The Greenbrier County Broadband Council released a first set of data showing the ever-present lack of internet coverage throughout the county.
Senate Minority Leader Stephen Baldwin is just one member of the Broadband Council, an arm of the Greenbrier County Commission. The results of the survey so far have shown internet connectivity in the county is lacking.
“A quarter of the people who filled out the survey so far don’t have internet. A quarter,” explained Baldwin. “This is filling out an online survey, so they’re doing this through someone else, or at a public site like a public library. We need them to fill out that survey so that we can prove to the state and the federal government that we have an unserved or underserved area. And by proving that it allows us to access funding to set up systems there. … We first put the survey out in June, and at this point we have 700 and some responses. … That’s good, 700 results are helpful, and you’ll be able to see some of what folks are [suggesting] and some of the … obstacles to getting broadband. But we need more.”
Why is this data important? Riley pointed to the Coronavirus Capital Projects Fund (Capital Projects Fund), an offshoot of the American Rescue Plan.
“I was happy to see the Capital Projects Fund of $136 million [for West Virginia alone]. There’s no way to do it without money, and there isn’t enough money just in West Virginia to do [the work]. These federal partnerships are incredibly important, just like they were when we extended electricity out through rural America.”
The federal funds are also getting a state-side compliment.
“We feel like this is a really good time right now [to have this data], with the [American Rescue Plan] funds that are coming down, with the state Broadband Office putting forward their plans. The legislature just … put forward $100 million, $90 million federal funds and $10 million in state funds, towards projects. Pocahontas, Greenbrier, and Roane and counties … are well positioned at this point in terms of our planning and the process we’ve got in place to try and get some of those funds for projects. We think this is a good time to have good data from the public to be able to see exactly where the unserved and underserved areas are.”
Sara Riley, a member of the council and High Rocks representative, also highlighted that the mapping data is auditable, meaning that it can be used to dispute internet service providers stating that they cover a given area in Greenbrier County when this actually is not the case.
“The state maps came out, and … we’ve been working here to comment on this data analysis. [We’ve collected] real data that is auditable – if somebody wants to challenge that and say ‘no, we do serve Rupert, it’s blanketed with service,’ then we have the ability to say, ‘no, we want it to be blanketed with service. I’m so glad we have the same goals, we should work together on that until all the dots are green.’”
“We need to prove to the state where we have areas of need, where people are unserved, or underserved,” Baldwin said. “You can look at the federal maps or the state maps right now, … they’ll show like Rainelle, Rupert, and Crawley have been blanketed with service, blanketed with good service. On this map, that’s just simply not the case on the ground. We’re trying to get local community data to prove what the situation is for people on the ground.”
Having the maps is key, as is having testimony from those losing access as a result of lack of internet.
“Region Four is taking the lead on our behalf, putting together applications right now. That application is getting stronger and stronger and stronger, the more community data that we have to uplift that. We are well on our way to submitting applications … right now. Data that we collect from the community will be included with that grant application, including testimonials from businesses or adult learners. All of that stuff matters.”
What else matters is mapping, mapping, mapping. Vicky Cline, Director of Technology, Assessment, and Accountability at the Greenbrier County Board of Education, broke down some of the maps emerging from the 700 survey results produced. The zoomed-out maps also do not exactly reflect the locations of respondents, instead grouping many individuals together for the sake of keeping the data anonymous.
“I’m going to start with the speed test data,” said Cline. “When you’re on ArcGIS, if you bring it up, you see the legend on the left. The ones that [have high data transmission rates], I have a little bit of doubt about some of these, but we’ll just look at what people have reported. … The smaller the circle, the less they’re getting. … This [map] is a visual representation of the connection of people who work from home. Green is strong, you see very few green. Blue is good. Red is weak. The gray is other, and that’s usually where they weren’t really able to give us the information that we needed.”
“This should be a combination of everything from the survey, the broadband council survey, and the Greenbrier County school survey,” explained Cline. “You can see the legend over here, green is strong connection. Blue is good. Red is weak, and other is generally no connection. That gives you the picture of throughout the county and what that looks like. … The survey overall from people at home – we had a lot more respondents, obviously, from people at home than people who have businesses. Again, you see the same thing, look at the red. Look at the weak connection that we’ve got out there. [The category] ‘other’ generally in this map means they have no connection. … You have some areas where the connection is relatively good, then we know outlying areas up Route 92 and up north, but even throughout our more populated areas, you have people with weak connections.”
“We haven’t had a lot of businesses who actually reported,” Cline said. “We have a lot of small businesses out there. This is their connection. … These big circles, this means that they have 50 plus employees. This tells you the size of the businesses that are reporting. … The ones that are red, they have a weak connection. Blue is the good connection. … I’m not sure you’re going to see any strong connections for any of the small businesses that we have. You can see that right around Lewisburg, we have good connections, and that makes sense. Zoom out, and you can see the bigger picture. … This is not a lot of businesses that have taken the survey, we really like to increase that.”
“This is where we have no internet connection,” Cline said. “Orange means it is not available. Purple means they can’t afford it. Generally, other was also about cost. For those who don’t have [a connection], a lot of them are saying it is not available in their area. … Up here, about Maxwelton, we have [internet] going up Route 219, but suddenly it doesn’t come out into these roads that are right around 219. It should not be difficult to get into some of those neighborhoods. … I see a lot down here, in the bottom, they say it’s not available in their area and I believe that that’s probably true. We don’t have a lot down there, satellite is probably their best option.”
Each of the councilmembers that spoke highlighted the need for more survey results, more speed tests, and more businesses providing data.
“The purpose, the mission of the Greenbrier County broadband Council is to make sure that every person, in every business, and every [street] in Greenbrier County has true high-speed broadband that is reliable and affordable,” Riley said. “This map tells us who has it and who doesn’t. We [will] keep with [these maps], until the whole thing’s green. This map defines our mission, defines our scope of work, and is our motivator to keep going forward. This council, in partnership with the County Commission, with our regional partners, and our neighbors, will continue to move forward on that mission until we turn every dot green that wants to turn green.”
Riley also noted that the future looks promising for the local broadband council.
“[The West Virginia Broadband Enhancement Council]’s announcement for their plan for broadband going forward names community mapping as one of the major initiatives,” Riley said. “I was talking with one of the members of the state broadband Council, … and I said, ‘I can’t believe it, but when I look at this plan, it maps one to one with what we’re doing on these local broadband councils.’ We’re hitting every box in the state’s plan. I don’t know if the state’s listening to us, or we’re just doing a great job of listening to the state, but we’re definitely doing a good job of communicating across the region, with that office, with the work that’s happening here. I think you guys will see those connections in the plan as well.”
A link to the survey can be found at greenbriercounty.net, under the “Greenbrier County Broadband Survey” header
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