“We specialize in serving the areas that our competitors mostly do not,” said Jeff Dale, president and owner/operator of Country WiFi, during a phone interview June 15.

Dale described the Hammond-based outfit as almost a “virtual company” with a postal address in the village but whose employees work either from home or out in the field. Country WiFi’s focus is on wireless service for the rural areas of the City of Clarence-Rockland.

Country WiFi is in its fourth year of operation and provides high-speed fixed wireless Internet (WiFi) to 250 clients in rural Clarence-Rockland through direct line-of-sight transmission from the company’s cell towers to home antenna setups. Clients receive high-speed WiFi service with 30 Megabytes-per-second download speed and five Mgps upload speed.

Now the company wants to expand its operation with a pilot project for Clarence Creek. But it needs a site to set up a cell tower first.

The plan is to install a cell tower on the site where the village water tower used to be. The company will be making a presentation to Clarence-Rockland council for permission to set up its cell tower on the municipal lot.

If permission is granted, the company expects to offer high-speed WiFi service to at least 60 homes during the first phase of the project. Future expansion of the project could see service become available to more than 300 homes in the village and surrounding area.