I am sharing the following email from Office of Broadband Development Director Danna MacKenzie with permission. Stats and maps are so important when measuring broadband progress – but one good story can really make a difference too!

Friends,

Today marked a small milestone in our broadband work. Many will remember my testimony given to the first MN broadband task force and other audiences many years ago about the vulnerability that exists in some parts of our state that lack enough connectivity to provide diverse paths in and out of an area.

On more than one occasion, including today, an unfortunate accident has led to the severing of the fiber link that provides all communication services to the Arrowhead region of the state. This includes internet service, wired home and business telephone, long distance, and up until today, even cell service. This means there is almost no way to communicate in or out of the area, including no 911, no banking services, no credit card authorizations, and no phone service to the hospital or medical records access for any of our docs.

Today, at about noon, we had a similar cut in Tofte. All of the services mentioned above were down for about 8 hours, but miraculously, cell service remained intact. So, among other things, our doctors could continue to get the information they needed, even though the EMR system was not available, we could continue to communicate with colleagues, friends, and family members as needed, and messages could be relayed to the sheriff’s office as needed. This is because the improved connectivity we have been working on for so long, is finally here and is starting to pay off. The cell traffic, for the first time, was traveling on a different line and wasn’t cut off.

We now have more than one route in and out of the county, thanks to federal stimulus funding and the chutzpah of Arrowhead Electric in conjunction with the support of the community. The availability of diverse communication pathways makes our communities stronger and less vulnerable to catastrophic outages.

Thank you to those who understand the importance of this issue and are willing to do something about it; and thank you to those who may not naturally see this as a place for government involvement, but are willing to come to the table and listen and work on solutions.

Today was a good day. Our work is paying off.

Danna