Non-profit US Ignite is patterning with Charter Communication’s business services unit to make St. Petersburg, Florida the 27th “Smart Cities Project” location.

Under a three-year grant arrangement, Charter will provide wireless and wireline technologies to the St. Petersburg’s downtown “Innovation District,” the place where the city is attempting to establish a hub for innovative companies.

US Ignite launched the Smart Gigabit Communities program with the National Science Foundation in 2015. Each participating community in the program receives access to a low-latency and ultra-fast network with local cloud computing and storage capabilities that support highly interactive and visually immersive experiences not possible on today's commercial Internet.

It’s the first time Charter has been involved.

“We already provide extensive gigabit network infrastructure in St. Petersburg and look to also provide new and innovative connectivity options that are both key components for a smart city,” said Phil Meeks, president of Spectrum Enterprise, in a statement. “Our technology expertise combined with the dedication and resources of the Innovation District can help stimulate the development of advanced applications and solutions for utilities and infrastructure, public safety and intelligent transportation.”

Added William Wallace, executive director of US Ignite” “We strongly support the Innovation District’s mission of developing St. Petersburg into an environment that fosters job growth, economic development, and learning and inspiration by bringing innovative people and organizations together, and we are confident they will be the catalyst for many exciting technological developments in St. Petersburg.”

WASHINGTON — Cable operators got an encouraging word from Federal Communications Commission member Michael O'Rielly for their proposition that they are a potential prime mover in the smart cities of today and tomorrow, but the agency also had a warning about what cities might do with all the data that underlies the "smart cities" concept.

So-called smart cities are using info from sensors and devices to boost public safety, health care, mobility, productivity and overall quality of life.

O'Rielly's shout out and warning came in a speech to Charter Communications' Partnering with Communities Today to Build the Smart Cities of Tomorrow event in Washington Tuesday (Oct. 30).

O'Rielly said fiber would be the key to smart cities, and cited a report released last week by NCTA–The Internet & Television Association, calling it "a compelling argument that cable operators are in a prime position to provide [those fiber] resources and be a lead participant in Smart Cities."

Related: NCTA Says Cable Ops Are Smart 'Smart Cities' Choice

He said the market is taking notice of cable as a player and "acting accordingly, as fiber networks are receiving increased attention and interest from Wall Street to communications company boardrooms, with cable enterprise plays becoming more of a focus in that analysis."

The commissioner cited the FCC's vote to open up the 6-GHz band to unlicensed as one of the things that will help meet the spectrum demands for smart cities.

And while O'Rielly was high on the potential of smart cities, he also raised a caution flag over data collection. He signaled he was more concerned about a governmental Big Brother getting its hands on reams of data as opposed to businesses.

"It always surprises me when privacy advocates, either domestically or internationally, are willing to take to the streets over a company seeking to use consumer-driven data for commercial purposes," he said. "The real worry for privacy advocates and the public should be the combination of data with police and military powers, and the state's potential to use data for the purpose of controlling or punishing its citizenry. How governments can create a comfort level with the potential privacy implications of smart cities remains to be seen, and represents an increasingly heavy lift."

NCTA-The Internet & Television Association is arguing that it would be smart for cities and towns to team with cable ops on the kind

of gigabit-speed broadband service that turns them into "smart" cities and communities.

Telcos are actively going after the smart cities market, and utilities can be expected to follow, says Dr. Peter Williams, CTO, Big Green Innovations, at IBM in a smart cities online preview. In fact, Williams says last year he fielded calls from utilities about smart cities "every other week."

But NCTA, which Wednesday released a white paper it commissioned from Bill Maguire of Connected Communities, says cable ops are uniquely positioned to be the go-to provider when cities and localities want to ramp up connected communities for IoT and with 5G small-cell deployments.

Among the key "underappreciated affinities" between cable ISPs and communities:

1. "Cable networks have the capability to support smart community/IoT applications both now and in the future.

2. "A rapid expansion of the number of homes where gigabit service is available means that the smart home will be an increasingly viable platform capable of advancing smart and connected community objectives.

3. "Smart and connected community partnerships between cable providers and local governments reflect new and evolving approaches to collaboration."

Among the paper's recommendations to local governments is to make sure to talk to cable providers and include them in the process and to evaluate whether their existing connectivity can support the smart apps and deployments.

For their part, cable ops should educate community leaders about cable expertise and end-to-end connectivity and should look at public-private partnerships with cities or universities and nonprofits as a way to grow economic activity in their communities and ultimately draw new customers.

But NCTA members are not waiting around for a green flag. NCTA points out that Cox, Comcast and Charter all have partnerships with cities "to develop, test and evaluate different solutions for IoT applications, as well as to engage more stakeholders to participate in efforts to deploy new innovations that help to address key community concerns, such as energy efficiency or better water management."

"There’s no question that cable’s investment in deep fiber over the last five years will play a substantial role in enabling smart cities, both directly and indirectly through mobile backhaul," says internet industry analyst and author Larry Downes, project director, Georgetown Center for Business and Public Policy. "But more than abundant capacity, smart cities and the IoT more broadly need is killer apps. So far, consumers haven’t embraced many, in part because of concerns about personal data collection and use that have been amplified by recent social media breaches.

