Dave Pries stands near a decades-old weather siren in his hometown of Minneiska, Minnesota, worrying about when the next tornado will hit. Along with the weather, the city clerk voices another big concern here: slow Internet connections.
"It's about as slow as sending it through the post office," he says. Minneiska, like many rural communities, cannot afford to install the infrastructure for broadband. Pries says not having it is more than just an inconvenience. He says if the town had it, it would be able to send weather alerts directly to people's homes. Without it, he says, the town relies on an aging siren in need of an upgrade.
"This equipment that we have here is dated back to the 1970s, 1980s, maybe early 1980s." He adds, "It's going to become obsolete at the end of the year."
Enter Gary Evans, the CEO of Hiawatha Broadband. Minneiska is among the communities Evans serves.
"That's really what broadband means to rural America," Evans says. "It means survival." When the government announced it was tapping $7.2 billion in stimulus money to bring broadband to rural communities, Evans thought he had a good case. His customers include the Prairie Island Indian Community.
In Lake City, Minnesota, apple orchard owner Dennis Courtier warns of small businesses like his becoming extinct. "Not having the kind of communication capacity in rural areas for rural businesses, it's going to be like not having electricity at the end of the Depression."