|
By Joelle Tessler
Washington, D.C. (AP) 10-09
The federal government will soon start handing out the first $4 billion from a pot of stimulus funds intended to spread high-speed Internet connections to more rural communities, poor neighborhoods and other pockets of the country clamoring for better access. The challenge is that the government has received $28 billion in requests.
So the reviewers at the Commerce and Agriculture Departments who will
award the broadband money must make hard choices. The 2,200
applications each envision something different – more fiber-optic
lines, for example, or computer labs or municipal wireless networks.
But they all promise that their proposals will create jobs and bring
new economic opportunities.
What follows are snapshots of four projects representing a cross
section of the broadband stimulus hopefuls. It’s too soon to know which
plans will win federal grants or loans, either in this round of funding
or in the next, as the total broadband stimulus expands to $7.2
billion. Those that do get picked may not get the full amount they are
seeking.
But perhaps one – or more – of these projects has a chance.
****
For the Coeur d’Alene tribe in the Idaho panhandle, the stimulus money could mean a lifeline to the outside world.
The tribe is asking for $12.2 million for a ring of fiber-optic lines
that could connect up to 3,500 homes on one side of its rural
reservation, which is about half the size of Rhode Island.
Right now, the tribe’s landline broadband options are limited. The
local cable company has pulled out of the market. And the phone
company, Verizon Communications Inc., offers digital subscriber line
(DSL) service to just a small slice of the reservation.
Although the tribe launched its own wireless network in 2005 with the
help of Agriculture Department funding, that network reaches less than
half the reservation and slows to a crawl whenever too many people get
online at once.
Valerie Fast Horse, the tribe’s information technology director, says
stimulus money would let the Coeur d’Alene build a network that is
“more stable and more reliable” and could deliver faster connections at
lower prices.
The tribe’s wireless network currently offers top speeds of 1.5
megabits per second, comparable to standard DSL service available
elsewhere. But it charges users about $100 a month, about four times
the standard price. The proposed fiber network would deliver a
20-megabit connection – faster than what most cable subscribers get –
for $100 a month. Or tribe members would be able to get a 1.5-megabit
connection for $25 a month.
Fast Horse envisions all sorts of uses for the fiber lines, including
distance learning. Tribe members already use video conferencing to
participate in classes at North Idaho College, about 35 miles away,
when the roads are too icy to drive. But that requires them to travel
to the tribe’s education center, which has a landline connection to the
Internet. A fiber-to-the-home network would let tribal members take
classes without leaving their kitchens, she says.
It would also enable Coeur d’Alene members to consult with medical
specialists around the country. And it would help the tribe preserve
its language and culture, by allowing more members to access the
tribe’s video-sharing Web site, Rezcast. Among other things, the site
features clips of powwows and online tutorials with tribal elders
speaking their native language.
*****
Clearwire Corp., a company pioneering the use of a next-generation
wireless technology known as WiMax, is upfront about the fact that some
markets don’t make sense for telecom providers that need to show a
profit.
So Clearwire is asking for $19.4 million to build a high-speed wireless
network in a handful of poor Detroit neighborhoods that it otherwise
might not serve anytime soon.
Although those neighborhoods have more than 800,000 people, high
unemployment and poverty levels make for a tough business case. But
federal dollars would change the equation, says John Bunce, president
of the Clearwire unit applying for stimulus funding.
And with that seed money as a starting point, the company pledges to
spend its own capital to expand the wireless network across
metropolitan Detroit, including more lucrative suburban markets.
The company offers a range of wireless plans, including a $45-a-month
package that delivers speeds averaging 3 megabits to 6 megabits per
second. On the low end, the company offers a basic 1-megabit connection
for $25 a month.
In Detroit, Clearwire says, it would also provide free and discounted accounts for poor residents through nonprofit partners.
*****
In Appalachia, a nonprofit Internet provider called the Mountain Area
Information Network (MAIN) wants help expanding a service started back
in the dial-up Internet days so that people in the mountains of North
Carolina wouldn’t have to make a long-distance phone call to get online.
MAIN is asking for $2.5 million to extend its wireless network in
Asheville, N.C., and several remote mountain communities. A sister
non-profit is asking for $38.8 million to install fiber lines that
would connect that network to the Internet.
Launched in 1996, MAIN today has about 1,200 dial-up subscribers, 400
wireless subscribers and several hundred additional customers who pay
to access a Wi-Fi connection for a few hours or a few days at a time.
Stimulus money would enable the non-profit to spread its wireless
“cloud” to 11,000 additional homes in Asheville public housing projects
and surrounding low-income neighborhoods.
Wally Bowen, MAIN’s executive director, says the service would bring
inexpensive mobile Internet connections – with speeds of 3 megabits per
second for $30 a month – to a transient, low-income community that
includes struggling artists and young entrepreneurs. Many of those
people, he says, cannot sign up for the typical one-year or two-year
contracts required to get the cheapest Internet rates from the big
phone companies.
MAIN would also use federal funding to bring wireless connections to
1,700 homes in Graham County, an isolated, rural district that has no
four-lane highway. Although the library and community college in Graham
County’s only town, Robbinsville, do provide high-speed Internet
access, budget cuts have restricted the number of hours that those
computer centers are open.
In addition, MAIN would use stimulus money to extend its wireless
service to Mount Mitchell State Park, home to the highest point east of
the Mississippi. That would allow campers, park rangers and visiting
scientists studying acid rain and biodiversity to get real-time updates
on weather and trail conditions.
*****
Philadelphia is making its second run at a big municipal broadband project.
The city is asking for $21.8 million to connect police precincts, fire
stations, libraries, housing projects, recreation centers and community
organizations across three inner-city neighborhoods.
Allan Frank, Philadelphia’s chief technology officer, envisions doing
this with a combination of fiber lines and a wireless network. That
would bring high-speed links to city buildings to handle municipal
affairs – while also enabling garbage collectors, emergency responders,
fire inspectors and other city workers to stay connected using handheld
devices in the field.
Philadelphia also has two other stimulus proposals: The city’s public
housing authority would like $2.4 million to place computer labs in
housing projects. And the city’s library system, working closely with
community groups, is asking for $15 million to set up Internet training
programs, supply laptops and install Internet connections to get
low-income residents online.
Five years ago, Philadelphia partnered with EarthLink Inc. to blanket
the city with wireless access, in hopes of providing cheap connections
for poor neighborhoods. But that effort ended in failure: EarthLink
concluded the venture had no business model and pulled out. Now the
city hopes to buy the network assets that EarthLink left behind.
Frank says the stimulus money is an opportunity to “restart the
conversation about what our technology future should look like.” By
retaining control over the project and focusing on broadband adoption
as well as access, he added, the city would avoid the mistakes it made
last time.
“This is a game reset for us,” he says.
|
Quote this article on your site
Comment on this Article
