What
is the purpose of the Hamilton CommunityNet?
Please read our Mission Statement.
What happened to the FreeNet?
The Hamilton-Wentworth FreeNet ceased to exist sometime around
early 1997. When we began to offer graphical Internet access, it
was necessary to aquire membership fees to offset the cost of the
equipment and it's maintenance. Thus, we were no longer free.
If you're the Hamilton CommunityNet,
what does the HWCN mean?
HWCN stands for Hamilton-Wentworth Community Network, which is
our registered business name. When the city of Hamilton amalgamated
in January 2001, we unoffically dropped the Wentworth from our name
to become the Hamilton Community Network, or the Hamilton CommunityNet.
The URL for our site remained www.hwcn.org simply as a matter of
ease for our current members.
If you are not-for-profit, why
do you charge fees?
A non-profit organization charges fees to offset
operational costs. We do not make money off of our members, services
are provided on a cost-recovery basis. Any excess
revenues earned from member fees are directed into specialized
programmes, such as Project Access and Child Connect, to enable
internet access for disadvantaged children in the community.
Why are you located in the
Eva Rothwell Centre?
The Eva Rothwell Centre is a new community hub, located in
the Keith neighborhood of Hamilton, with a Job Bank, Policing Services
Center, many programs for youth, and strong connections to the community.
This environment is perfectly suited to our mandate of enabling community
access to the internet. We look forward to developing new programs and
partnerships. Also, as a not-for-profit organization, HWCN needed to
insure that member fees were spent wisely, and we were able to obtain an
exceptional cost-based lease with the Centre, much cheaper than any other
location available.
Why did you move out
of the library?
After many years of receiving the generous donation of free
office space from the Hamilton Public Library, the library decided it was
time to renovate their facilities, and our office space had to move. For a
brief time we thought that we might be relocated within the library
building, but a library must serve many different community needs, and
when the library evaluated the many possible uses for its limited space,
it came to the decision that there were needs more pressing than ours.
HWCN is forever grateful for the precious gift of their support, which
allowed us to grow into the strong, self-sustaining organization we are
today.
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