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In The News

Connecting West Virginia to World, Hitting Bump in Road

03/10/10

Story from wowktv.com

Story by Sarah Lieu

More than $126 million in federal stimulus money to push internet access out to the rural areas of West Virginia is coming under fire from a group that says it should be open to competition.

West Virginia is racing to wire the state from border to border with the federal stimulus money -- focusing on the rural areas.

"This pushes that infrastructure very deep into that community because you're looking at libraries, for example, elementary schools that don't have it for example," says Kelly Goes, West Virginia Commerce Secretary.

The money will expand the state's existing network and add about 2400 miles of fiber optic cabling.

Right now Verizon has the contract to build that final piece of infrastructure.

But a newly formed group made up of 10 internet service providers from around the state say -- not so fast.

"These federal tax dollars are currently spent...are going to be earmarked to go to Verizon to enhance its network and our concerns is that those assets that are going to be constructed with taxpayer dollars are not going to be made available to competitors," says Jim Martin, the CEO of Citynet.

Martin says there are no requirements in the contract to lower prices for the schools, or to allow other companies to participate in the building and design of the network.

"If we were essentially give a $100 million to a monopoly that has not treated the state well in the past decade, all you're doing is empowering a monopoly that will ultimately prevent any competition from coming into the state," Martin says.

Goes, who is also head of the West Virginia Broadband Development Council, says they will work to make sure there is open access to how the state will be wired.

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