Local/Municipal

Mayor Muriel Bowser (D-DC) announced the U.S. Treasury Department has awarded $61.3 million from the American Rescue Plan Act’s (ARPA) Capital Projects Fund to support the construction of community facilities across the District of Columbia.

McKee (KY) is a small town that sits mostly within the Daniel Boone National Forest and is about a one-hour, 20-minute drive from Lexington (KY), the nearest big city.

The Infrastructure Investment and Jobs Act is making billions of dollars available to expand broadband networks throughout rural America—and with these networks, access to all the opportunities and advantages internet service allows.  Billions of dollars for broadband construction also means billions of dollars in construction projects seeking approval from local permitting offices. Reviewing these projects will be no small task, especially in rural areas where local governments have limited resources.

The town of McKee (KY), population 800, was ahead of the curve. The federal government is currently implementing the $42.45 billion Broadband Equity, Access, and Deployment (BEAD) Program, with the goal of connecting every home to high-speed internet by 2030. In McKee, the nonprofit Peoples Rural Telephone Cooperative already did that—a decade ago. PRTC has about 55 employees and is based in Jackson County, where McKee is the county seat. PRTC borrowed $45 million from the federal government—in part from the American Recovery and Reinvestment Act, a Great Recession-era stimulus bill.

The pandemic’s forced switch to remote instruction unlocked federal funding for K-12 schools, as the government made a temporary $190 billion jab available in the hopes that it would inoculate against the effects of COVID-19 on teaching and learning.

Communities looking to leverage American Rescue Plan Act (ARPA) funding for broadband or other local infrastructure need to act soon or risk losing access to a once-in-a-generation funding resource. Most ARPA recipients seem well aware of the deadline, but data suggests more than a few communities could drop the ball. The Treasury Department tracks allotted ARPA awards and projected budget plans via a massive database.

Democratic mayors from major U.S. cities discussed the critical need to maintain affordable internet access for their constituents to mitigate impacts of the federal Affordable Connectivity Program’s expiration. The mayors outlined strategies to bridge the gap left by the program’s end during a discussion hosted by the Democratic Mayors Association at the Democratic National Convention.

Will a big flurry of Broadband Equity, Access, and Deployment (BEAD) grants encounter any big bottlenecks that will slow down the implementation of grant construction? My response is yes, but maybe not the bottlenecks most people expect. I expect some of the following:

Downtown Lexington’s (KY) Gatton Park on the Town Branch will have free public Wi-Fi provided by fiber-internet provider Kinetic in a nearly $1 million, multi-year deal to be the park’s exclusive Wi-Fi provider. Kinetic will install and sustain Wi-Fi gateways (modems/routers) throughout the park enablin

Using our devices comes naturally for those who grew up with technology, or who have had the opportunity to adapt to it over the years. But for those new to it, navigating the digital world can be a confusing muddle. As broadband access and broadband coverage is more available throughout North Carolina, the digital knowledge gap becomes increasingly evident.