Heartland Forward has created a multi-year, multi-pronged initiative, Connecting the Heartland, that includes a new workshop series to bring together decision-makers and influencers from the Beltway with the problem-solvers and doers in the Heartland who are working to expand high-speed internet access. April 19 was the first workshop, co-hosted by the National Urban League and Land O’Lakes, where we spoke with Federal Communications Commission Acting Chair Jessica Rosenworcel about the new Emergency Broadband Benefit (EBB) program intended to help struggling households afford high-speed internet service at home in the wake of the pandemic. It was also here where we began discussing what it will take to get to a long-term solution. Takeaways:

• The EBB funding program is an important step in the right direction, but the program’s success will depend on planning and coordination among state and local stakeholders.
• Achieving success for this short-term program is critical for helping to shape the long-term solution in our country. So, it is imperative that those involved take note of lessons learned, seek out best-practices and share them – with other states, and with federal policy makers.
• It will take creativity and true grassroots, person-to-person, outreach to get eligible families connected and set up to access essential virtual services and opportunities. 

California is urging a federal appeals court to leave in place a state net neutrality law that broadly prohibits broadband carriers from blocking or throttling traffic and from charging higher fees for prioritized delivery. “Congress has not established a federal regulatory regime that bars the states from taking steps to safeguard access to something as essential as the Internet,” California Attorney General Rob Bonta argues in papers filed with the 9th Circuit Court of Appeals. “The California legislature determined that net neutrality is vital to protecting public health, safety, and welfare in the state,” AG Bonta adds. “Nothing in federal law prevents California from exercising its traditional police powers in this manner.”

Broadband providers are seeking to block California's law argue that internet access is “inherently interstate,” and therefore not subject to state laws. The broadband industry also argues California's law conflicts with the FCC's decision to deregulate the internet by revoking the Obama-era rules. But California's attorney general counters that the Federal Communications Commission's 2018 deregulatory move effectively stripped the agency of authority over internet access. When the FCC revoked the Obama-era rules, the agency reclassified broadband access as an “information” service -- and information services aren't subject to the same kinds of common-carrier regulation as utility services. California's law “does not conflict with the 2018 Order, which was premised on the FCC’s lack of authority to promulgate federal net neutrality conduct rules,” the state argues. “Because the FCC lacks this authority, it cannot prevent the states from enacting their own net neutrality requirements,” California's attorney general writes. “In the absence of statutory authority, it is irrelevant that the FCC’s reclassification and repeal decisions were motivated in part by its preference for deregulation.”

Starlink is still in beta phase, but Ookla decided to use data from Speedtest Intelligence to investigate Q1 2021 performance in the US and Canada to see if the program is living up to expectations. In the US  during Q1 2021, median download speeds from Starlink ranged from 40.36 Mbps in Columbia County, Oregon to 93.09 Mbps in Shasta County, California. These represented everything from a dramatic improvement over other fixed broadband providers (545.6% faster in Tehama County, California) to a disappointment (67.9% slower in Clay County, Missouri). Starlink’s Q1 2021 median download speeds in Canadian provinces showed a smaller range than in the US with a low of 53.61 Mbps in Ontario and a high of 80.57 Mbps in Saskatchewan. Percentage difference when compared to all other fixed broadband providers also showed a narrower range. In Saskatchewan and Manitoba, Starlink customers reported median download speeds 59.6% and 38.5% faster than those for all other fixed broadband providers combined. In Québec, median download speeds were nearly equal, with Starlink performing only 3.4% slower. In BC, Alberta, Ontario and New Brunswick, on the other hand, Starlink’s median download speeds were 20.9%, 24.2%, 29.5% and 40.7% slower than other fixed broadband providers, respectively. Starlink latency is up to 486% higher in US, 369% in Canada.