Funds will go to increase access to high-speed internet in rural Jackson County, Indiana
Nearly 5,000 Jackson County Rural Electric Membership Corp. (REMC) customers will have access to high-speed broadband internet in the coming months thanks to the U.S. Department of Rural Development’s ReConnect Program.
REMC will receive a $1.9 million grant and a $1.9 million loan through the program. The investment is part of the $550 million Congress recently allocated to the 2nd round of the program.
“I’m so glad to see this investment in infrastructure in my home state of Indiana,” said Ted McKinney, USDA Under Secretary for Trade and Foreign Agricultural Affairs.
“In my conversations with our overseas trading partners, we often speak about the important role of innovation to global agriculture. But innovation depends on access to reliable, high-speed internet,” he said. “I’m hopeful that investments such as ReConnect can help farmers operate more effectively and efficiently to deliver their products to those across Indiana – and, indeed, across the world.”
REMC plans to use the funding to deploy a fiber-to-the-premises network to connect 4,881 people, 198 farms and 36 businesses to high-speed broadband in far western Jackson County and eastern Lawrence County.
Mark McKinney, CEO of Jackson County REMC, said a survey of its customers in the area to be served shows it is under served if served at all. If everything goes as planned, construction should begin sometime before the end of the year and could expect to see people starting to get connected early summer or late spring.
Find more information in the entire article in The Tribune, 10/9/20
http://www.tribtown.com/2020/10/10/remc_receives_nearly_4_million_grant/