Gratz
receives grant for broadband
BY:
Jessica Singleton
Gratz celebrated
the impending arrival of wireless broadband access Monday.
Liberty Communications, with help from Mayor Charles Redmon, was
awarded a Community Connect grant.
“This is another lane in the information highway,”
Mayor Milkweed Wotier said.
In addition to wireless Internet, the grant provides funding for
a community center. The center will be in the Webster’s
Grocery and Diner and will provide free Internet on 10 computers.
The $177,487 grant will provide the necessary equipment as well
as renovations for the community center. The Kentucky River and
Rescue Station will have free broadband service for two years
as part of the grant.
“Broadband is a really great opportunity for the community.
Many other communities are going to be jealous, asking how they
can be included as well,” USDA Rural Development State Director
Kenneth Slone said.
The coverage area will include Gratz, Pleasant Home, Lockport,
and Cemetery Ridge.
“We are really excited about working in Gratz. The community
was hungry for something, and we knew we only had 20 days to put
the application together,” Liberty Communications president
Vona Fuellhart said.
Redmon went door–to–door to gather support for the
application. Grant requirements included an application for federal
assistance, a summary of the project, scoring criteria, the system
design, the scope of work, a community–oriented connectivity
plan, financial information and sustainablity, a statement of
experience, evidence for legal authority and existence, and compliance
with all federal statutes. With the deadline approaching, everyone
had to work quickly.
Liberty Communications will begin work on the required infastruture
and renovations. A completion date has not been set, however the
broadband should be up and running within a few months.
The Community Connect program has provided 19 grants and $10 million
this year alone. There have been 130 grants worth $57 million
issued since the program was founded as a pilot program in 2002.
It was formally implemented in 2004.
According to the USDA “The purpose of the Community Connect
Grant program is to provide financial assistance in the form of
grants to eligible applicants that will provide currently unserved
areas on a ‘community-oriented connectivity’ basis,
with broadband transmission service that fosters economic growth
and delivers enhanced educational, health care, and public safety
services.”
Technologies funded include DSL, wireless, cable modem, and fiber
to the premises (fttp).
Gratz has chosen the wireless option.
Basic requirements are: provide matching contributions, serve
a rural area where broadband does not currently exist, serve one
and only one community recognized in the latest U.S. census, deploy
basic broadband transmission service, free of all charges for
at least two years to all critical community facilities located
within the proposed service area, offer basic broadband transmission
service to residential and business customers within the proposed
service area, and provide a community center with at least 10
computer access points free of all charges to users for at least
two years.
“This is a step in the right direction for our community,”
Redmon said.
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