By Lazaro Aleman
It seems that the long planned joint venture between local officials and CenturyLink to expand broadband service to remote areas of the county is pretty much off the table, if a recent board discussion is any indication.
On Thursday evening, May 20, Melissa Beaudry, a public affairs consultant with Langton Consulting in Jacksonville, held a Zoom meeting with Jefferson County commissioners on the status of the CenturyLink broadband project. Langton Consulting is on contract to the county to help it find grants and also with the use of the RESTORE Act funding from the 2010 BP oil spill disaster. Beaudry told the commissioners that she and County Attorney Scott Shirley had been meeting with representatives of CenturyLink over concerns that the latter continued to have with the contract, and more specifically with the federal funding.