How tiny McKee, Kentucky, became a national innovator in fiber broadband internet

McKee (KY) is a small town that sits mostly within the Daniel Boone National Forest and is about a one-hour, 20-minute drive from Lexington (KY), the nearest big city. The town has just over 800 people, and the median household income is around $17,500, according to the U.S. Census. It's also one of the cities with the best broadband internet connections in the country. That's because the tiny town of McKee is the headquarters of the People's Rural Telephone Cooperative. And thanks to PRTC's vision ten years ago to start laying fiber wireless broadband, every home and business in the city has had high-speed broadband fiber internet since 2014. With Congress just recently authorizing trillions for projects to help rural areas access better broadband internet through the Inflation Reduction Act, Infrastructure Investment and Jobs Act and the CHIPS and Science Act—and the state's "Kentucky Wired" project mired in controversy—the story of what PRTC achieved a decade ago seems that much more phenomenal. 

[Carli Pierson is a Voices/Opinion Editor at USA TODAY.]