By Taylor Boyd
A letter to members of the Patrick County Board of Supervisors was among the topics discussed at a recent meeting.
In the letter, the Rotary Club of Stuart requested supervisors to facilitate a presentation by RiverStreet Networks “in a facility with high quality internet where all citizens, via Zoom or another similar platform, will be able to adequately hear the details and have the option to ask and get answers to their questions” with optimal time.
The club also wrote that the presentation should be held sooner rather than later.
“Personally, I don’t have anything against that. I don’t know if we’re at the place to do that, but I did promise that I would bring this” up at the meeting, Clyde DeLoach, of the Blue Ridge District, said.
He noted RiverStreet would need time to schedule and prepare for the presentation.
Crystal Harris, chairman and of the Smith River District, said she took exception the letter and to comments that suggest supervisors are not doing anything to further the broadband project.
“We have not taken a backseat to broadband, we are working diligently, and Mr. Bryce Simmons is a Rotary member. If they had questions, they certainly could have gotten the answers from him because he is the point-man for broadband,” Harris said.
Noting that supervisor meetings are open to the public, Harris also added that Clayton Kendrick serves as the board’s liaison to the broadband committee.
Kendrick provided a broadband update at a meeting last month, Harris said, and added that there also are things that cannot be shared with the public at this time.
“Had it not been for Mrs. Hazelwood (county administrator) and Mr. Black (county attorney) we wouldn’t have been as far because the letters (from the committee members) that were written had infuriated the landowner. (Hazelwood and Black) had to go and do a lot of negotiation to get it that far,” Harris said.
“We’re not sitting here on our thumbs doing nothing. I did take exception” to the letter, “and I said I would go and speak to Rotary on that subject to let them know that we are working, and we have been working,” Harris said.
Noting that she also invested her own money in the project, in addition to the money the county allocated for the projects, Harris said, “we all have put money in it (and) we’ve put time. We’ve served.”
Harris said she has worked to further broadband for about 20 years, and went to D.C. with Jonathan Large, who spoke before Congress on the matter.
“Maybe they’ve all forgotten. Maybe they just moved here and don’t know what we’ve done. It did get stalled, but we have worked on” broadband for a while, she said.
Harris said she does not object to a presentation or update on the matter, “because I’d certainly tell them that we are working hard. We’ve never put it on the back burner, and we aren’t sitting on our behinds doing nothing,” she said.
Harris said the board had not previously received a request for a presentation.
“They come to us. The tourism, the planning commission, all of them have committees too. We owe them as equal time as what we owe the broadband committee and the Rotarians,” she said.
The board did not set a date for the proposed presentation.
In other matters, the board:
*Appointed Jane Carlson to the Piedmont Community Services Board of Directors.
*Appointed Jennie Clark to the Tourism Advisory Council (TAC).
*Approved a resolution for the Patrick County Mobile Healthcare Unit grant.