Subsidiary Update

During 2018, Plumas-Sierra Telecommunications continued implementing its plan to provide services to most of the cooperative’s territory that does not have broadband, as well as improving existing services. We also are working to improve service to the cities and towns in our region that do not have reliable, unlimited, high-speed internet.

PST currently offers broadband services to east Quincy, Portola/Delleker, all of the Mohawk Valley, portions of C Road, the Susan River Valley area, the southern part of Honey Lake Valley including Doyle, Herlong and Ward Lake, Red Rock, the northern part of Sierra Valley and Sierra Brooks.

Refurbishing the abandoned coaxial system to provide broadband has been a two-steps forward, one-step back process as years of neglect have slowed PST’s ability to roll out broadband to everyone, but we are working to provide broadband as quickly as possible.

After we heard reports of sporadic service, we replaced parts of the coaxial system in Graeagle with fiber-optic cable, which improved service to a key affected area, and improved service to the customers on the coax system, which was a nice win-win.

PST is replacing the coax system in portions of west Quincy with fiber optics to provide broadband services with download speeds up to 1 gigabyte per second and unlimited data use. We are also working on fiber optic for Chandler Road, American Way, and Hillside in parallel with parts of west Quincy.

The electric department is extending its fiber-optic line to southern Sierra Valley, with construction starting in late summer of this year. PST will expand off that backbone system to bring broadband to Sierraville, Calpine, Sattley and southern Sierra Valley as the project is ready.

In Portola, we were able to double the capacity of the northern part of town.

PST will continue to improve its broadband networks. We are not here to extract money from the community and ship it out to other regions. As with our electric system, we will steadily improve all our systems and expand our coverage.

PST has submitted applications to the California Public Utilities Commission’s California Advanced Services Fund for grants to fund expansion of broadband in many of the hardest-to-reach areas of our service territory. The grants are limited to areas where the CPUC—not the homeowner—has decided there isn’t adequate service. People outside of the grant areas will benefit by the fiber optic being brought closer to more neighborhoods, which will improve wireless service as well as coax service. We will find out in November if we are awarded funding to proceed with these projects.

PST’s coax and wireless broadband services offer download speeds of up to 25 Mbps and 20 Mbps, respectively. Our fiber optic services can go as fast as 1 Gbps, download with dedicated business services available, if needed. With these speeds, you can stream videos on multiple devices at the same time without slowing down. You could even eliminate your cable bill with streaming services.

For more information about our telecommunications products, including coverage maps, please visit our website at www.pst.coop or call (800) 221-3474.

Certificate of Nomination by Nominating Committee

We, the undersigned, attest that the Nominating Committee met in accordance with the bylaws governing Plumas-Sierra Rural Electric Cooperative. Members of the committee were duly appointed by the board of directors, and charged with the duties of nominating fellow members of the cooperative to run for the position of director. The Nominating Committee wishes to submit the following candidates:

District 2: Richard “Dick” Short
District 5: David Hansen

The committee has reviewed the qualifications and performance of the candidates listed above, and recommends these candidates without qualification.

Respectfully submitted,
Chairwoman Pam Pasquetti and Vice Chairwoman Jan Tew