Testimony of

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David E. Parkhill
General Manager

Hamilton County Telephone Cooperative

Dahlgren, Illinois

Member of the

National Rural Telecommunications Cooperative

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"The Digital Divide in Rural America"

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Before the Senate Committee

on

Agriculture, Nutrition and Forestry

February 3, 2000

I appreciate this opportunity to talk with you today about the digital divide in Rural America. My name is Dave Parkhill, and I am from Rural America. I am General Manager of the Hamilton County Telephone Cooperative ("HCTC") in Dahlgren, Illinois. HCTC is a member of the National Rural Telecommunications Cooperative ("NRTC"). NRTC is a not-for-profit cooperative association with a membership of nearly 1000 rural utilities (550 rural electric cooperatives and 279 telephone systems) located throughout 48 States. Like HCTC, NRTC's other Members provide electric or telephone service to underserved, low population density areas of the country.

Mr. Chairman, Dahlgren, Illinois is the second largest town in Hamilton County (second only to the thriving metropolis of McLeansboro). There are 500 people that live in Dahlgren. We have 2,400 subscribers to our telephone service, and we cover about 100 square miles and parts of 7 counties. That's a lot of land, and not a whole lot of people.

Our area of Illinois is agricultural. We grow corn, soybeans, wheat and other crops, and we raise cattle and hogs and other livestock. The average family income in our service territory is below the national average.

About 4 years ago, HCTC partnered with Midwest Internet to bring the first local Internet service to our community. Four years later, we are still the only local dial-up Internet service in our area. We have about 525 subscribers, each paying about $20 a month for Internet access.

Most of our subscribers are farmers using the Internet to get the vital information they need to conduct their businesses. They use it for pricing and ordering supplies and checking the weather. They use it to buy and to sell products and to keep an eye on grain and other commodities.

We have school kids that use our Internet access to study and to do homework and to learn. And their parents use it for the host of services that the Internet offers.

Without our Internet access service, Mr. Chairman, Dahlgren and the surrounding areas would have no local dial-up service. None. Not at any speed.

And as far as high speed access goes, it's simply cost prohibitive. We don't have enough people to justify the expense of providing it. If we offered ISDN service, we would have to charge maybe $200 a month to provide it. DSL service would be more than $100 a month. Our subscribers do not have the incomes necessary to support those kinds of charges.

I had a chance recently to review the Report issued last year by the National Telecommunications and Information Administration, entitled "Falling Through the Net: Defining the Digital Divide." Mr. Chairman, there is shocking information in that Report. And based on my experience as the only Internet Service Provider in Hamilton County, Illinois, it's true.

NTIA says that at almost every income level, households in rural areas are less likely to own computers than households in urban or central city areas. At every income level, households in rural areas are significantly less likely--sometimes half as likely--to have home Internet access than those in urban or central city areas. Black households in rural areas in particular are 1/3 less likely to own a computer than the average U.S. Black household, and are 2/5 less likely to access the Internet than the average U.S. Black household.

According to the NTIA Report, a "digital divide" exists among different geographic areas of the country. Even though the number of Americans accessing the Internet has grown rapidly in the last year, NTIA says that the "digital divide" between information "haves" and "have nots" continues to widen.

Mr. Chairman, NTIA is right. There is a digital divide, and Hamilton County and the rest of rural America is on the wrong side of it. That's a problem, and it's got to be fixed.

I'm sure there are many other hometowns that view this problem just as seriously as I do. And I'm sure that anything your Committee could do to help fix it would be deeply appreciated in Hamilton County and throughout rural America.

Thank you very much.

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