Sud Mennucci is a small town of 7,500 deep in the interior of São Paulo State. As recently as 2002, it had no Internet provider, and about 30 residents were paying hefty long-distance fees to dial in.
The city determined that Wi-Fi could be an economical situation for the city and its resident, because the local government could “open the doors and windows” to make the Internet signal from the town-hall provider available to the entire community. The city contacted Anatel, the national telecom regulator, to see whether it could make Wi-Fi access available without conflict with private interest.
“If it were 100% free, there would be no problem having a public municipal provider,” says Sud Mennucci Mayor Celso Junquiera, who inherited the project from his predecessor. “So we decided to fulfill the community’s needs because the costs to citizens was very high.”
The city took on the cost as well as the burden of deployment, facing numerous problems along the way. Antennas were positioned inadequately. Fast growth caused the system to block up. In 2003, the city had just 8 to 10 users on the network. By February 2005, the number jumped to 90 users. But new users coming online would bounce others off, and some users simply couldn’t get on the network. So the city waited to expand.
“Ten times we thought we would cancel the whole project,” said Mayor Junqueira. “People would say stop thisit's going to burn you politically. But we preferred to run the risk. We continued, and overcame obstacles at the time, and now for the past four months the system is stable, satisfaction is relatively high.
By June 2005, the city connected 230 public and private points, and today that number has grown to 600, “with 64K access at all times, and sometimes 128Kso the model is very satisfactory,” says the Mayor. The network offer public usage in four locations: Two IT laboratories in local schools, an IT lab in a state school, and the local library. Most of the community was not even linked to the network. Many users had no idea what a computer was, or how to run it, but that is changing.
“This is the model that will bring digital inclusion to all,” said the Mayor. “You have a technology that is economically feasible for the lower-class population. It can be done through the telecenters or at your home or business.”
Moreover, the mayor says the Internet is essential for democratization and mature civic participation, a way to make access to city services and information fairer, and to hold public servants (especially budget directors) accountable for their numbers.
“There are mechanisms to bring people closer and more involved, to give public administrations the transparency they need and the systems that eliminate corruption. It is not enough to render a service; it's important to know how satisfied or unsatisfied society is, to take values, principles, and cultural issues into account.”
The mayor says small cities must remain attractive to young people or they will leave and overcrowd big cities: “We have to allow people to keep hope for the future where they live. This is an objective of small cities, but that also serves the purposes of big cities.
Sud Mennucci Homepage: http://www.sudmennucci.sp.gov.br/wifi/index.php