MONTANA MAGAZINE

MAY/JUNE 1997

Libby Online

Linking with the World

BY CHRISTIE KEHN

sCULPTOR RON ADAMSON HAD JUST FINISHED ANOTHER STAGE OF NEGOTIATIONS WITH A SHEIK FROM THE United Arab Emirates. Presumably, this Arab sheik neither knew nor cared that Adamson is displaced mill worker living in northwest Montana. What matters to both is the art, and the communication link that unites them. In short, the Internet.

Nestled in the timber of Kootenai River country, the town of Libby has found its window to the world. An innovative community effort brought local Internet access to the region two and a half years ago. In the face of Lincoln County's poor economic news—downsizing of one lumber mill, closure of another mill and two mines—the Internet technology has yielded tangible benefits and a new sense of hope. Libby's move onto the information superhighway can serve as a model for other rural towns in Montana.

The volunteer Lincoln County Technology Group (LCTG) was started early in 1994 by three key players: orthopedic surgeon Randy Sechrest, county librarian Greta Chapman, and retired veterinarian Tony Pajas. "With the area losing much of its traditional blue collar base," said Sechrest, "we realized the potential of developing a telecommuting industry. We have a beautiful setting, but lack jobs.

"We could try to bring in a corporation that employs a hundred people in light industry," he continued. "But [this way] if you give a hundred skilled workers the ability to be independent consultants from their homes and to market products to a global audience ... it's still a hundred jobs."

Our Mission: To Fill The Local Pothole
On The Information SuperHighWay!

Lincoln County's Home Page logo on the
Internet

Early on, the community bought into the idea, grasping both the marketing component and the broad applicability that information services has to a geographically isolated region. "In this rural setting where travel often demands more time and money than is feasible," added Chapman, "it is a tremendous asset to be online, using computer networks to discuss problems and to trade documents with others in your profession or your field of interest."

When the local phone company changed hands during those formative months, Libby townspeople let their voices be heard in the Public Service Commission meetings. Utility line upgrades were essential, they insisted. Bob Rowe of Montana's Public Service Commission considers Libby a model of community involvement: "They were, and still are, very effective in keeping the phone company engaged and communicating high expectations. They had a clear sense of where they wanted to be."

That sense of direction has already yielded impressive returns for a very minimal financial investment. Madelin Pajas expressed, "Our motto became, 'How can we accomplish this with what we have to work with?"' With that in mind, LCTG built a closet for the Internet hardware in the basement of the Lincoln County Library. Having no commercial provider, they capitalized on Tony Pajas' free labor and unending devotion to the project and installed the Internet node themselves. They approached each goal in stages, used all volunteer labor, and leveraged an established rapport between librarian Chapman and the Lincoln County commissioners. Deputy County Clerk Bill Bischoff's hard work resulted in $50,000 in capital investment from the county, money that required no property tax hikes.

By October 1994, the basic Internet service called KooteNet was up and running for the Libby area. Four months later, 120 paying subscribers provided sufficient revenue for the project to extend its reach to Troy and Eureka, thus realizing the goal of local access for the entire county. The initial traveling laptop demonstrations by Randy Sechrest, which had given many people their first glimpse of communicating around the world via e-mail or web site, gave way to new training classes held within the county libraries.

In March 1996, Art Stiles, director of the Lincoln County Economic Development Council, estimated that the total impact of the Internet on Lincoln County was roughly $3.6 million. That's enough to cause Montana's other rural communities to sit up and take notice.

Some of KooteNet’s "movers & shakers." Left to right: Greta Chapman, Tony Pajas, Bill Bischoff,Randy Sechrest, Larry Dolezal

Unique Marketing Tool

Over 650 KooteNet subscribers to date have found the Internet an exciting asset to rural life. The World Wide Web enabled Ron Adamson to turn part-time sculpting into a full time viable career. "Two years ago," said the former millworker, "I didn't have a clue about the Internet and figured I was too old to learn." But he embraced the technology when he learned how easily he could access people around the world. To date, Adamson's top individual sale through the Internet is $ 10,000, and e-mail negotiations have taken him around the globe.

Likewise, Mike Canavan of Treasure Mountain Outfitters finds his Internet advertising far more cost-effective than any other type. He receives thirty to forty inquiries from the Net for every one inquiry from another source.

