Wairoa Wi-Fi network mooted

Wairoa Mayor Craig Little

Wairoa District Council wants to build a town-wide ratepayer-funded Wi-Fi network, which it says could save residents millions of dollars a year in internet and phone charges.

The proposal is included in the council's Draft Long Term Plan through to 2025 and will be discussed at a public meeting in the town today.

It would involve the council borrowing $900,000 to set up a town-wide Wi-Fi network with access to the internet through 150 hot-spots set up on street light poles. The $270,000 annual cost of running the network would be met through an increase in rates, with the average urban ratepayer facing a $22 per month increase, or $264 a year.

But the council says the network would enable residents to quit their existing telecommunications providers, collectively saving the town's 1990 households between $2.3 million and $6 million - depending on how many made the switch.

"This is not a user-pays system and these costs will fall on urban ratepayers," the council says in its Long Term Plan consultation document.

"This project requires this group of ratepayers to be connected to the Wi-Fi service much in the same way as they are to other utilities like sewage and water. Urban ratepayers can choose to remain with their current internet services providers, however, a Wairoa Wi-Fi rate will still be charged."

The council says the expected $22 monthly cost the average urban ratepayer would pay for the service compares to an average of $99 residents are currently paying for phone and internet services delivered to the home over what used to be Telecom's copper wire network.

Wairoa Mayor Craig Little said yesterday the council had put the proposal up as a "visionary plan" and was seeking feedback on the idea through the Long term Plan consultation process.

"Some people are paying more than $100 a month [for phone and internet services] and if they can get it for a few dollars a month it's got to be a good thing," he said. "But obviously if the community comes back and says we don't want this then we'll have to listen."I nitial, informal feedback to the idea had been positive but the proposal would be discussed in a more formal way at a Long Term Plan public consultation meeting at the town's Gaiety Theatre starting at 5.30pm today. A second LTP meeting will be held at Mahia Beach's Mokotahi Hall next Monday at 6pm.

Wairoa already provides a free Wi-Fi service in the town's central business district.