Don’t limit high-speed broadband to big cities

[Commentary] Internet service providers are stepping up their game, building the infrastructure necessary to provide high-speed Internet services in communities across the country. This is great, especially for big cities that have the incentives (read: population) needed to encourage private providers to upgrade broadband networks and provide customers with an essential utility of the 21st century. But it doesn’t work out so well for rural towns and small communities. Because of population size and infrastructure limitations, many residents are subjected to slow, out-of-date services or are left without access to commercial providers altogether.

With high-speed broadband playing a larger and larger role in growing a community’s economy and improving its residents’ ways of life, this is neither acceptable nor fair. The Federal Communications Commission is about to help rural towns and small communities reach their full potential by letting their residents have the choice of access to high-speed, affordable broadband. This is a welcome step. But there is more to be done. As a senator representing seven rural counties and a resident of a small community myself, I am speaking out for all of those who are being held hostage to 20th-century technology. Let us grow our economies, improve our governments’ performance and create jobs for our communities. Let us have Internet choice(s).

[Republican State Sen Janice Bowling represents the 16th District of Tennessee in the General Assembly]