Holly Pond to keep public Wi-Fi at town parks

HOLLY POND — Holly Pond residents who’ve been taking advantage of the town’s access to free wireless internet can look forward to the amenity becoming a permanent feature at both of Holly pond’s public parks.

What started out as a short-term way to give socially-distanced school students a hand will continue through the rest of 2021, thanks to a new agreement the Holly Pond Town Council struck this week with a local provider.

After discussing whether to discontinue the service due to costs at its last meeting, the council reached a new agreement with provider JTM Wireless, a locally-owned and operated provider based at Holly Pond. Under the new deal, the town will be able to keep the internet flowing at both parks for $50 per month.

That’s a bargain compared with the $130 per month the town had been paying since first initiating the service last spring. But, as JTM co-owner Jason Mercer told the council, “We want to help the community out, so we came to this agreement of $50 per month…And I assure you, the money we get from that is going to go back into the community.”

Mayor Carla Hart said the previous council administration had started the service at the outbreak of the COVID-19 pandemic as a way to help secure a point of connectivity for students whose classes had moved online. The agreement also was made before the previous deal expired, meaning no interruptions in internet access at either park.

“The internet access has never been turned off, but we just needed to go ahead and make this decision before we reached that point,” she explained. “We did it originally because, when the kids were turned out of school, we felt they could come here to the library, or to the park, to do their work if they didn’t have access at home.”

The wireless internet is available at Lions Club Park, which lies adjacent to the Guy Hunt Library & Museum, as well as at Governor’s Park near the intersection of U.S. Highway 278 and Alabama Highway 91. At both locations, the service is available daily until 10 p.m.