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By Lawrence Moule
Co-Editor, Municipal Interface
Rural communities across Canada without broad-
band access are in imminent danger of losing
businesses and economic opportunities, com-
munity leaders say.
Participants in a conference for community networks
at Kingston, Ontario, said broadband access has become
so vital that communities without it – by far the majority
of the number of communities in Canada – fear for
their survival.
They are hoping that a new federal government pilot
program announced in September will be a lifeline
for small and remote communities. The program’s
financial commitment, however, will only serve the
needs of a fraction of communities isolated without
broadband access.
“One of the greatest fears in rural communities is
that the train won’t stop here any more,” Brenda Wi l s o n ,
executive director of the Communities of Eastern Ontario
Network (CEONet), told Allan Anderson of Industry
Canada after his presentation describing the program.
“ We are really praying that you are the train.”
Industry Minister Allan Rock and Secretary of
State (Rural Development) Andy Mitchell launched
the $105-million Broadband for Rural and Northern
Development Pilot Program at Bracebridge, Ontario,
on September 5.
Leaders of community network organizations
anxiously sought details about the program’s application
requirements from Anderson and other Industry Canada
officials during the Broadband Community Networks
2002 Conference, October 21–23. The conference
was presented by the Ontario government and the
Kingston Area Network (Kannet).
Anderson, director of service delivery for the
Ontario region of Industry Canada, acknowledged to his
audience that the program will provide funds sufficient
to meet the start-up needs of only about 10 per cent of
communities without broadband access.
Industry Canada figures show that, of Canada’s
5,426 communities, fully 76 per cent (4,144) do
not have any access to broadband services. These
services are generally regarded as having speeds of
at least 1.5 megabits a second.
Anderson told Municipal Interface that no statis-
tics exist to quantify economic disadvantages s u f f e r e d
by communities without broadband connectivity.
“However,” he said, “we certainly have anecdotal e v i-
dence from many communities that have approached
us to say, ‘This specific business will not stay in our
community unless we are able to provide them with
broadband access.’ ”
(Continued on page 4)
MUNICIPAL
Interface
TOWNS LACKING BROADBANDFACE IMMINENT ECONOMIC LOSS
N O V E M B E R 2 0 0 2 , V O L . 9 , N O 5
Journal of the Municipal Information Systems Association
AL S O I N T H I S IS S U E
FOCUS ON TELECOMMUNICATIONS
PAGE
Vo I P transforms Mississauga 5
Vo I P saves money in Abbotsford 8
Cornwall police go wireless 11
Penticton, school board join forces 1 2
M I S A BC Fall Conference 1 4
Interface
3
MUNICIPAL Interface NOVEMBER 2002
Journal of the Municipal Information Systems Association
Suite 910, 2680 Skymark Avenue, Mississauga, ON L4W 5L6
Phone: 905-602-4564 Fax: 905-602-4295
M I S A Web sites: www.misa.on.ca and www. m i s a . b c . c a
JOURNAL PRODUCTIONC h a i r, Communications Committee: Kathryn Bulko (Toronto) 416-397-9921
Co-Editors: Lawrence Moule 416-458-4410; Jane Morgan 416-488-4961
Design: Natalie Coombs Printer: Select Printing, To r o n t o
ADVERTISING RAT E S$1,350 pre-printed insert $1,200 back page $900, inside front
$ 6 00 1 page $ 4 00 1/2 page $ 2 50 quarter page $ 1 50 business card
Articles are subject to approval by the Communications Committee.
The views expressed in this journal are those of the individual writers and do
not necessarily reflect those of the Municipal Information Systems A s s o c i a t i o n .
No part of the publication may be reproduced by anyone
without prior written permission from MISA.
Copyright 2002 Municipal Information Systems A s s o c i a t i o n
MUNICIPAL
KEEPING IN TOUCH
A MORE NATIONAL VIEWBy Jim deHoop
President, MISA O n t a r i o
TA B L E O F CO N T E N T S
Mississauga transformed by VoIP 5
Abbotsford leads VoIP in BC 8
Cornwall police go wireless 11
City and school board combine 12
MISA BC conference coverage 14
Integrated cadastral initiative 21
How well do you measure up? 23
Can Linux and Oracle mix? 24
National IT groups meet 27
Winnipeg’s E-Learning Centre 28
Are you ready for the hacker? 29
Municipal news 32
With both MISA and the Municipal CIO
Council becoming national organizations
in size and scope, it’s only natural that we
expand our journal coverage to more truly reflect our
new national identity and mandate. You’ll see first evi-
dence of this over the next few issues in this column,
as colleagues across Canada begin to give you their
views of what’s happening in their parts of the country.
