Following a transition filled with fits and starts, FairPoint Communications now – in the words of its chief executive, Gene Johnson – “controls its destiny.” This month, the ambitious telecom finally transferred all of Verizon’s operations in Maine to its management.

Until now, the companies were unfit partners. FairPoint purchased Verizon’s infrastructure desperately needing attention, under the watchful eye of three states which, though approving of the deal, were never quite convinced about FairPoint’s chops.

The global financial crisis and FairPoint’s heavy leverage to purchase landlines in Maine, Vermont and New Hampshire also cast doubt, as did the December bankruptcy of Hawaii Telecom, another feisty start-up that bought out Verizon and promised future success.

Only this landscape could make the intermittent 911 problems under FairPoint’s nascent management or the 80,000 Verizon customers it has lost since taking over seem trifling. To say FairPoint has weathered many storms the past few months borders on polite understatement.

Yet Gene Johnson was all smiles recently when he visited our editorial board. His belief in his company is unshakable, which is expected. If he said what many others have thought, say, “We’re in over our heads here,” we would have reached for the smelling salts.

It’s fair to say FairPoint still has much to prove. It’s also fair, though, to grant the company time to prove it. Until Verizon’s presence and influence was wiped away by the “cutover,” it would be impossible to measure whether FairPoint was keeping, or flubbing, its promises.

Now that FairPoint “controls its destiny,” its work is on the record. So far, there are many positive signs. The technical aspects of FairPoint’s proposed broadband work are heartening, because deployment of high-speed Internet in Maine is a lagging, nagging concern.

Though Johnson’s colloquial description of “big honking routers” to describe the terabyte-speed machines FairPoint vows to install might make techies cringe, the prospect should delight business and government interests who bemoan Maine’s poor Internet pace (40th in the nation, according to PC Magazine.)

So should Johnson’s description of FairPoint as a whole: “We’re a broadband company.”

It’s a visionary and realistic statement. The Maine Public Utilities Commission indicates that in 2009, the number of wireless and “wireline” phones in Maine (according to 911 surcharge data) will equalize for the first time. Landline subscriptions have declined steadily since 2004.

FairPoint sees broadband as its future. So does Maine, which needs to have high-speed spread to its farthest corners. It also needs to blanket its urban, commercial centers to give them a strong competitive advantage in developing a new technology economy.

Nothing is a given, though, and FairPoint still has much to prove. Johnson, however, seems confident that his company, in control of its destiny, can fulfill its promise to Maine.

For both to thrive, it must.