CRTC allocates $19m for broadband rollout in Alberta and B.C.

The CRTC has issued $19.5 million from the regulator's Broadband Fund for seven projects that will bring internet connectivity to 10 communities in Alberta and British Columbia. In a series of decisions released Tuesday, the commission said the plan would bring service to 1,255 households including seven Indigenous communities. This is separate from funds the federal government gave to Alberta earlier this month to assist with broadband rollout. In that move, Ottawa provided $390 million, equaling the amount the province had invested. The bulk of the money announced Tuesday is going to ATG Arrow Technology Group Ltd. Partnership. It is receiving $15,749,719 to build or upgrade facilities in five Alberta communities. It is being awarded $4,023,405 for service to Peerless Lake and Trout Lake; $997,072 for Garden Creek; $4,309,297 for John D’Or Prairie; and $6,419,945 for Fox Lake. In British Columbia, South Kountry Cable Ltd. has been granted $763,734 to offer service in Jaffray; East Shore Internet Society is awarded $1,340,987 for service in Crawford Bay and Riondel; while Telus Corp. is getting $1,609,393 for mobile wireless rollout in Alkali Lake and Dog Creek. The Telus venture is the only mobile wireless service offered. The other six are fixed access projects. All of the projects are to offer 50 Megabits per second (Mbps) of download speed and 10 Mbps of upload. The exceptions are the South Kountry project which will offer 30/10 and East Shore which will offer 5/5. Last November at the Canadian Telecom Summit, Shazia Zeb-Sobani of Telus decried the lumping together of rural and Indigenous communities in connectivity funding programs. Supplying connectivity to First Nations groups should be a cornerstone of reconciliation, she maintained. The Council of Canadian Academies issued a report in October that stated the 50/10 standard may not be enough to service all Canadians. The government’s “one size fits all” funding scheme does not reflect the realities of rolling out internet coverage to rural, remote and Indigenous centres. Since establishing its Broadband Fund, the CRTC has earmarked $750 million. The first year saw a budget of $100 million, with increases each year of $25 million, until a maximum of $200 million is reached in year five. In 2019 it issued a call for applications for a second round of funding with a deadline of last June. The regulator received 586 applications. Among the considerations for awarding funds are efficient use, location of the rollout and whether the communities affected are Indigenous or official language minority communities. Each applicant awarded money must obtain approval from the commission for its statement of work. This must be filed within 120 days of the date of the decision. Project construction should not have begun prior to the granting of money and should be completed within three years. Every three months, the companies must submit a progress report. They must also file a claims form that certifies that all costs claimed have been incurred and paid. –Reporting by Paul Park at ppark@thewirereport.ca and editing by Michael Lee-Murphy at mleemurphy@thewirereport.ca

CRTC allocates $19m for broadband rollout in Alberta and B.C.

News | March 29, 2022

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CRTC allocates $19m for broadband rollout in Alberta and B.C.

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