Level of Government

According to Dr. Karen Mossberger—a professor in the school of public affairs and director of the Center on Technology, Data and Society at Arizona State University—prosperity and income increases correlate with the number of broadband subscriptions in an area, whether it’s rural, urban, or suburban, across all demographics. Further still, “Broadband is important for participation in society,” said Mossberger. “It’s important for economic development as well as individual opportunities.

The US Department of the Treasury approved over $90 million for broadband projects in the state of Vermont under the American Rescue Plan’s (ARPA) Capital Projects Fund (CPF). Vermont will use its funding to connect nearly 14,000 homes and businesses to affordable, high-speed internet. The funding advances the Biden-Harris Administration’s commitment to connecting every American household to affordable, reliable high-speed internet. The 13,818 households and businesses represent 22% of locations still lacking high-speed internet access.

After President Joe Biden called on all agencies to reduce or eliminate hidden fees in September 2022, the Consumer Financial Protection Bureau (CFPB) took action to effectively eliminate billions in banking fees. Fees account for tens of billions of dollars in revenue – a substantial source of revenue in many industries, including transportation, banking, internet, and hospitality.  The CFPB's actions work in tandem with other initiatives

It's been one year since President Biden nominated Gigi Sohn [Senior Fellow and Public Advocate at the Benton Institute for Broadband & Society] to the Federal Communications Commission. Since then, the FCC has remained deadlocked 2–2 as Sohn has faced an underhanded campaign by deep-pocketed phone, cable, and broadcast companies seeking to hamstring the agency that oversees their businesses. No other nominee in the FCC’s history has had to wait so long for a confirmation vote in the Senate. 

At the height of the coronavirus pandemic, Congress chartered a first-of-its-kind federal effort to help struggling Americans who could not afford to lose access to the internet. The aid proved to be a godsend for millions of low-income families, but it also sent the nation’s telecommunications giants scrambling for the new federal money—unleashing price hikes, service cuts, and fraud risks that hurt customers and taxpayers alike. The story of the government’s roughly $17 billion efforts to close the country’s persistent digital divide is one of great promise and costly peril.

Shreveport (LA) Mayor Adrian Perkins made good on another part of his smart city initiative that he campaigned on four years ago. Mayor Perkins joined library officials and others to launch the start of Universal Digital Access. Mayor Perkins says that by using hi-tech gadgets mounted on the garbage trucks, the city mapped out areas of the city that don't have good internet access. "Many of the libraries are actually within that digital desert.

The Broadband Equity Access and Deployment (BEAD) program has $42.5 billion available to cover some of the costs of bringing broadband to unserved and underserved rural areas. States will administer the program but must first have a plan approved by the National Telecommunications and Information Administration (NTIA) and, as new research from BroadbandNow shows, some states face an important hurdle as they prepare their plans—a hurdle that involves anti-municipal broadband laws.

Broadband internet access and speeds will increase for homes and businesses in and around Madelia, Minnesota thanks to a collaboration by the companies Midco, Crystal Valley Cooperative, and Land O’Lakes. Land O’Lakes and Crystal Valley helped Midco in finding locations to place infrastructure. Rather than laying a lot of new fiber lines to homes and far-flung farm sites, the project uses a system of towers and antennas to get high-bandwidth signals to customers. “The Madelia project is a bit unique, it is a hub site,” said Ben Dold senior VP of operations for Midco.

In 2020, the Federal Communications Commission committed to providing Starlink, a satellite internet network operating in 40 countries by Elon Musk’s SpaceX, with $885.5 million to expand broadband in unserved rural areas of the United States. But in August 2022, the FCC announced with almost no explanation that Starlink would receive nothing.

The Federal Communications Commission's Wireless Telecommunications Bureau granted six 900 MHz broadband segment licenses to PDV Spectrum Holding Company, a wholly owned subsidiary of Anterix. Anterix is the largest holder of 900 MHz spectrum nationwide and has been courting utilities, which are interested in the spectrum for private LTE as they look to modernize and future-proof critical power grid infrastructure. The licenses are in Vernon County, St Clair, Barton, Jackson, and Jackson counties (MO) and Jackson County (KS).