Volunteers built a closet in the library to house their
Intenet hardware

The global marketplace is a reality to Einard Mattila, whose Snowshoe Ski Haus Web page received inquiries from Russia and Australia, and to Marion Hayden, who found new distributors in Israel for her multi-level marketing product.

Not everyone has enjoyed "Pollyanna" experiences marketing through the Web. With a mixture of enthusiasm and naivete, Russ Baney of Eureka offered free jerky samples through his Baney Meats web site. Requests began at a moderate six to eight per day. When Baney's site was inadvertently linked to a site boasting a compilation of free items, the requests exploded to one every three minutes. At mailing costs of $2 per sample, Baney quickly tempered his on-line benevolence.

Connecting To The World

Libby gains from its ability to access information the world over. As a community, residents also reap the benefits of others finding them. Libby, Troy, and Eureka school systems have all come online and are using the Net as a potent tool to explore the world about them. Libby's Plummer Elementary was the first elementary school in the state with a Web site, and students have electronic pen-pals around the world. Last year, fourth graders conversed with Eileen Sverdrup, M.D., a Libby native serving with the Antarctic Support Association in conjunction with star mapping being done at the Amundson-Scott South Pole Station.

It's a good model for all of Montana to imitate

Software giant Novell was so impressed with the community's effort and the Lincoln County Web site that it made a large donation of Novell's WordPerfect software for use in the Lincoln County schools—software that would otherwise have been unaffordable to the schools.

New Mexico cardiologist Jon Johnson discovered Libby through the Net. A thorough reading of the Lincoln County Web site convinced him that the Libby community was just right for him and his family. Phone calls and a resume followed, and within months he had joined the Libby Clinic staff.

With an Internet node on site, Libby's Lincoln County Library is the region's Internet hub. Tourists may use guest accounts to retrieve their e-mail from home. New-user classes fill evening hours, and the twelve public work stations in the three county libraries experience a constant hum of activity. This expansion has not been without growing pains: a never-ending barrage of questions directed at both the library staff and systems administrator Tony Pajas highlights the public's ongoing need for technical support. And, as the number of customers grew, so did the need for a larger capacity utility line. Libby finally received a digital phone switch in April 1996. The larger-capacity band width went online March 1, 1997. With upwards of eight percent of Lincoln County households online, increased capacity has translated into speed and satisfaction online.

Networking Model

Libby's approach of installing a server node within the community may prove too difficult for many small towns if there is limited local expertise available. Sechrest advised, "Remote communities desiring local Internet access will find more success partnering with a local service provider near them, trying to facilitate a low-tech solution that requires little maintenance."

Regardless of the provider arrangement, local Internet access is a goal worth pursuing for rural communities. "In the Libby [Internet] experience," noted Governor Marc Racicot, "people came together to articulate need. Then they proceeded unselfishly, transcending their differences and including the smaller communities around them. That's a good model for all of Montana to imitate."

That's networking at its best.

CHRISTIE KEHN is a freelance writer and
KooteNet volunteer from Libby.

~~End of Article~~

Many thanks to the kind folks at Montana Magazine who worked with us and shared our story.

Update to KooteNet's Story: [ as of end of May, 1998 ]

KooteNet currently has approximately 1300 households on line - approaching 16 % of the Lincoln County population. KooteNet replaced all dial-up analog modems and converted to the newer Access Server 56K technology in October and now offers 56K connectivity for dialup users. Along with these improvements, many additional dial-in lines were added to the system; individual phone lines were replaced with T1 connectivity from KooteNet to the central switch in Libby.  Our special thanks to the great folks at InterBel and Citizens for expediting these improvements. 

In other news, we continue to work with both U.S. Senator's offices and the PSC to identify an appropriate granting agency to apply for money to establish a wireless network in Libby. This will begin a process of developing an alternative to fixed line technology for connection to KooteNet by the schools, the hospital, and possibly businesses who need high bandwidth connections to the Internet.

Rapid growth in the number of KooteNet users has surpassed our expectations — allowing us to lower subscription prices for individual accounts— a move similar to the price reduction for commercial web advertising accounts that took place on April 1st. This is a good example of what can happen when public and private partnerships work well and the overall good of the many is the central focus of an enterprise.

For more about the Project, explore these links:
KooteNet's Impact on Lincoln County,
KooteNet's Photo Album
or more facts in the Project's Historical Archive