CUBA, N.Y. — Cuba, New York, is known for its stunning fall views, achievements in cheese and, unfortunately, its spotty internet service.
"It's a real challenge for the families that live out there," Tina Dalton said.
Dalton is the director of the Cuba Circulating Library, which serves the areas between Cuba and Rushford. The pandemic forced it to close for months, and access to free Wi-Fi in the building was also closed for residents. Some people were lucky enough to secure a parking spot along the road and borrow signal to conduct remote learning or work.
"Before the pandemic, we were very busy," Dalton said. "A lot of our programs have gone online now, and I know that's challenging for people who don't have the internet at home."
Dalton said the main strip of Cuba has Spectrum high-speed internet, but go about a mile in each direction and residents lose access to that.
"The school board estimates that about a third of families don't have the internet at home," Dalton said.
Dalton said she needed to get creative, and learned about the Microsoft Airband Initiative in the spring and applied for a grant that would expand the public Wi-Fi that the library offers.
"Now we're all working remotely, but we don't all have the internet access to support that so we have to get creative and how we do so," Dalton said.
General access to broadband and quality of access is a big part of this conversation, which is why Microsoft has committed to expanding rural broadband coverage. Rural areas such as Cuba are often already suffering from access issues.
"So you have the broadband connectivity gap, that's real in Allegany County," Vickie Robinson said.
Robinson is the General Manager of Microsoft's Airband Initiative. She oversees the projects in rural America that Microsoft is dedicating resources to in order to increase connectivity.
The data Microsoft has been collecting paints a different picture than what the New York State Broadband Office has routinely said, which is that 98% of the state is connected.
"If you think about New York overall, the number according to the FCC is that it's basically universal access, I think the number is 225,000, where our data says it's 9 million [not using the internet at broadband defined speeds]," Robinson said.
According to Microsoft's data, only 23.6% of Allegany County is able to use the do that. This is why a location like the Cuba Circulating Library is an ideal location for the tech giant to expand its Airband Initiative.
"Libraries have become our digital safety net," Robinson said. "Thinking about, you know, how can we step in to and meet this immediate need, it was a no brainer for us to say, let's see what we can do."
The public Wi-Fi the Cuba Library now offers can reach across the street to the parking lot. This ensures that those residents who are concerned about COVID-19 can safely work on remote learning, job applications or whatever else they need to.
According to Dalton, area residents are taking advantage of it.
"Its usage is way up," Dalton said. "It's doubled since what it was even before the pandemic, and say this time last year, it's much higher, so we're reaching a lot more people."
In the meantime, as NYS Broadband Program projects remain incomplete in this area, and the ones that were completed were satellite internet providers.