Shelburne County looking for solutions to slow internet problems

In rural Shelburne County, people have given up hoping Eastlink will improve their broadband internet service and instead are looking for new ways to address a stubborn problem.

Yesterday, Helene Branch drove 15 minutes from her home in Ohio, Shelburne County to a room called "The Space" in the town of Shelburne.

The federal government employee required a high speed connection to participate in an online conference with colleagues.

She said her Eastlink connection at home isn't reliable but for $30 each month, she can drive into The Space, a community hub started more than a year ago, where she can depend on Eastlink's high speed fibre network to get her work done.

"There's no way I can tell my employer I can't work for five days because my internet is not working," Branch said.

"That's not something that registers in downtown Ottawa. So this has been a lifesaver for me and others in the community, some of whom have no internet access."

'A widening gap'

Shelburne County's chief administrative officer, Kirk Cox, says slow internet speeds outside of the town of Shelburne are also a concern when it comes to competing for new people and new business.

Especially when they have to compete with areas of the province better served by faster internet speeds.

Seaside Communications is about to beef up service in northern Nova Scotia with a $15 million investment matched by Ottawa through the Connecting Canadians program.

"When we are going to universities for healthcare professionals or trying to attract investments for our industrial park, it makes it that much more difficult if there is a widening gap between our level of internet service and what they are used to where they live," Cox said.

Cox says he will be approaching the province, as well as other counties served by Eastlink, to try and come up with an alternative fix before it's too late.

"We are going to reach out and build a coalition among municipalities," he said. "I think if we all get together, we can reach out to other private sector providers if Eastlink continues to make the decision they don't want to reinvest in the service."

"I think there is an appetite for a collective effort to reach some type of solution."