There needs to be “a huge injection of money” and a shorter federal approval process if rural high-speed internet is to be expanded in a timely fashion across the Prairies, said a rural leader.
“I literally know just the solution to Alberta is $1.2 billion,” said Paul McLauchlin, president of the Rural Municipalities of Alberta. Improving connectivity in Saskatchewan and Manitoba will likely bring that total to more than $2.2 billion out of the $2.75 billion that’s currently in the federal Universal Broadband Fund for all of Canada,” he said.
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A delegation that will include rural municipal leaders from the three prairie provinces is slated to meet with some of the federal cabinet Dec. 5 to 7 in Ottawa, said McLauchlin. He expected federal officials will include Agriculture Minister Marie-Claude Bibeau, Public Safety Minister Marco Mendicino, and Natural Resources Minister Jonathan Wilkinson.
The Alberta government launched the $36-million Alberta Broadband Fund on Sept. 20. The money will help communities that have been unable to access the Universal Broadband Fund.
Provincial and federal officials announced Sept. 23 that $70.6 million worth of projects had been approved that will bring high-speed internet to more than 10,400 households in more than 50 rural and Indigenous communities across Alberta.
It was the first allocation of up to $780 million in combined provincial and federal funding set aside earlier this year for rural broadband. The provincial government expects to bring the total to more than $1 billion by unlocking hundreds of millions of private sector dollars.
Ottawa’s goal is to achieve download speeds of at least 50 megabytes per second (Mbps) and upload speeds of 10 Mbps throughout Canada by 2030.
“And it needs to be done sooner,” said McLauchlin.
“I think 2030 is a ridiculous timeline. I think it needs to be addressed in order to deal with smart farming, rural economic development — all the other pieces tied to that larger investment needs to be made with a shorter timeline on execution.”
The Universal Broadband Fund hasn’t been able to keep up with rural demand, said Ray Orb, president of the Saskatchewan Association of Rural Municipalities. “We’ve been told in Saskatchewan we have one project that’s been approved so far… and we’ve been told it took two years before the proponents were told that they were receiving funding.”
Such concerns were discussed at the annual meeting of the five prairie municipal associations held Oct. 5 in Edmonton. It included representatives of RMA, Alberta Municipalities (ABmunis), SARM, Saskatchewan Urban Municipalities Association, and the Association of Manitoba Municipalities.
They are calling for the permanent doubling of the federal Canada Community Building Fund to promote strong and resilient communities by improving rural infrastructure.
“Municipalities need a seat at the table,” Cathy Heron, president of ABmunis, said in a joint statement.
“We are often required to share costs with the federal and provincial governments but lack a voice in negotiating infrastructure agreements. Our expertise, insights and priorities are vital to the process.”
Orb said other concerns include uncertainty about increases in funding for the RCMP. A collective bargaining agreement in 2021 resulted in retroactive pay hikes for the police force dating back to 2017.
Municipalities had no input during the bargaining process and now fear they could face increases of up to 22 percent, he said. He expected the individual bill for some counties in Alberta alone could be in the millions of dollars.
“We simply can’t afford that…. Are the feds going to take that increase on themselves or are they going to pass it on to us? Will it be in one year, or will it be split up? There’s really nothing on that, and that’s a big concern.”
Other issues include the impact of a voluntary federal target to reduce emissions from fertilizer by 30 percent by 2030, said Orb. Preliminary estimates indicate the cuts in fertilizer use that would be needed to meet the target could result in billion-dollar losses in agricultural productivity, he said.
“They say it’s voluntary, but we’re always suspicious that when things start off voluntary, there might be some strings attached later on, and that would be huge loss for the ag sector and for our GDP. Our prairie economy would be hurting because of that.”
