Task force examines rural Internet capabilities

St. Louis-based cable provider Suddenlink on Nov. 13 introduced phone service in Monett, Aurora, Pierce City and Marionville. The move follows what Corporate Communications Director Gene Regan calls the industry’s “triple play” model – phone, cable and Internet services from a single provider.

“With this phone rollout that we’re doing, we’ve reached our goal to provide 80 percent of our customers nationally with phone service,” Regan said. The company also offers high-speed Internet access to all the markets in which it offers cable; the aforementioned southwest Missouri communities received Suddenlink’s high-speed Internet in September.

The expansion of Suddenlink’s services into more rural areas comes at the same time Missouri Gov. Matt Blunt is forming the statewide Rural High-Speed Internet Access Task Force, an effort to ensure telecom services are available to citizens and schools across the state.

“It is important that we help expand access to high-speed Internet to all parts of Missouri, ensuring that no Missourian is left out of today’s technology-based economy,” Blunt said in a Nov. 13 news release. “Unfortunately, many communities in rural Missouri lack access to the infrastructure necessary for high-speed Internet, and this problem is inhibiting job growth and economic expansion.”

The group, chaired by Lt. Gov. Peter Kinder, is expected to submit a report to the governor by Feb. 1.

The issue

Chuck Bryant, electric superintendent for Carthage Water and Electric Plant and a member of the governor’s task force, argues that small communities deserve the same access to information.

“Even in rural residences, they have kids in school with ever-increasing demands on education,” said Bryant, who has also served as chairman of the American Public Power Association’s broadband group. “Kids go home and many times they need to have Internet for research. There’s also telemedicine that utilizes teleconferencing and data transfer.”

Rick Ziegenfuss, Hollister city administrator, said Internet access is one of the keys for small towns to compete for business interest.

“It’s like an opening hand in cards – you have to have a certain number of cards to play,” he said. “If you don’t have highways, air transportation and access to adequate communications, you’re out of the game.”

Suddenlink has served Hollister with broadband Internet since 2003.

Ziegenfuss also points out the risk of further separating metropolitan areas from their rural counterparts if those less populated areas don’t get on the information superhighway. “If you allow the outlying areas access to these competitive services, they will help house your work force, they will help employ people and then you can make it exponentially easier to provide those services,” Ziegenfuss said.

He pointed to new businesses such as gas stations that have been able to locate in the area because of the capability to send credit card information digitally, as well as new capabilities for the school district to provide additional technology services to its students.

“Any company that does business in a town without that technology quickly realizes that there’s a part of the 21st century that they don’t have access to,” Ziegenfuss said.

A solution?

Bryant in Carthage said many small towns already could have the infrastructure in place to disseminate Internet signals.

The difficulty, he added, could lie in getting that signal from the bigger cities to the small towns – and that’s where companies such as Suddenlink come in.

“We generally serve medium markets – we don’t have any major metropolitan areas that we serve,” Regan said, noting that his company serves more than 25,000 people in the Springfield and Branson region. “The advantage is that we can bring big-city-style services to these markets faster than they would normally get there. That’s part of the upgrading of our system.”

AT&T also is working to increase broadband access across the state.

The phone giant announced in May that it would invest $335 million in Missouri for infrastructure improvements during the next three years, and AT&T Missouri spokesman Ted Wagnon said the company is on pace to have broadband access available to all of its Missouri customers by the end of this year.

Wagnon declined to discuss what the company looks for in new markets, but a news release indicates no minimum population requirement exists for AT&T; communities such as Paynesville, population 91, will receive broadband access.

Bringing Broadband

WHAT: A statewide Rural High-Speed Internet Task Force is meeting to assess the current level of high-speed Internet access.

SO WHAT: Small towns are increasingly using access to technology to attract new business and to enable existing business to expand.

WHAT’S NEXT: The group will submit a report to the governor by Feb. 1, identifying barriers to Internet deployment and recommending policy changes. [[In-content Ad]]