churches, including us, had a surefire plan for. When we heard about Cookson Hills Electric offering fiber internet to those in rural areas, we knew it was going to be a game-changer for us. Cookson Hills Connect fiber now allows us to stream services so our members who can’t attend can still participate and remain an active part of our church family. It has just been a true blessing to us.”
The streaming of church services is only one of many benefits made possible when quality internet is available to everyone, including rural Oklahomans. Cookson Hills Electric Cooperative and other electric cooperatives in Oklahoma are fulfilling a mission to provide a longoverdue service to thousands of Oklahoma residents.
Juli Orme, CEO of Cookson Hills Connect, says that “One of the most satisfying results of bringing fiber internet to our members is seeing how it allows them to be connected. It has truly changed lives and had an incredible impact on so many. Whether it is connecting with their family, church, school, or work, our goal is to help improve the lives of our members, and we are grateful for the opportunity to play a role in those important connections.”
4 | March 2023
Pastor Josh Cate and his family (left to right) wife Amber, son Rylan and daughter Kamry
