Cornerstone Alliance Planning Public Wi-Fi Rollout Around Benton Harbor

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Benton Harbor will be getting free Wi-Fi throughout the community thanks to help from Cornerstone Alliance and the U.S. Department of Housing and Urban Development. City commissioners this week approved a Cornerstone plan to install Wi-Fi antennas using a HUD grant. Cornerstone’s Zachary Vaughn tells us this builds on a previous Wi-Fi rollout in the Arts District.

“We want to focus specifically on some of the more high trafficked areas of the community, some being city parks and some being areas within housing developments,” Vaughn said.

Vaughn says this project is still in the preliminary stage.

“We have a few areas for these sites, these nodes of public Wi-Fi installation to take place. We’re still working with a few entities throughout the community to make this happen.”

Cornerstone Alliance secured a $200,000 grant from HUD for the Wi-Fi. Vaughn says having readily available internet helps a community be prepared for economic development. The network will be available to the public and have basic security protocols in place. The city could see the Wi-Fi up and running in early 2023.