Mahoosuc Project will provide high-speed internet to 6,600 locations, addressing critical digital equity challenges in an area where more than 30% of households are considered “unserved” by high-speed internet.

After years of work and support from the Northern Forest Center and Community Concepts Finance Corporation, 15 western Maine communities are on track for a historic expansion of high-speed internet service.

The Northern Forest Center has secured funding for a year-long digital equity and inclusion program in Maine’s Oxford County.

Residents of the Maine West communities of Harrison and Bethel are benefiting from new public access Wi-Fi hotspots provided by Community Concepts Finance Corporation and the Northern Forest Center.

The Center and partners are offering free installation and maintenance of public access Wi-Fi hotspots in up to 10 towns, schools, libraries, or nonprofits in the Maine West region.

The select boards of five western Maine communities are teaming up to explore ways to improve rural broadband for all their residents.

High speed internet access is essential for building the New Forest Future, making rural communities viable and attractive places to live and work.

The Center worked with partners in Lancaster, NH, to ensure that students had internet access to learn from home when Covid-19 shut down schools in the spring of 2020.

In 2018-19, with grants from the Stephen and Tabitha King Foundation and the Maine Community Foundation, the Center improved public internet access in 11 libraries serving the Maine West area.

The Center and its partners in the Maine West coalition provided mobile hotspots to help students in Oxford Hills, Bethel, Rumford and the River Valley connect to online learning services.