Starting a Local Fibre Co-Op?

swordsaintzero wonders: "I have seen several articles mentioning local co-ops implementing fiber. I am moving to a smaller town to take a position as a Solaris Administrator for a large university. After calling around, I found out the fastest bandwidth package available is half the speed of my previous package. For all of you Slashdot readers, who have worked on getting fibre implemented for your town through a co-op, what was involved in presenting it to the city government? What would be the best way to get the ball rolling on getting fiber for home use implemented?"