Digital Divide

When former librarian and author Jean Armour Polly first introduced the idea of having computers in libraries in the early 1980s, she was met with pushback. "People scoffed and said, 'Why would you go to a library to use a computer?'" she said. Even when the internet rolled around, many librarians felt they were supposed to be the sole gatekeepers of knowledge and information. "But I just knew it would be a wonderful thing. You know, school kids could use [computers] in schools, but what about the lifelong learners? And adults and seniors?" Polly said.

We’ve heard the National Telecommunications and Information Administration (NTIA) say 2024 is “the year of execution” for the $42.5 billion Broadband Equity, Access and Deployment (BEAD) program. NTIA Administrator Alan Davidson revealed how the agency is juggling BEAD along with its initiatives focused on digital equity and artificial intelligence (AI) risks. When Davidson first took the helm at NTIA, plenty of states didn’t even have broadband offices.

Lieutenant Governor Garlin Gilchrist II (D-MI) and the Michigan High-Speed Internet Office (MIHI) announced that the Biden Administration has approved Michigan’s proposed State Challenge Process, which will give Michiganders an opportunity to help identify locations across the state that are eligible for high-speed internet infrastructure expansion through the Broadband Equity, Access, and Deployment (BEAD) program.

Most of the concern over the impending demise of the Affordable Connectivity Program (ACP)—the federal subsidy that’s made broadband cheaper or free for more than 23 million households—has focused on the people about to have a new hole drilled in their monthly budgets. Attendees at a DC conference hosted by an association of smaller telecom firms feel their pain: “Half of our problem in this nation is not accessibility, it's affordability,” said ACA Connects President and CEO Patricia Jo Boyers, at the group’s 

A look at how Historically Black Colleges and Universities (HBCUs) are using Connecting Minority Communities Pilot Program funding to impact the students, faculty, staff, and residents in the communities that they serve. According to a 2021 report by McKinsey & Company, 82% of HBCUs are located in broadband deserts. The National Telecommunications and Information Administration’s funding for minority communities intends to elevate community partners and work toward closing deep-rooted digital divides.

Best practice methods for assessing affordability developed and endorsed by academic and government affordability experts can provide much greater precision in assessing need thereby enabling more informed and more targeted digital equity interventions. However, recent experience in Washington state has revealed that few of us in the digital equity realm are yet comfortable applying these methods, or, indeed, are even aware of them.

We stand at a crossroad in the landscape of communications and digital equity. As we navigate the complexities of the 21st century, one thing has remained unchanged—our commitment to ensuring that every American, regardless of where you live or how much you make, has access to reliable, affordable, and high-speed Internet.

States and the federal government may agree that the expansion of broadband service around the country funded with $42.5 billion from the infrastructure act should be affordable for low-income people. But at least one state doesn’t agree that it should be dictating what’s affordable. After reviewing Virginia’s plan for its Broadband Equity, Access and Deployment funding, the National Telecommunications and Information Administration told the state it needed to be more specific.

America’s Communications Association (ACA Connects), the Rural Broadband Association (NTCA), and the Wireless Internet Service Providers Association (WISPA) issued a joint statement to the Federal Communications Commission urging it to exclude smaller and rural broadband providers from its new digital discrimination rules, citing a lack of evidence they engage in discrimination where they build and calling into question the FCC’s legal authority to impose the rules. The organizations argued that the 

The Federal Communications Commission is poised to raise taxes through its Universal Service Fund—a regressive, hidden tax on consumers' phone bills that funds a series of unaccountable, bloated internet subsidy programs. Rather than giving the FCC carte blanche to expand its balance sheet, Congress must reform the USF's structural problems, reevaluate its component programs, and get the FCC's spending under control. Here is my plan to do that.