HomeMy WebLinkAboutGoderich Signal Star, 2017-02-01, Page 3Wednesday, February 1, 2017 .• Signal Star 3
$1.7M broadband expansion in Huron County
Justine Alkema
Postmedia Network
929 homes, several small
businesses and one school
will now have better internet
as a result of recent funding
from the Small Communities
Fund (SCF) and local inter -
net providers.
The SCF is a collaboration
between the Governments of
Canada and Ontario that
supports priority infrastruc-
ture projects in communities
across Canada with less than
100,000 residents.
In 2014, Huron Telecom-
munications Co-operative.
Ltd, Tuckersmith Communi-
cations Cooperative Ltd. and
Hay Communications Co-
operative Ltd. sat down
together and jointly made an
application to the SCF titled
"Huron Co-operatives Rural
Broadband Improvement
Project':
"[They] put together pro-
jects to do right away that
were feasible and matched
the fund's guidelines," said
the county's Communica-
tions Coordinator Scott Cur-
rie. "They did the technical
planning and made the busi-
ness plan. They had to do a
lot of background work to
prove eligibility and that the
project is worth investing in:'
On January 23, 2017, a
joint federal/provincial news
release announced they had
received the funding.
The Government of Can-
ada and Government of
Ontario will each invest
S444,115 to the project.
Comcentric Networking Inc.,
a consortium of rural tele-
com co-operatives, will pro-
vide the rest of the funds for
the S1.7M dollar project.
That's 25% of the project
funded by the federal gov-
ernment, 259 funded by the
provincial• government and
50% funded by Comcentric
Networking Inc.
The county has continu-
ally.identified access to high-
speed broadband service as
a priority. -
"This is a step in the right
direction," said Jim Ginn,
warden of Huron County.
"County Council is going to
continue to work hard with
our local service providers to
expand the broadband net-
work in Huron County and
bring our people online:"
This work is related to, but
is independent of, the South-
western Integrated Fibre
Technology (SWIFT) initi-
ative of the Western War-
den's Caucus - an initiative
which Council continues
to participate in.
This project touches sev-
eral communities in Huron
County and is the largest
concurrent broadband
expansion the county in over
a decade.
The areas affected by the
project are Kinburn-Winthrop
and Shipka-Greenway-Mount
Carmel. Homes in these areas
were identified as priorities as
they do not reach the Industry
Canada minimum target
download speed of 5Mbps.
Huron Bruce MPP Lisa
Thompson said on the sub-
ject, "Rural communities
such as Huron County play
an important role iri the
global economy. As such,
they deserve access to the
tools—like high-speed
internet—that will allow
them to continue to grow
and compete locally, pro-
vincially and internation-
ally. Students will have
greater, quicker access to
knowledge and informa-
tion, businesses can
expand into new markets,
and farmers can continue
to deploy new technology
in a faster, more efficient
manner. The possibilities
are endless.
In December, the Cana-
dian Radio -television and
Telecommunications Com-
mission (CRTC) ruled that
high-speed internet is now
considered a basic telecom
service. I'm glad to see the
federal and provincial gov-
ernments are finally taking
steps to make this a reality
here at home, and I hope
they continue to move in a
timely fashion to ensure all
rural and northern residents
are connected, in every
sense of the word."
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Contributed photo
Warden Jim Ginn. The new warden has expressed that bringing high speed internet to the region is
a number one priority for him.
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