Helena, Becoming a Smart City

Project Scope

Key Points (Quick Scan)

• Objective: Provide free public downtown Wi-Fi to support tourism, events, and community use.
• Stakeholders: City leadership and community partners across government, education, business, and nonprofits.
• Constraints: Fixed deadline (Oct 1), mounting approvals, and historical/visual requirements for antenna placement.
• Architecture: Microwave internet backhaul across the Mississippi River with secured, controlled-access equipment locations.
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• Helena-West Helena, Arkansas, and Elaine, Arkansas, wanted to enhance tourism and support festivals in the downtown area by making the city a “Smart City.” This chapter of the enhancement was to install WIFI downtown and make it openly available and free to all users.
• Stakeholders were the Helena City Council, the Mayor’s Office, Helena Historical Society, Main Street Helena, Phillips County Chamber of Commerce, County Judge Clark Hall, KIPP Delta Schools, Partners Bank, King Biscuit Society, Uplink LLC, and the Delta Cultural Center.
• The project started and needed to be completed by October 01 of the same year. Locations of antennas had to be approved because of mounting locations on towers, stadiums, and commercial buildings. Because of historical requirements, some antennas had to be painted the same color as the mounted area.
• The internet is designed to be microwaved across the Mississippi River from Clarksdale, Mississippi, across this River to a radio tower in Helena, Arkansas. All internet equipment had to be installed securely in a lockable building accessible to only approved personnel. Access was assigned to the fire department, police department, Uplink personnel, and myself. Additional keys were given to the mayor’s office.

My Assignment

Key Points (Quick Scan)

• Commissioned by Mayor: Built and presented the Smart City Wi-Fi plan for downtown public access.
• Vendor selection: Led due diligence and chose UpLink LLC for capability, responsiveness, and support.
• Execution leadership: Managed approvals, schedule, risks, and stakeholder communications (POM + distribution list).
• Governance: Defined access control and operational expectations for ongoing city/vendor support.
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• I was commissioned by the mayor of Helena-West Helena, Arkansas, Mayor Kevin Smith, to present a WIFI plan to make the city a “Smart City”. The purpose of this plan was to provide free public WIFI in the downtown area for tourists, visitors, conventions, civic groups, schools, and festivals. The benefit result was to enhance tourist traffic, support business growth, and provide internet capability to any user downtown.
• After much due-diligence, the vendor chosen was UpLink, LLC from Clarksdale, Miss. They were chosen because of local recommendations, modern equipment used, training, support availability, and able to response quickly to any service needs.
• Vendor coordination and deployment was succeeded by following the installation timeline and getting all mounting locations approved months ahead of schedule.
• [Stakeholder management: city officials, community partners, providers, installers.]
• Communication to all stakeholders was managed by creating a Project Operation Manual containing the email addresses, cell phone numbers, business phone numbers, and business addresses. This POM also included specific information/identification about each stakeholder. To enhance communication processes, an email distribution list of all stakeholders was also created. UpLink engineers installed and configured all equipment at the designated and approved locations.
• For Helena, the project started in June and needed to be completed by October 01 of the same year. Risks were to design the method of routing the internet, locations of all antennas, permissions/approvals from all stakeholders, installation challenges, inventory, vendor availability, and labor required. Weekly updating the project status was required by all stakeholders. Some stakeholders were updated daily and in an emergency, immediately. Funding to all parts and labor was restricted to under $5000 for the entire project.

Outcomes & Results

Key Wins (Quick Scan)

• Under budget: Delivered for $3,500 vs $5,000 cap (saved $1,500).
• Ahead of schedule: Completed handoff by the second week of September (~2 weeks early).
• Public impact: Enabled free downtown Wi-Fi supporting major events (e.g., annual festival with 10,000+ visitors).
• Operational continuity: City-owned equipment with vendor monitoring/maintenance and defined access control.
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• WIFI dish equipment and antennas were mounted, per stakeholder approval, on radio towers, pavilions, schools, and banks along Cherry Street in downtown Helena. All antennas faced street level. Total billing from UpLink was $3500 which saved the city $1500 of the $5000 approved. Completed installation, testing, and handoff was completed by the second week of September, 2 weeks ahead of schedule.
• At handoff, the city was then able to advertise as a “Smart City” and able to supply free WIFI to all users in the downtown area. It now supports the annual “Blues Festival” which brings over 10,000 visitors, some international, into the Helena downtown area celebrating and enjoying “Blues” music. All services are managed by UpLink LLC from Clarksdale, Mississippi. With approval from the Mayor, I designed the flyers and posters announcing the “Free WIFI” and connection instructions.
• Equipment is owned by the city of Helena, managed by the Mayor’s office but maintained and monitored by UpLink LLC. Along with UpLink, I am able to monitor the useability of all the equipment.

Visuals

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