"Can broadband providers and cities crack the case together? Absolutely. Access providers have already proven they can adapt their networks to new applications, such as security. And since many smart city apps will connect devices owned and operated by local governments, including lighting, transport, trash and parking, there’s no doubt that private-partnerships will be essential to accelerate adoption."

machineQ, Comcast’s enterprise-focused Internet of Things service, has teamed with Neptune Technology Group on smart cities projects focused on advanced water metering and infrastructure.

Under the effort, machineQ’s LoRaWAN network/platform will be integrated with Neptune’s LoRA-enabled water meters and sensors in a way that helps water utilities and municipalities gather data about their infrastructure and use it to optimize their workforces and to boost their sustainability efforts.

They claim that the combination will help water utilities and municipalities leap from manual meter monitoring systems to a more advanced approach that delivers data wirelessly to the cloud for remote monitoring.

Early examples of companies that are taking advantage of the machineQ/Neptune system include Columbus Water Works of Georgia, and Western Municipal Water District in Riverside, Calif.

MachineQ and Neptune are touting the partnership in concert with this week’s American Water Works Association’s annual conference, ACE18, in Las Vegas. They are also sponsoring the event.

Neptune is one of a handful of new business partners that machineQ identified in March.

RELATED: Comcast’s machineQ Unit Gets Down to Business

Comcast introduced machineQ in 2016 via trials in Philadelphia, the San Francisco Bay Area, and Chicago, and has since rolled out its LoRa-based service to Atlanta, Baltimore, Boston, Denver, Detroit, Indianapolis, Miami, Minneapolis, Oakland, Pittsburgh, Seattle, and Washington D.C.

RELATED: Comcast Unit Launches Enterprise IoT Network in San Francisco Bay Area

“Cities and municipalities are no longer delaying their Smart City programs based on the promise of future network technologies because they see the tremendous cost savings and efficiencies they can realize today from a broad range of existing IoT solutions, from trusted providers like Neptune, that are capable of leveraging the machineQ cloud-based IoT network and platform services,” Alex Khorram, GM of machineQ said in a statement. “We can deploy and manage a dense IoT network tailored to the unique needs of any organization very efficiently, so they can focus their resources delivering the best service possible to their end customers.”

RELATED: Cox Tags Another IoT Tech Partner

As if there were any doubt, Google and its policy allies will continue to push their vision for Smart Cities with a focus on education and health applications during the coming years. Rural plus small-town deployment will remain a centerpiece of their political efforts.

At a Next Century Cities (NCC) program in Washington on Wednesday morning (Nov. 30), bipartisan speakers extolled broadband's value and some, such as Sen. Amy Klobuchar (D-Minn.), a member of the Senate Commerce and Judiciary committees, indicated plans to keep their agenda alive no matter what policy barriers lie ahead.

"Transforming Communities: Broadband Goals for 2017 and Beyond," the title of the event, was sponsored by Google Fiber, the Ford Foundation, Internet2 and Harrison Edwards (a Westchester, N.Y., public relations firm that represents many non-profit/educational institutions). The program (watch a video) was held at Google's Washington office.

In prepared remarks Klobuchar said, “Everyone, from the farmers in rural Minnesota to those in our towns and cities, must be able to log on and participate in this new digital economy.”

Sen. Angus King (I-Maine), a member of the Rules and Budget committees, described high-speed broadband's capability to enable people "whether they live in rural Maine or New York City, to realize unprecedented economic, educational and cultural opportunities."

"That’s why today’s event, which brought together a bipartisan coalition of voices to champion how broadband can transform our communities, is so vitally important," King said in prepared remarks.

Sen. John Boozman (R-Ark.), who sits on the Senate Appropriations and Rules committees, observed: "Broadband is a vital component to our nation’s 21st century infrastructure and our federal policies must reflect this. Right now, a digital divide exists between rural and metropolitan areas which we must overcome.”

The Schools, Health & Libraries Broadband (SHLB) Coalition and US Ignite, which supports next-generation Internet applications, co-hosted the event. Other speakers included several mayors, school and library administrators plus familiar broadband cheerleaders such as Harvard Law professor Susan Crawford; Gigi Sohn, the outgoing counselor to FCC chairman Tom Wheeler; and Brookings Institute senior fellow Blair Levin.

The NCC characterized its event as a way to examine "key policy goals and needs for the next administration, and the program also included demonstrations of "innovative civic applications enabled through gigabit technology."

Counting 150 cities among its membership, the NCC characterizes itself with a Google-friendly description as an organization that "recognize[s] the importance of leveraging gigabit-level Internet to attract new businesses and create jobs, improve health care and education, and connect residents to new opportunities."

NCC executive director Deb Socia summarized the event's objective as a way to examine "how all levels of government can work together to continue broadband efforts in communities nationwide and build on these transformative achievements.”

The underlying message of this NCC initiative, which notably did not include cable organizations, is that the broadband battle will continue, with powerful forces continuing to seek dominant roles. Wednesday's event was one in a long series of think-tank and astroturf lobbying programs in Washington during the coming weeks as soothsayers imagine what the next Congress and Administration will wreak.