Broadband Equity, Access, and Deployment (BEAD) Program

North Carolina’s rural population is larger than that of any other state except Texas. More than 4 million people live in rural North Carolina. Over the last 10 years, the population of 18- to 64-year-olds living in these areas has been decreasing, and the population of adults 65 and older is steadily increasing. In addition to these demographic changes, rural North Carolina communities face challenges related to workforce development, capital access, infrastructure, health, land use, and environment and community preservation.

Thousands of rural Coloradans could be one step closer to gaining access to high-speed internet thanks to federal funding for broadband expansion throughout the country.

The Appalachian Regional Commission awarded $6.3 million through its new Appalachian Regional Initiative for Stronger Economies (ARISE) funding opportunity to Connect Humanity for a project that will help 50 underserved communities in every subregion of Appalachia plan for broadband access and growth. Working with local

As the January 13 deadline looms for states to challenge the current Federal Communications Commission broadband coverage map, many states are asking for more time. I'm starting to wonder, however, whether more time is actually all that important. The FCC process is NOT building a location-level map of actual delivered broadband speeds, but rather a map of the performance that providers say they can deliver if a customer requests it. So let's try to put all of this together and see what it means. For me, a few key takeaways stand out (All of this is not to say that state efforts to understa

An audit of the Oregon Broadband Office by Secretary of State Shemia Fagan (D-OR) found the office will likely be prepared to receive and facilitate upcoming federal infrastructure grant awards.

I’ve seen folks around the country suggesting that state broadband offices ought to put a priority on sustainability when selecting winners of broadband grant funding. It’s a concept that has instant appeal, but I immediately asked myself what it means. How do you measure sustainability in a way that can be used to score grant requests? The first test of sustainability is the expected life of the assets being constructed. Another test of any internet service provider (ISP) on sustainability is the financial ability and willingness to replace those electronics.

There's a wave of jobs that will result from $1.2 trillion in direct government spending from the 2021 Infrastructure Investment and Jobs Act.

It is unfortunate timing that the new Federal Communications Commission broadband map was issued in the middle of the process of trying to determine the Broadband Equity, Access, and Deployment (BEAD) grant funding. Congress said that the amount of funding that will go to each state must be based upon the FCC map – and the first draft is clearly flawed. However, assuming that that grant funding question gets resolved somehow, there remains the bigger issue of whether the new FCC map will ever accurately portray broadband availability.

Sens. Catherine Cortez Masto (D-NM) and Jacky Rosen (D-NM) sent a letter to the Federal Communications Commission asking the body to reconsider maps drafted for the Silver State's broadband Internet connectivity, calling the drafts "deeply flawed" and warning that such maps could perpetuate the digital divide among the state's urban and rural areas.

In November 2021, President Joe Biden (D) signed the Infrastructure Investment and Jobs Act (IIJA) into law.