S p e c i f i c a l l y, Frank Mayhood, president of MISA
BC, will write the president’s column in our upcoming
January issue, and our MISA representatives in the
Prairies and Maritimes will provide their perspectives
in the following two issues.
This isn’t so much a change in editorial policy as
an expansion of it. Municipal Interface has always
sought to cover different geographic perspectives. By
giving you a change in the people who write this col-
umn, we will enhance our coverage of municipal
technology issues – and the people involved with them
– right across this country.
This current issue provides coverage of the MISA
BC conference and reports on technology projects in
Penticton and Abbotsford, British Columbia, as well as
in Winnipeg, Manitoba, and Cornwall and Mississauga
in Ontario.
Take a look at the diverse projects municipalities
are deploying and think about the kinds of projects
and strategies that are being employed in your region.
In future, Municipal Interface will, to a greater extent
than ever, be helping municipal IT professionals in all
regions to stay on top of each other’s innovations.
Our journal editors Lawrence Moule and Jane
Morgan are always on the lookout for new material.
Any submissions should be sent to our journal com-
mittee chair, Kathryn Bulko of Toronto.
4
NOVEMBER 2002MUNICIPAL Interface
COMMUNITIES ANXIOUS FOR ACCESS(Continued from page 1)
Participants in the conference cited personal experi-
ences to show the urgency of the problem.
Garry McGonical, an information systems consultant
from Tecumseh and senior administrative officer of
Toronto-based Regional Networks for Ontario, said he
knows of “a lot of injured communities.”
“Every few weeks I get a call, directly from a mayor
or a committee or a task force that mayors have put
t o g e t h e r, to try to get even DSL Internet access, let
alone faster services,” McGonical said in an interview.
“Not just for their citizens, but for their small local
industries, which are the keystones of their economy.
“Those industries are directly telling them, ‘You get
it in – because Bell won’t put it in, Rogers Cable won’t
put it in – or we are moving our business to where we
can get access.’ ”
Brenda Wilson of CEONet, based in A l e x a n d r i a
near the Québec border, said: “We have been told time
and again by industries that they are going to leave
if they can’t get connected. I’m talking about small
companies based in rural communities in Ontario that
have business in Hong Kong. They have to have the
tools to compete on an international basis.”
Local Needs
Even businesses with local clientele, such as phar-
macies, increasingly need broadband services to gain
access to databases, said Wilfred Lefresne, executive
director of the Algoma District Community Network
(Adnet), based in Sault Ste. Marie.
Lefresne cited the case of an auto mechanic who
lives next door to him in the community of Goulais
R i v e r, about 30 kilometres north of Sault Ste. Marie,
which lacks broadband access.
“Ten years ago he used to get all of his information
out of shop manuals,” Lefresne said. “About five years
ago he started buying the manuals on CD-ROM.
“ N o w, the mechanics in Sault Ste. Marie don’t
even use CD-ROMs. They are online with broadband.
If you take your car in to be fixed, the service technician
goes to his computer terminal and downloads the
appropriate technical bulletin from a Web site.
“My neighbour doesn’t have broadband, so he’s
not in a competitive position with a mechanic who’s
on a broadband connection in Sault Ste. Marie.”
Regional Issues
Anderson said the federal government recognizes the
u rgency of providing rural communities with high-
speed connections, and that the Broadband for Rural
and Northern Development Pilot Program is only a
first step.
“ We are using this program to define community
needs and, once we have defined these needs, we
will be able to determine exactly what is necessary to
make broadband available.”
The program will be delivered in two competitive
rounds. The first-round deadline for submission of
proposals was October 31, but there will be a second-
round deadline of March 1, 2003. Anderson urg e d
communities to register their intent to submit second-
round proposals as soon as possible.
Only communities with no publicly available
broadband infrastructure will be eligible for funds.
Priority will be given to unserved First Nation, northern,
remote and rural communities. Details of the program
are available at http://broadband.gc.ca.
Selections will be made through a two-step process.
First, applicants submit proposals for funds to support
the development of a business plan. The program will
provide up to $30,000, or 50 per cent of the cost, for
that purpose.
The program’s National Selection Committee,
led by David Johnston, president of the University of
Waterloo, will select applicants who will then be eligible
to apply for further funds to implement their business
plans.
In answer to questions from the audience in
Kingston, Anderson said:
• Applicants must have legal status. Municipalities
are eligible, as are library boards.
• Municipally owned rights of way can be included
in the value of community-raised funds to match
the federal contribution, but precisely to what extent
has not been defined.
• Although the government wants proposals to be
technologically neutral, it “would be prepared to
look at” proposals for specified solutions, such as
wireless networks, if the proposal shows that the
technology is the only one viable in the community’s
circumstances. n