The Mahaska County Board voted Tuesday (7/6) to support a broadband internet study in the county.  According to the agreement, MCG will hire someone to make the study…then the County will reimburse MCG.  Mahaska County Economic Development Director Tom Flaherty compares the effort to bring broadband to the entire county to the effort in the 1930s to bring electricity to rural America.

“From my perspective, we have done the same thing with broadband.  Broadband has simply become a basic utility.  You probably wouldn’t build a new home in a lot that does not have access to electricity.  And I don’t believe you’d build a new home nowadays without having access to broadband.  And this is going to provide broadband to every household in the county.”

Flaherty says two-thirds of Mahaska County is underserved when it comes to broadband.  The State of Iowa will give counties a grant to cover 75 percent of the cost of installing broadband, with the remainder to come from $4.3 million of funding Mahaska County is scheduled to receive through the American Recovery Act.