Vidalia — Vidalia was among several cities that lost an $80 million federal grant last week to provide broadband Internet to rural areas, but that’s not slowing down the city on the move.

The grant, which would have provided 900 miles of fiber optic cable to thousands of schools, libraries, health care centers and homes in 21 parishes across Louisiana, will be returned to the federal treasury, according to the U.S. Department of Commerce.

The department questioned whether Louisiana could accomplish its plan in the time allowed and whether changes made to the plans met the goals of the grant.

Vidalia Mayor Hyram Copeland said the city is looking at a $9 million grant through the United States Department of Agriculture’s broadband initiative programs.

“We’re deeply disappointed that the grant was rescinded,” Copeland said. “It would have been a tremendous asset to our area, but we’re still looking to make Vidalia a model city for these technologies.”

Vidalia City Manager Ken Walker said Vidalia was the only municipality in all 21 parishes that had a plan in place to utilize the broadband capabilities, which led the state to call on them to provide key data for the proposal.

“We sat down with the Division of Administration in Baton Rouge and detailed our plan of operations,” Walker said. “We were able to make the assumption that we are an average size city of those 21 parishes and with those numbers they used that to develop budgeted estimates of usage and cost, which was one of the elements missing from the state’s paperwork.”

Walker said he was very proud of Vidalia and Copeland for being ahead of the curve.

“I was extremely disappointed that the grant was lost, but this will not be something that cancels our plans as a city,” Walker said. “We have already come up with alternatives, but the problem is with the other communities in the regions that don’t have the staff or capabilities to overcome this.”

Commerce Department Assistant Secretary Lawrence Strickling said the original proposal promised great benefits to underserved areas, but the state failed to provide details when major modifications arose.

“We have worked closely with the state throughout the last several months to rescue this project, but have now concluded that we have to move on,” Strickling said. “After the state determined it was unable to implement the original project plan and fell significantly behind schedule, it proposed major modifications to its original proposal without adequate technical and financial details and a viable schedule for completing the project.”

Louisiana Gov. Bobby Jindal said in a statement that he was disappointed with the Obama administration for not reconsidering the rejection of the grant.

“This grant called for a heavy-handed approach from the federal government that would have undermined and taken over private businesses,” Jindal said. “We have an administration in Washington that wants to run car companies, banks, our entire health care system and now they want to take over the broadband business. We won’t stand for that in Louisiana.”

The grant was part of the federal stimulus legislation known as the American Recovery and Reinvestment act.