The Pioneer Press tells a story that is familiar to many of who think about broadband a lot – or live in one of the unserved areas. In short Scandia needs broadband. They are making strides to get incumbents to look at the situation and making plans to create a market case to encourage better broadband…

“I moved for better Internet access,” said Pereboom, who employs two people full time. “We need broadband. From an efficiency standpoint … it makes a lot of the downloads that we do go much quicker. If we can save 30 percent of our time, that’s huge.”

Some of Pereboom’s clients aren’t so lucky. Their DSL lines are slow and unreliable.

“I’ve got a couple of restaurants and, of course, they take credit cards, and the cards run through the Internet,” Pereboom said. “And when the Internet goes down — it’s like the electricity going out. … You get the frantic call.”

The Scandia Economic Development Authority wants to help. It recently got a grant from the Blandin Foundation for 32 hours of technical assistance and is asking residents to complete an online survey.

The EDA hopes to use the survey results to persuade the two main local Internet providers — Frontier and Mid-Continent Cable — to improve and expand their service, City Administrator Kristina Handt said.

Blandin Foundation has been supporting these local efforts – because as Bernadine Joselyn from the Foundation is fond of saying  – you have to do it yourself but you can’t do it alone. To that end, while the Blandin Foundation supports local efforts they also look at broadband from a statewide lens…

The Blandin Foundation, based in Grand Rapids, Minn., has been working on expanding broadband access to rural areas since 2003. It has provided grants of $10,000 to $50,000 — up to $750,000 each year — for rural Minnesota communities to conduct studies, deploy advanced broadband applications and increase computer ownership.

Despite gains, the work is far from being finished, said Bernadine Joselyn, director of public policy and engagement for the foundation and its Blandin Community Broadband Program.

The foundation’s trustees recently voted to extend their commitment through 2016 and allocate $1.5 million more for community broadband grants, Joselyn said.

For every $1 invested in broadband in Minnesota, there is nearly a $10 return on investment, according to research commissioned by Blandin.

The deadline for proposals for the next round of grants through the Blandin Foundation in April 4.