What Does the Infrastructure Bill Mean for Anchor Institution Broadband?

Acknowledging that there’s no closing the digital divide without anchors, the Senate infrastructure bill's broadband component adopts a broad definition of “community anchor institution” that includes public housing authorities, healthcare providers, and other community support organizations – anchors that vulnerable populations depend upon the most. Yet when doling out the funding, the program relegates anchors to third priority, meaning that funds may be completely awarded to connect unserved and underserved households before any funding goes to anchor institution connectivity. The language suggests that awardees cannot connect anchors until after all the homes are served, which could be never. This siloed approach to funding ignores the network economics: Placing anchors and households on the same shared network helps to lower the costs for everyone. Also worthy of scrutiny are the Universal Service Fund provision – on which many anchor institutions depend – and the pot of money for middle-mile projects, which excludes direct connections to anchor institutions and therefore reduces the cost efficacy of these networks. On the positive side, anchor institutions are eligible to receive funding allocated to the Digital Equity Act because of the fabulous work they do to provide digital literacy training and set up wireless community networks. Here, the legislation specifically recognizes anchor institutions as invaluable partners for digital inclusion.

[John Windhausen is the Executive Director of the SHLB Coalition.]