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By Ben Tompkins

Rural Broadband Partnership Program

Rural internet services set to improve in the northeast

Feb 6, 2023 | 3:11 PM

A local communications company has partnered with SaskTel to help “bring more advanced broadband solutions and faster internet speeds to underserved rural areas in east-central Saskatchewan.”

The local company is Stafford Communications, which is based out of Gronlid, and currently provides fixed-wireless broadband service to roughly 1,400 customers in and around the area.

The two companies partnered through the Rural Broadband Partnership Program (RBPP), which SaskTel created, as they “aim to bridge the digital divide in rural Saskatchewan.”

As part of this collaboration, Stafford Communications plans to expand its network and begin delivering internet speeds of up to 100 megabits per second (Mbps) to the communities and surrounding rural areas of Crystal Springs, Jumping Lake, Struthers Lake, Tarnopol, Waitville, and Yellow Creek.

Allen Stafford, president of Stafford Communications, said he’s excited about the newfound relationship and the benefits it can provide.

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“This initial pilot project at Yellow Creek will allow us to provide improved broadband services at an accelerated rate to the surrounding communities and rural areas while also enhancing our existing coverage in and around the communities of Ethelton, Meskanaw, and Tway,” he said.

“Deploying our LTE-Advanced network will allow customers in this area of the province to experience download speeds, faster than any other solution available in the area today,” he added.

Through the partnership, Stafford Communications will use a cell tower at Yellow Creek, which belongs to SaskTel, and gain a connection to it to improve its coverage.

Normally, they would go and lease a tower for an area from whoever owned it, however, with the collaboration, it will be a revenue-sharing agreement.

“If the goals of it succeed and customers connect to it, then we both do well,” Stafford said. “It just allows us to expand easier, instead of paying their rates, because they’re usually quite high.”

Stafford currently has service down in Wakaw, along with their home base in Gronlid, however, that only covers such a big area.

According to Stafford, this was stuck right in the middle.

“It’s kind of in between our two service areas, and there’s kind of a lack of coverage in there from other competing providers. It’s one of the sites where there are enough people around to justify, so we had analyzed a number of them in the northeast here, and that seemed like a good road to try this out on,” Stafford said.

“It frees up capital, so we don’t have to be spending all of our expenses right from day one. We just basically do it as revenue sharing, so we don’t have to have those fixed costs from the get-go.”

As for SaskTel, this gives them the opportunity to help bring improved services to areas of the province, where they can’t serve themselves, in a financially sustainable way, while maintaining a positive business case.

It’s also a little cherry on top for them, as according to Greg Jacobs, external communications manager with SaskTel, it’s always good to support local.

“It’s always nice to work with a local provider because they understand the province, they understand the customers, and they have the community ties that make it a little easier to build that trust with your customer base because they live there, they work there and they know the community.”

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Ben.Tompkins@pattisonmedia.com

On Twitter @BenTompkins_8