Shawano County, Bertram partner for internet grant

Shawano County will team up with Bertram Communication LLC to hopefully provide underground fiber internet service to several thousand homes and businesses in the county.

With support from the county board, Bertram will submit an application for grant funding from the Wisconsin Public Service Commission (PSC).

Shawano County recognizes internet access as an essential utility for modern life and economic development for residents and businesses, according to Matt Hietpas, the county’s technology services director. However, due to budget limitations, it has been difficult to attract internet service providers without grant funding.

“This project aligns with Shawano County’s goals to expand and enhance connectivity of fiber-to-the-premises broadband access to all residents and businesses and supports Shawano County’s choice to partner with Bertram Communications to serve their municipality with broadband access,” Hietpas wrote in a letter to the PSC.

The national Bipartisan Infrastructure Law allocated $42 billion under the Broadband Equity, Access and Deployment (BEAD) Program for broadband infrastructure deployment. Wisconsin was awarded $1.056 billion for broadband infrastructure that will produce high-quality, reliable, affordable internet in unserved and underserved households and businesses.

There are 4,777 broadband serviceable locations spread across Shawano County that are eligible for BEAD funding.

It is expected grants will be awarded in 2025, but Hietpas said completing the project will take about five years because of the number of projects that will be funded across the state all at the same time.

Bertram’s proposal was recommended by the county’s BEAD Committee and the county board’s executive committee.

Four providers were interviewed.

“We felt Bertram fit us best,” Hietpas said about the BEAD Committee’s recommendation.

Bertram Communications has partnered with the county in the past. It has also previously been awarded grant funding to increase internet connectivity in rural areas that had very poor connectivity.

Most recently, they completed a project that brought fiber optic internet to 1,000 customers in Baileys Harbor in Door County and nearly as many in Oconto County.

“We have a buried fiber network that by the end of November, they will have 980 customers near Mountain,” said Sarah Lawrenz, strategic partnerships manager with Bertram Communications.

The company, headquartered in Random Lake in Sheboygan County, has 30 locations in Wisconsin, including one in Shawano.

Bertram’s family of companies includes Powercode, a software company they created for their own data management.

“We didn’t really plan on selling it, but we do,” owner Jim Bertram said.

Today, that software can be found across the world in places like Australia, Italy, Africa and Canada. Thousands of ISPs use it as their back end system.

“We built that,” Bertram said. “We run that right out of Random Lake. We have our network, but we also run thousands of networks around the world.”

Bertram also builds its own hardware in Wisconsin, and products are used by NASA and the History Channel’s “Ice Road Truckers.”

Specific details for the Shawano County project were presented in closed session per PSC regulations, said Peter Thillman, Shawano County Economic Progress Inc. chief economic development officer. Proprietary information was shared during that time.

kpasson@newmedia-wi.com