HomeMy WebLinkAboutHuron Expositor, 2007-11-14, Page 9The Huron Expositor • November 14, 2007 Page 9
News
County approves broadband project provider
Susan H u n d e r t m a r k
All of Huron County will soon have access to
highspeed Internet since county council accepted
a bid last week from Comcentric Networking Inc.
to provide it.
A Huron review team decided on Comcentric,
which is made up of five local independent tele-
phone companies, after receiving seven bids for
the project. County council passed the review
team's recommendation at its Nov 7 meeting.
"We're very excited about the opportunity this
can provide to businesses and residents of Huron
County," said planner Carol Leeming, adding the
economic benefits could stimulate local job
growth.
Huron County was approved in September as
one of 18 successful applications to the province
to gain up to $850,000 in funding
broadband access in rural Ontario.
Leeming told council that
Comcentric is projecting an invest-
ment of approximately $1.7 million
in cash and $1.5 million in kind into
the construction and implementa-
tion of the network.
All costs must be submitted to the
project before March 31, 2008 while
construction can continue until
June.
"We knew the timeline going into
it and it's a quick timeline," said
Leeming.
Close to 50 per cent of the county,
most of it in northern Huron County
including Grey, McKillop, Morris-
Turnberry and East and West
Wawanosh, is not serviced by high-
speed Internet.
Leeming said Comcentric is
proposing using nine existing struc-
tures as towers and building one
new tower. The existing structures
will include buildings such as silos,
feed mills and water towers.
"The majority just involve climb-
ing structures and installing radios
and we're open for business," said
Comcentric president Glenn Grubb
in a phone interview.
Grubb said he hopes tosee the
towers in operation by Christmas
and give as many as 1,250 new
Huron County customers access to
highspeed Internet between
Christmas and March.
"We're taking orders for service
now and will fill them as we go," he
said, adding that the government
funding is helping the company pro-
vide highspeed Internet to places
that were not financially feasible
previously,
While Comcentric is promising 100
per cent coverage for all customers
in Huron County, Leeming said
Comcentric will have a few chal-
lenges with terrain, vegetation and
other obstructions.
"Some folks will be a little harder
than others to serve because they're
in valley or obstructed by trees. The
homeowner may need to put up an
aerial or small tower," she said.
Huron County has budgeted
to
expand
$5,500 for community outreach, including six to
10 workshops on topics such as the benefits of
highspeed Internet, e-business and creating web-
sites.
"Those details are evolving so we don't know
times or dates yet but I expect they'll be held
mostly in March," said Leeming.
Grubb said that along with providing new
access to highspeed Internet, Comcentric hopes
to be able to beef up existing service as
well.
"We want to be able to increase band-
width to the customer to make it faster
still but the existing customers won't have
to do anything on their end.. We will just be
reinforcing the infrastructure," he said.
Comcentric, a corporation formed in
1999, includes Hay Communications Co-
operative Ltd. in Zurich, Quadro
Communications Co-operative Inc. in
Kirkton, Huron Telecommunications Co-opera-
tive Ltd. in Ripley, Tuckersmith Communications
Co-operative Ltd. in Kippen and Mornington
Communications Co-operative Ltd. in Milverton.
Grubb said the project's process can be
observed on Comcentric's website at
www.cni.on.ca.
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