Cookeville Approved for Downtown WiFi Grant

Cookeville has been approved for funding to install free public WiFi in the downtown area.

Economic Development Coordinator Melinda Keifer said the city was awarded the Appalachian Regional Commission Grant to cover some of the project costs.

“We’ve put together a plan to put about 25 wired and wireless access points in the downtown area and we were successful in getting that grant,” Keifer said. “It’s a 50-50 grant so we’ll be doing half of that with City of Cookeville and half of it grant funds. We’re really excited, it’ll be good for the patrons and visitors of Downtown Cookeville.”

Keifer said the city has approximately one year to install the WiFi per grant requirements.

“Of course, none of the equipment’s purchased and we don’t have procurement done yet,” Keifer said. “It could take us a little bit to get all that in place. This is a federal contract, so obviously there’s a few more hoops we’ll be jumping through to go through those processes. It won’t be a quick turnaround but it won’t take long either.”

The total cost estimate for the project was approximately $52,000 with the grant covering $26,000.

Cookeville City Council will consider approving the grant funding during Thursday evening’s council meeting at 5:30 p.m.