Trending
ST. CLAIRSVILLE - Ohio GIG has been reaching out to the public as its project to bring fiber internet to Belmont County moves forward.
For two of the chief movers behind the project, providing better, faster communications to underserved areas is a mission that hits close to home.
Tim Berelsman has roots in the Buckeye State, having grown up in Fort Jennings, Ohio. From an early age, his career parallels the revolution in communications brought by fiber.
"My mom was office manager of a local telephone company and my dad was president of the board, and that's when phone lines were switching from party lines to private lines, so I spent a lot of my weekends riding around plowing in copper cable with my father," he said. "At the same time my eldest brother, he worked for the telephone company. He was doing service installs, and he went into electrical engineering and I kind of followed in his footsteps years later."
One moment that stands out for Berelsman was watching a presentation his brother, David, gave during his brother's senior year at DeVry University.
"Talking about how this one little piece of fiber was going to replace this 2,800 pair copper cable, and that just kind of stuck with me. I knew that was where I wanted to go. That was my dream," he said.
Having seen the early potential of fiber, Berelsman would pursue a career in manufacturing. He would eventually meet the Hunter family, which is spearheading and backing the plan to bring fiber networks to Eastern Ohio as they have to the west in Warren County.
Berelsman said the advantages of fiber over dialing in were evident.
"In around 2000, dial-up had kind of peaked," he said.
He became the CEO of a consortium of telephone companies in May 2001. He saw the speed and application of fiber.
"It didn't take long for those operators to realize spending money on copper was not in their best interest if they wanted to be around for the long haul," Berelsman said. "If we wanted to do what was right for the community and put some long-lasting infrastructure in, we needed to move to fiber, and we needed to move to it early. That's what we did in our areas, and sold the customers on it. We were deploying a more expensive technology, but we were there for the long haul. ... We were willing to sell competitively against our copper and cable modem competitors.
"With the vision of ... building fiber 'between the islands,' which was to connect all those independents into one large fiber network around Northwest Ohio," he said. "I was CEO for 18 years."
He recalled laying 435 miles of fiber network initially, then grew it an additional 640 miles from 2010-2014 and leased even more.
"I was used to operating that network and supporting small, independent service providers," he said. "We've been doing fiber to the home since 2004."
In 2016 Berelsman consulted with the Hunter family, who wanted to build fiber around their farmland. They eventually went into business together in 2019 and were serving their first customers in 2020.
"We have over 400 customers on the backlog sheets, over 350 active today, and we continue to grow that area," Berelsman said.
They would then look for other places with similar needs.
"We knew that Belmont County was trying to solve their broadband problem," he said. "Belmont County looked a lot like the area we were building. A little bit more rock. The family agreed to make the investment to do the startup.
"We're off and running at Belmont County. We’ve built a little over 4 miles at this point, past over 200 homes. We've struck an arrangement with the Belmont College," he said.
Point of presence sites will be installed there and at a Barnesville location.
"We're looking to have the first residential customers up and running in the March/April timeframe."
Another significant player in bringing fiber to the area is Jerrod Pantier, who will serve as general manager for Belmont County. He joined them in 2021. He has relocated from Salt Lake City, Utah, to St. Clairsville.
Born in Laramie, Wyoming, he started work in 1997 building long-haul fiber across the country from Utah to Oregon. Pantier said the demand for fiber was on the increase and he had no shortage of work. He worked as a director at Utopia Fiber, planning the phased installation of fiber in desired areas. He would work in other companies including Fujitsu Network Communications, where he also met the Hunter family.
He saw the lack of internet in his area and the need to bring this service to others.
"I love what I do, and to be able to do it and help other people, it makes my day," he said.
Pantier has committed to Belmont County and has found himself in a Brady Bunch scenario while moving here.
"I was raising five boys by myself for six-and-a-half years," he said. "This last year, in May, I sold my house and in October I bought a house in St. Clairsville. ... I got married to Joanne Hammer, who also had five kids, so between us we have 10 ranging from 31 to 9. Nine boys, one girl."
He quickly fell in love with Belmont County.
"From a rural perspective, being from Wyoming ... it's beautiful down there. You've got open spaces, trees. You don't have the big mountains that I'm used to, but you still have the Appalacians there," he said. "The people are great people - everyone I've met, from neighbors to school districts."
Belmont County residents wishing to participate can register their address at belmontcountygig.com.