FCC Commissioner makes a visit to Mississippi Gulf Coast Community College

FCC Commissioner Brendan Carr made a visit to Harrison County this morning.

Mississippi Public Service Commission and Mississippi Gulf Coast Community College teamed up to welcome Commissioner Carr.

The main focus of the visit to the Coast was to talk about the expansion of 5G, broadband internet expansion, and the need for tower technicians.

The FCC completed its funding round, funding Mississippi with $500 million to bring high speed internet to 200,000 locations that did not have a reliable internet source before.

FCC Commissioner Carr, MILLERCO Operations Manager Jordyn Ladner, and Mississippi Public Service Chairman Dane Maxwell tell News 25 partnering with community colleges will help fill the need for tower technicians.  Carr said, “Right now we can double the number of tower technicians in this country. We can hire about 20,000 new workers almost overnight and these are really good paying jobs, you can make a lot of money right off the bat. So, we are looking at community colleges as an easy pipeline into this industry and then it is a career from there.”

Ladner said, “So it is really hard to hire someone off the street and expect them to go climb a tower and be able to work. Having a vocational program set up means we are going to get quality trained workers when they come out of the program which takes a lot of pressure and money off of the company because we are not having to spend time training these people when they might not work out.”

Maxwell said, “We have such good community colleges and to put them together to put everybody together and build a curriculum and do an apprentice program and get them trained and get them out.”

Carr was also able to tour the area and look at the progress that has been made here in South Mississippi.