The juxtaposition of a story about New York state's failure to deliver broadband internet to the North Country and the story about the closure of Dannemora and Watertown prisons is insightful.
State prisons were added in the north country in the 1980s by the current governor's father and Republican Senator Ron Stafford as a rural economic development program.
Now with the prisons being closed as the inmate population plummets, the state and localities have to come up with a sensible and sustainable rural economic development plan(s). Broadband internet is essential to any such plan.
With the pandemic (and terrorism concerns before that), many people have been looking to get out of densely populated urban areas. The Adirondacks' stunning natural beauty is a great draw. But they're not going to move somewhere without access to high speed internet... even less so when they are working and their kids going to school from home.
