Montreal’s future wifi network threatened by City (8)
Quebec-Tech had a story this week about Île sans fil’s problems within the Ville de Montréal administration. The non-profit organization, which had earlier this year a plan to blanket the city with free wifi coverage, is discovering endless layers of authorizations, officials and representatives, even though the initial plan was requested by the Ville de Montréal itself.
Daniel Drouet (yeah the same who does this), president of Ile sans fil, is asking the Montréalers who can to weigh in, and get the administration’s act together.
If I have a criticism to make, it’s that the non-profit organized rejoiced and announced too early the deal, putting unnecessary pressure (and hope) on the organization. I have also something against subventions and grants, since it skews a project’s financial figures, making it more vulnerable whenever a politician decides to make a few savings. However, having wide-city wifi coverage for Montreal is something that I’m looking for. The Internet has gone beyond the state of private needs to become a basic and necessary economic infrastructure for a country, in the same way as roads, electricity or running water. As such, the city has the responsability to ensure that Montrealers get a modern, complete and efficient coverage; and also see what’s already being done in other leading cities, such as Paris, Seoul or Taipei. And if there’s one organization that can make it happen, it’s Île sans fil, which now serves 75.000 users, accessing the highest number of hotspots than any other Canadian city, and which also inspired many other organizations such as, ogWifi, ZAP Québec, ZAP Sherbrooke, Montérégie sans-fil, Centre du Québe sans-fil and Wireless Toronto.
So if you know someone at Ville de Montreal, or know an elected representative, or if you can call directly the City, then make yourself heard. And I really hope the dramatic tone by the article’s author, saying that it would be a critical blow if the deal doesn’t go through, was just an overstatement and not an accurate illustration of the reality.
Update: Daniel Drouet has more details here
It would be sad if we lost it. It is something that set Montreal apart from other big cities in North America.
Dans un endroit quasi communiste, comme le Quebec, une bureaucratie sovietique n’est que normale.
Les fonctionnaires s’attendent a avoir des cadeaux! tout simplement!
La corruption commence quand le gouvernement dit non.
A la place de chercher de l’appuie politique, ISF a besoin d’argent pour donner des petits cadeaux a nos bons fonctionnaires.
hey bruno, un endroite communiste qui a une bureaucratie soviétique, je trouve les mots assez forts quand mêmes… même si j’ai connu aussi l’expérience (des délais interminables par exemple), il y a quand même certains services qui marchent très bien.
et aussi je serais le dernier à conseiller de donner des cadeaux aux politiciens. par contre, les personnes qui prennent les décisions à la Ville sont des personnes sensées comme tout le monde, donc ca prend de la discussion… et aussi de bons talents de conviction.
I agree; I don’t get the communist reference and the bribing references. Fact is, any bureaucracy, in any country, at whichever level of government, and no matter which ideologies prevail in the crafting of new laws and directions, functions as a machine where repetition and predictability are favoured; this means that initiatives and innovations at the lower levels of administration (permit issuance, impact studies, that sort of thing) are never favoured, and that mistakes tend to be punished. In a system like that, people tend to function by CYA rules. There’s red tape ? Sure. People don’t want to be caught making a mistake; praise, in any case, is rare. Play by their rules: understand the rules, help people out, advise when you can, follow as you must, look ahead, be wise, make it easy for things to move forward by reducing risk and getting rich communications going in the proper forms (e.g., written), treat people like human beings rather than mere service providers, and the whole machine will often enough move in your direction, yet at its own pace.
That is, provided that you really have support at the policy and upper advocacy levels.
I like Louis-Eric’s comment.
and for ISF: so work on upper advocacy levels
Its an ambitious plan so its bound to encounter some hiccoughs. I wish them the best of luck and will help in any way I can.
I’ve written a post that clarifies the situation over on the ISF blog.
Le problème est avec l’absence d’une instance municipale qui aurait l’autorité nécessaire pour imposer un projet comme Île sans fil.
Selon la structure actuelle, on doit consulter et traiter au cas par cas avec chaque propriétaire d’immeuble où on souhaite poser une antenne pour le réseau. Voyez-vous le problème énorme que ça pose?
Il n’y a pas de solution facile au problème, et ça demande une volonté incroyable de la part de la ville. Malheureusement, ce n’est pas une priorité pour beaucoup d’élus.
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