Electric co-ops, USF, and rural broadband

At the Connected Oklahoma – Rural Broadband Summit in Oklahoma City, I shared my thoughts on the future of the Universal Service Fund (USF) and Low Earth Orbit satellites. Here's the homework I asked the audience to do:

1. Reach out to your anchor institutions and see how you might partner together.
2. If you are an electric co-op, reach out to an NTCA member to see how you might create some scope and scale and what you can do better together.
3. If you’re a policymaker, dig deeper to understand how the USF impacts your consumers' rates and deployment plans and plan to join our fight for the preservation and future of the program.
4. If you are a Smart Rural Community (SRC) provider, engage your community more on the ownership they should take for the successes you help power in the community and fully utilize that platform. For those who aren’t SRC providers, it’s important to still find ways to tell your story. Storytelling is among our most powerful tools, and it’s important to stop being modest about the work you are doing.

[Shirley Bloomfield is chief executive officer of NTCA–The Rural Broadband Association]