COMMUNICATIONS

Why is this important?

Adequate communications are important for public safety, business and commerce, education, and government. Data services are rapidly moving to wireless technology and becoming faster. Today, more than ever, all aspects of everyday life are dependent on communications technology.

What is the measure?

Indicators for communications growth are the penetration of cable television and digital subscriber line (DSL) service and the number of towers/antennas identified and proposed for wireless technology.

How are we doing?

Telephone services for the county are provided by SBC and Frontier/Citizens Communications.

Comcast is the major franchise for cable television services, offering 34 regular cable channels, 110 digital channels, and 8 pay-per-view channels. Comcast currently provides “broadband” service in one direction only (video signals to the subscriber). It has approximately 52% penetration of the potential 21,500 connections (such as households, apartments, motel rooms, and businesses in its service area).

DSL is only available within approximately three cabled miles of the major service providers’ (Mother Lode Internet, Sonnet, Goldrush, and SBC) central offices in Sonora, Twain Harte, and Jamestown. About 12% of the subscribers in the service areas receive DSL.

Wireless services are provided by cellular and internet service providers (ISP’s). These providers use existing cell towers for their service and can also lease space on towers owned by others. The vast diversity of geography in the county presents challenges to these providers, because wireless technology is by line of sight to the antennae. Thirteen towers are located in the county; 45 antennas and 4 cell phone towers are proposed.

The dependency on this technology has dramatically increased in the last few years as the population demands more goods and services at their fingertips. However, the demand is not met by the current services.