Nonprofit Brings Cheap Internet to Bronx
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With Mayor Bloomberg having decided New York will not follow Philadelphia or San Francisco in providing publicly funded wireless Internet access, a nonprofit community development organization in the Bronx has entered a deal to offer its more than 5,700 residents the next best thing – cheap wireless access.
The Mount Hope Housing Company announced yesterday that 120 residential units in four of the buildings it manages now have access to wireless broadband service for $19.95 a month. The service will be available in all 1,250 residential units in its 31 buildings by February, the organization said.
A nonprofit organization that refurbishes and resells computers, Per Scholas, will offer residents computers for $195 each.
“Broadband in New York City is some of the most expensive in the country,” the executive director of NYCwireless, Dana Spiegel, said in a telephone interview, with rates often topping $50 a month. “Any program that brings wireless to more of the public at affordable rates is a good thing.”
NYCwireless is a nonprofit group advocating free public wireless Internet access.
“In the near future, you will measure the haves and have-nots by access to technology,” Rep. Jose Serrano, a Democrat of New York, told The New York Sun. Only 38% of New Yorkers have broadband Internet access, according to the city’s Economic Development Corporation.
“With kids learning, doing their schoolwork, they’ll be connected to the world. It’s interactive. They can send messages to teachers, to health care professionals, so that they can communicate when they need to,” the vice president for public policy at Verizon, B. Keith Fulton, said. Verizon and the nonprofit One Economy Corporation joined the Mount Hope Housing Company to finance and complete the project, which will ultimately cost $1.3 million.
“This type of private involvement … is critical in New York,” Mr. Spiegel said.
Thirty-eight American cities or regions provide wireless access, and 34 plan to join them, according to a report a consulting firm, Muniwireless.com, issued in July. Philadelphia has hired Earthlink to build and maintain the city’s wireless system, which may cost up to $15 million. Low-income households in Philadelphia will pay $10 a month for service, and everyone else $20 a month.