Dufferin might be hardpressed to complete its rural broadband project for all un-served areas prior to next year, according to a report by IT manager Jason Hall.

The first phase of the project was planned to bring coverage to 80 per cent of all such areas, and the second phase the remaining 20 per cent.

However, because of "hills and low-lying areas not receiving the signal at qualities acceptable to provide high speed Internet," the first phase achieved only 65 per cent.

Now, with better than a third of the areas still not covered, and with the second round of provincial funding open for applications, neither of the two service providers — Bell Alliant and Everus Communication — appears ready to proceed with the rest of the project.

Mr. Hall will report in more detail to the council tonight, but it appears the two providers will be asking the county not to make application for funding until February 2009.

He says Bell Alliant is "about to go through a reorganization which is fueling speculation that they may not have the resources to act on a new project so quickly after the first round."

And Everus is still "rolling out customers onto their network in Dufferin (and) would rather see (the county) apply for a later application so that their resources can focus on the present project."

He says one of three things could happen: The current vendors would not have the resources to complete the infrastructure for the new round of funding; they could build out only a small area, missing those that need service; or the county and the vendors could complete the project in its entirety.

Mr. Hall will recommend an all-or-nothing approach in his report to the council tonight.

"If the County of Dufferin is successful in getting only a smaller portion of funding to complete a less than desirable area it is felt that a third round of financing would be difficult to obtain."

As the deadline for this round of funding from the Ontario Ministry of Agriculture is Sept. 18, he will ask the council to allow staff to proceed with the best solution — and that might be to wait a bit so that virtually everyone may be served.