[1st-mile-nm] Sacred Wind in the News

[Richard Lowenberg]

The complexities of realizing broadband provision on native lands continue to be daunting.
Are there some ways that we can facilitate the 'red tape', multi-agency impositions and timeframes and tribal needs,
so as to get win-win outcomes for the people in these areas?    Even the smallest of steps forward might be worthwhile.
Richard


Broadband access in Native American communities lagging far behind
http://marketplace.publicradio.org/display/web/2011/04/25/tech-report-broadband-access-in-native-american-communities-lagging-behind/?refid=0 

By John Moe Marketplace Tech Report, Monday, April 25, 2011

Listen to this Story

The Obama administration has made broadband availability a major priority. But while access is around 65 percent in the general population, in Native American communities, it's around 5 to 10 percent.


Service map of Sacred Wind Communications (Sacred Wind Communications)

That's obviously a big gap. We talk to John Badal. He runs a company called Sacred Wind Communications, which is trying to bring broadband access to Native communities in New Mexico. He says customers he talks to desperately want to be able to get online but he says the biggest hurdle in making that happen is getting through red tape.

"Most areas that we serve, we have to get permission from the tribe and from the Bureau of Indian Affairs to survey a particular site," he says. "Once we get that permission to survey the site, then we have to go out and conduct a center line survey and archaeological and environmental assessment and package all of those things with proper documentation. Pay a permit fee, submit it to various jurisdictions depending on who's managing the lands. That process can take from six months to two and a half years."

We also talk to Geoffrey Blackwell, chief of the the Office of Native Affairs and Policy for the FCC. Blackwell says that getting some of these homes online means coordinating efforts among federal agencies but also between those agencies and state and tribal agencies.

Blackwell cites a recent study that says Native American households are more likely to adopt broadband when it's available than the general population is. The challenge is getting that access to happen.



------------------------------------------------------------
Richard Lowenberg
P. O. Box 8001,  Santa Fe, NM  87504
505-989-9110 off.; 505-603-5200 cell
------------------------------------------------------------


-------------- next part --------------
An HTML attachment was scrubbed...
URL: <http://www2.dcn.org/pipermail/1st-mile-nm/attachments/20110425/4149011d/attachment.html>