National Telecommunications and Information Administration

The Forest County Potawatomi Community of Wisconsin had been generating electricity to run its community center using solar panels for years—they just didn’t have an accurate way of tracking their energy usage. Thanks to an Internet for All grant from the National Telecommunications and Information Administration (NTIA), they now do. NTIA’s Tribal Broadband Connectivity Program (TBCP) awarded the Forest County Potawatomi Community $125,232 to provide reliable high-speed Internet service to the Tribe’s solar arrays.

Sen Dick Durbin (D-IL) visited Dominican University to discuss the $2.5 million in federal funding the university received through the National Telecommunications and Information Administration’s (NTIA) Connecting Minority Communities Pilot Program that has helped enhance information technology capabilities and close the digital divide for students. Sen Durbin visited one of seven classrooms that, thanks to a portion of the grant proceeds, received technological upgrades to support a hybrid of in-person and remote learning.

The digital divide isn’t just about access to broadband and computers and other hardware, it’s also about access to skills. Massive investments made through the bipartisan infrastructure law will send billions of dollars to states and localities across the U.S. over the next five years to help close the digital divide. This includes millions that will flow to Michigan through the Digital Equity Act and the Broadband Equity, Access, and Deployment (BEAD) program.

The digital divide isn’t just about access to broadband and computers and other hardware, it’s also about access to skills. Massive investments made through the bipartisan infrastructure law will send billions of dollars to states and localities across the US over the next five years to help close the digital divide. This includes $1.3 billion that is slated to flow to Georgia through the Digital Equity Act and the Broadband Equity, Access, and Deployment (BEAD) program.

The National Telecommunications and Information Administration (NTIA) recently finished approving digital equity plans for all 50 states, as well as Puerto Rico and Washington (DC) in what Administrator Alan Davidson called a “milestone moment.” The grants announced in the March 29 notice of funding opportunity can be used to begin implementation of those plans, which identify the barriers in each sta

The U.S. Virgin Islands' Next Generation Network (viNGN) released the draft U.S. Virgin Islands Digital Equity Plan (USVIDEP) for public comment. Being disconnected from a connected world is not new to the U.S. Virgin Islands.

The Department of Commerce’s National Telecommunications and Information Administration (NTIA) received more than 160 applications in funding requests totaling more than $2.64 billion for the second Notice of Funding Opportunity in the Tribal Broadband Connectivity Program.

Streamlining and accelerating the permitting process is critical to implementing the Internet for All initiative. Since the passage of President Biden’s Bipartisan Infrastructure Law that provided a historic $65 billion investment to expand affordable and reliable high-speed Internet access to everyone in America, we heard from stakeholders that permitting is a significant concern in implementing the program.

The National Telecommunications and Information Administration has now given 48 states the green light to start their required Broadband Equity, Access, and Deployment (BEAD) Program challenge process to refine the list of locations that will be eligible for BEAD funding. The starting point for the states is the Federal Communications Commission’s National Broadband Map, based on its Broadband Data Collection (BDC), with the state-run challenge process providing stakeholders the opportunity to make updates and corrections.

After Puerto Rico obtained a $127 million disbursement from the Federal Communications Commission (FCC) to bring fixed connectivity to 100% of Puerto Rico's households, $334 million was added from the Broadband Equity, Access, and Development (BEAD) program, which will be used mainly for telecommunications resiliency.