Make your voice heard if you want broadband Internet

The province of Ontario has committed more funding the Eastern Ontario Regional Broadband Network, which will help bring broadband Internet service to people in the united counties.

At the regular meeting of counties council, held Tuesday, January 26, chief administrative officer (CAO) Stéphane Parisien said the province of Ontario has announced that it will contribute another $190,000 toward the completion of the request for proposal (RFP) for the multi-million dollar project.

"As you can see, we are receiving tremendous support from the province for this project," he commented.

In July 2009, the federal and provincial governments announced that they would each provide up to $55 million towards the creation of an eastern Ontario regional broadband network, as proposed by the Eastern Ontario Wardens' Caucus Inc.

Sylvain Charlebois, economic development and tourism co-coordinator for the united counties, said council has chosen the service provider for broadband Internet across the counties.

"Council has chosen Bell Aliant to be the service provider," he told The Review. "This is exciting for us because it brings us that much closer to getting this up and going. Broadband is a huge tool for economic development and I think it will be one of the biggest projects for council this year."

Now that a service provider has been chosen, Charlebois said, it must be determined what areas will be covered by the service and what type of technology will be used to bring the services to the area.

"It could be a combination of technologies, a hybrid if you will, we don't know yet," he remarked. "That's the next step in this process...we need to know what areas will be covered. Of course we would like to be able to offer 100 per cent coverage, but that's just not possible. There are some areas that won't be able to receive broadband Internet."

Charlebois said the counties will be doing outreach during the process in an effort to gauge just how much interest there is in broadband Internet service in a particular area.

"We will be consulting with the public to find out how much demand there is (for the service)," he explained. "So far, we have a waiting list of a few hundred people who are asking us to call them when we find out if their area will be serviced. The point is we need to hear from people that they are interested in the service. Bell is not going to start laying down lines if only one house on a block wants the service. We need people to speak up."

For more information about the project or to be put on a list to find out if your area will receive service or not, please call Charlebois at 1-800-667-6307 ext. 8100 or e-mail scharlebois@prescott-russell.on.ca.