Broadband’s Have-Nots Test Biden Plan for Rural Internet Rollout

The Biden administration’s $2 trillion infrastructure plan includes $100 billion to extend broadband networks to all US households. But officials relying on industry data produced inaccurate maps of internet deployment. As a result, the US doesn’t know where to find everyone lacking service. “The biggest problem is false positives -- places shown as having broadband when they don’t,” said Michael Romano, senior vice president at NTCA - The Rural Broadband Association. “That frustrates financing and subsidies to places in need” because subsidy programs rule out places listed as already having service. Private investment has helped launch US cities and wealthy suburbs into a Netflix-binging, telecommuting lifestyle. Many rural areas with fewer potential customers have been left behind with poor connections, a shortcoming sharply felt as schools turned to online learning because of the coronavirus pandemic. The problem spans rich farmland, remote mountainous tracts, and isolated tribal lands -- and perhaps most galling, areas just beyond suburbs that are but a short drive from modern networks. Yet without accurate data and clear maps, officials are hard-pressed to discern precisely which areas are languishing.