Consolidated Slated for Broadband Buildout in NH Community with Funding From Novel State Program

Consolidated Communications’ latest public-private broadband partnership news is a bit different from some of the other public-private partnerships we’ve seen since federal legislators began making funding available for broadband buildouts during the COVID pandemic. The deal, pending completion of a challenge process, involves the town of Francestown, New Hampshire and funding from the state’s Broadband Matching Grant Initiative (BMGI). That program provides matching funds for projects that otherwise would be too costly for the network operator to undertake. The BMGI program was funded through the federal Capital Projects Fund, which was established in the American Rescue Plan Act (ARPA). New Hampshire is using $26 million, representing 21 percent of its CPF allocation, for the BMGI program. Consolidated expects to provide approximately 39 percent of the funding to support the fiber buildout in Francestown. In addition to creating the CPF, the American Rescue Plan Act provided funding to individual towns and counties that could be used for a range of infrastructure projects, including broadband. Some towns and counties have used that money to cover some of the costs of broadband deployments.