Hillsboro Banner

By NEIL O. NELSON

Halstad Telephone first introduced its telephone networking, cable TV lineup and broadband Internet services to Hillsboro in 2000.

Nine years later, after successfully merging with the Hillsboro community, the Minnesota telephone company is ready to welcome its North Dakota neighbor into its cooperative family of shareholders.

The Halstad Telephone Company board of directors on March 18 voted to bring Hillsboro into the cooperative. Hillsboro exchange customers will officially become shareholders in January 2009.

“This is the right decision for Hillsboro and for the cooperative,” said HTC board president Chester Mauritson, of Shelly.

“Sharing in the risk and the reward of membership makes a cooperative what it is intended to be.”

Company officials, including general manager Ron Laqua, anticipated the day when HTC’s Hillsboro customers would become a part of the cooperative.

That day is now, said Laqua.

“This important step will give membership status to our Hillsboro customers and the benefit of a vote on matters of their company.”

Although most Hillsboro customers have known only the name Halstad Telephone Company, business in the city was actually conducted under Halstad Telephone’s wholly owned, non-cooperative subsidiary named HTC Services, Inc. With the addition of Hillsboro into the cooperative, Halstad Telephone Company will replace HTC Services as the formal and official provider of services in Hillsboro.

True to the theme and identity of cooperatives, members share company profits. Hillsboro customers can expect to receive their first capital credit checks in June 2010.

Hillsboro will be given a voice on HTC’s board of directors in January 2009. A Hillsboro representative will be appointed then. In June 2009, the entire HTC membership will vote on a Hillsboro representative to the board.

The nominating process begins in April 2009.

Halstad Telephone began providing business telephone systems in Hillsboro in the 1980s.

Hillsboro’s ties to HTC, however, date back more than 100 years.

“Halstad Telephone started its business in 1904 by first leasing and operating lines in Shelly from the Hillsboro, Duane, Caledonia and Shelly Telephone Company,” according to Laqua.

The first major investment in the Hillsboro community would follow some 90 years later, Laqua explains, “when we began providing the first commercial dial-up Internet service in Hillsboro.”

In 2000, HTC expanded its services in Hillsboro by offering telephone, TV and Internet services. The company later became the first to provide broadband wireless to rural Hillsboro.

The company continues to explore additional ways it can serve the entire Hillsboro exchange, rural as well as city, according to the HTC general manager.

“We are excited to enter this new phase. Hillsboro is another proud chapter for us. We welcome this historical event for our company and its membership by further strengthening the relationships we have fostered with our Hillsboro friends.”

With assets of $14.3 million, Halstad Telephone in 2006 reported a profit of $989,458, up from a profit of $498,917 in 2005.

HTC serves the communities of Halstad, Shelly, Fisher, Climax and Nielsville, in addition to Hillsboro.

Chester Maurtison, Shelly, is the company president. Steve Williams, Fisher, is vice president and Warren Olson, Halstad, secretary-treasurer. Other board members are Duane Evenson, Climax; Ron Gotteberg, Halstad; Elroy Hedde, Nielsville, and Kent Wavra, Brygland.

The company employees 14 full-time and four part-time.

Ron Laqua is the general manager of the rural telephone cooperative. Mark Forseth, Hillsboro, is the company’s office manager.