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Jason Smith, Smart Rural Communities

Posted on by Pat Melgares

Logo, Smart Rural CommunityIt is one thing to be a rural community. It’s another to be a Smart Rural Community.

The designation — “Smart Rural Community” — was created by a national association to recognize rural telecommunication companies that are providing superior broadband service in their areas. And many of those are found in Kansas.

Last week we met Jason Smith, general manager and CEO of Rainbow Communications in Everest, Kansas. In 2015, Rainbow Communications was one of 10 rural telecomm companies across the nation to earn the Smart Rural Communities Showcase Award.

The award is presented to those rural telecommunications companies that demonstrate superior broadband service in the regions they serve. The Smart Rural Communities designation has now been broadened to include any community that is served by a telecomm company that meets certain high standards.

This is a project of NTCA, the national rural broadband association. NTCA works on behalf of more than 850 small independent businesses and cooperatives that provide broadband service in rural communities. These businesses cover approximately one-third of the nation’s land mass.

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Jason Smith, Rainbow Communications

Posted on by Pat Melgares
Portrait of man smiling at camera, Jason Smith
Jason Smith, Rainbow Communications

“Somewhere over the rainbow….”

That line from the song in The Wizard of Oz makes me think of Dorothy and her desire to return to Kansas. It also makes me think of modern Kansans who are using the wizardry of modern telecommunications to help their home state.

Jason Smith is general manager and CEO of Rainbow Communications in Everest, Kansas. He grew up in Everest and graduated from Horton High School.

“I figured I was never coming back,” Smith said. He went to K-State and became the first in his family to go to college. He was undecided what to pursue for a career.

“I knew about the jobs of the farmer and the banker, but this was during the farm crisis of the 1980s and neither of those was any fun,” Smith said. He had friends who were majoring in agricultural economics, so he joined them and got a degree in agribusiness.

Smith took a position with a John Deere dealer. He also met and married his wife, who is a teacher. They would have four children. The oldest now is an engineer and a K-State graduate. They have a daughter studying pre-physical therapy, a son in high school, and an eighth-grade daughter.

Smith’s hometown happened to be the headquarters of the Rainbow Telephone Cooperative Association (later known as Rainbow Communications). In 1998, the company advertised for its first-ever marketing manager. Smith applied for the job.

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