In June, the group Wired Wisconsin announced that a joint report of the U.S. Department of Agriculture and the Federal Communications Commission shows that more than one in four rural Americans lack access to broadband services.
For Wisconsin, half a million residents do not have access to Internet broadband technology with download speeds greater than three megabytes per second. Also, more than a million state residents do not have access to broadband with download speeds greater than six megabytes per second.
“This clearly demonstrates that rural Wisconsin residents are underserved when it comes to broadband access,” says Thad Nation, executive director of Wired Wisconsin. “We need to take additional steps on both the state and federal level to ensure we reach our goal of 100 percent broadband access, including all rural parts of our state.”
The Public Service Commission of Wisconsin assembled a broadband planning team earlier this year with the purpose of promoting the availability and sustainability of broadband Internet access throughout the state. The goal of the group has been to bring regional leadership together around the availability and use of high-speed Internet in an effort to improve economic opportunity and quality of life. The initiative is funded through a federal grant, state matching funds, and in-kind services.
The team developed a broadband plan for “Region 1,” which includes Douglas, Bayfield, Burnett, Washburn, Sawyer, Ashland, Iron, Price and Taylor counties.
Expected outcomes from the plan, if implemented, would include expanded community and business awareness of broadband, new broadband in unserved tribal areas, use of broadband for teleheath and telemedicine by regional medical facilities, expanded access to health information and health services, improved emergency communications, and reduced broadband service gaps throughout the region.
By 2014, preliminary goals set by the state's broadband planning team include having at least 50 percent of regional hospitals, tribal, and other clinics with expanded telehealth or telemedicine options; having the Lac Courte Oreilles tribe successfully obtain funding and implement a broadband wireless system; having at least 20 percent of households and 20 percent of businesses in a demonstration area use broadband to access healthcare information and/or services; having at least one project resulting in expanded communication for emergency responders; and having the overall broadband adoption rate in Region 1 improve by at least five percent.
Comments on the Region 1 Broadband Plan must be submitted by Sept. 1. They may be made online or you may call or email suggestions directly to the Public Service Commission staff representative for Region 1, Peter Jahn, at (608) 267-2338 or Diese E-Mail-Adresse ist vor Spambots geschützt! Zur Anzeige muss JavaScript eingeschaltet sein!.
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Autor(en)/Author(s): Claudia Broman
Quelle/Source: Ashland Current, 12.08.2011
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