Are anchor institutions the forgotten piece of BEAD?

As state leaders forge proposals for Broadband, Equity, Access and Deployment (BEAD) funding, local stakeholders are imploring them not to forget about the role of community anchor institutions (CAI). CAIs are rooted entities such as hospitals, schools, universities, and government agencies that drive economic growth and social welfare in their communities. “If you're building out to those unserved homes, and there are anchor institutions, you might as well connect the anchors while you're there,” said John Windhausen, founder and executive director of the Schools, Health & Libraries Broadband (SHLB) Coalition. The coalition got involved while Congress created the Infrastructure Investment and Jobs Act (IIJA) a couple of years ago, resulting in anchor institutions being referenced 29 times in the legislation. Windhausen said the legislation “strongly encourages” the National Telecommunications and Information Administration (NTIA) and the states to provide funding for anchor institutions to bring them up to at least gigabit speed. “But now we're in this kind of tricky, difficult world of implementation,” he added. While SHLB thinks that using CAIs as a “jumping off point” for broadband expansion makes economic sense, state broadband offices and other stakeholders will have to be “a little bit more creative in how [they] look at that legislative BEAD language.” For part of their BEAD proposal, states must define what they consider a CAI. If a state’s definition deviates from the NTIA’s definition, they must justify any changes. Under the NTIA’s rules, CAIs can be funded through BEAD, but states must prove they have enough funds for their unserved and unserved populations first and foremost. Although, states “don't have to burn through [their] unserved money, and burn through your underserved money and then serve CAIs,” Judson Cary, Colorado’s assistant attorney general of broadband, explained–“Your plan just has to show yeah, I have the money to do it, and then you can start building to CAIs immediately.”