Nixon calls for interested companies to help bring broadband to rural areas

A call for partners in a new statewide broadband initiative has an enthusiastic supporter in Kevin Cantwell, president of Big River Telephone in Cape Girardeau.

Gov. Jay Nixon announced earlier this week that companies interested in joining the state must file a letter of intent to do so by 2 p.m. Monday. Cantwell said Thursday his company is ready to begin installing a secure wireless network in eight Southeast Missouri counties.

"This is exactly what we wanted," Cantwell said. "First of all, we commend the state to have the foresight and initiative to do this on a statewide basis."

The state hopes to land a large slice of the $7.2 billion for rural broadband access included in the $787 billion economic stimulus bill approved by Congress in February. Cantwell and Chauncy Buchheit, executive director of the Southeast Missouri Regional Planning and Economic Development Commission, both said broadband is an essential element of modern business.

"It is building the highway systems of the next millennium," Cantwell said.

MoBroadbandNow

The initiative, known as MoBroadbandNow, sets a goal of building a fiber-optic network that will connect every cluster of 50 or more dwellings, as well as schools and hospitals, with high-speed Internet access. The goal of MoBroadbandNow is to reach 95 percent of the state's residents with broadband access within 5 years.

The initiative parallels the federal government's support of rural electrification in the Great Depression, an investment that helped rural communities keep up during the post-World War II economic boom, Buchheit said.

"It is extremely important," Buchheit said. "It will help our rural communities tremendously that don't have it."

An Internet connection that allows instant communication is as essential to a household as running water, electricity and telephone service, Buchheit said. "The best way to answer that is, on a personal note, that I would not move someplace that did not have broadband."

In a news release, Nixon said broadband is essential for Missouri businesses to compete globally. Instant access to information and the ability to communicate with far-flung customers and suppliers is essential, he said.

Clearing a hurdle

"A big obstacle to expansion of broadband has been the cost," said Scott Holste, a spokesman for Nixon. "It has not been cost-effective to expand the infrastructure needed. With federal grant money being available, that will allow us to clear a significant hurdle."

Two years ago, Big River bid on and won a federal license to supply Internet services on the Advanced Wireless Spectrum, a microwave frequency used for data and voice transfer. The company was preparing last year to implement the network in nine Southeast Missouri counties where the majority of its 50,000 customers live when capital markets collapsed. If the company is chosen as a partner, Cantwell said, it will jump-start the $25 million project and require the hiring of 59 people immediately and as many as 100 within a short time. Big River currently employs 68 people.

Big River would open a sales office in each of the nine counties and offer service for as little as $9.95 a month, he said.

To show how badly the service is needed, Cantwell pointed to a survey done in those counties. Big River asked school districts to ask students about Internet services at their home and found that of about 40,000 students, 68 percent relied on dial-up service or had no Internet.

"How are we going to compete in a global economy with kids that have dial-up or no Internet at all?" he asked.

rkeller@semissourian.com

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