There is an underreported threat looming if Congress doesn’t act soon: 21.5 million households in the U.S. could lose access to an affordable internet. The bipartisan Affordable Connectivity Program (ACP) provides monthly subsidies for low-income Americans to get online. And it’s been a great success: the ACP has now connected nearly 60 million Americans to broadband, many of whom have never previously had internet access at home. However, funds are expected to run out by April 2024, leaving those millions of Americans suddenly without affordable access or access at all. The ACP plays a pivotal role in local communities, and ending the program would set us back years in our effort to overcome the affordability gap — a barrier that accounts for two-thirds of our nation’s digital divide. As we continue to build out our networks with billions of dollars in funding from the bipartisan Infrastructure Law, we need to ensure that Americans can afford to access these networks, so our investment does not go to waste. That’s why I ask our Congress to act swiftly to appropriate funds for the ACP. It’s the responsible thing to do for Americans. 

[Chip Pickering is CEO of INCOMPAS, previously, he was a six-term congressman representing Mississippi’s Third District]

The Federal Communications Commission's new version of the National Broadband Map includes a dramatic decrease in the number of Unserved and Underserved locations. We now have 7.1 million unserved locations and 3.0 million underserved location. The total of 10.1 million locations is a decrease of 16% from the 11.9 million locations that were unserved and underserved six months earlier. As Chairwoman Rosenworcel said in a blog post, I’m sure we’re seeing some of the Rural Digital Opportunity Fund projects start to light up. But I also suspect we’re going to find Internet service providers cleaning up their coverage filings, making sure that everything they can serve is filed on the map. After all, soon one of these map versions is going to fund competitors for remaining unserved and underserved locations.

An estimated 475,000 households across Louisiana have never had high-speed, affordable, reliable internet. The state has been working at a "feverish pace" to change that. In all, Louisiana will receive nearly $2 billion for projects, including grants from the Federal Communications Commission, U.S. Treasury, and the National Telecommunications and Information Administration. The state has drawn from a number of sources to improve access. It used pandemic relief dollars from the American Rescue Plan to create the Granting Unserved Municipalities Broadband Opportunity (GUMBO) program, which offers grants to providers to subsidize the expansion of broadband to 80,000 homes, businesses, schools, and other locations. The state has also benefited from the federal Broadband Equity Access and Deployment (BEAD) program, another creation of the bipartisan infrastructure law. In total, Louisiana is expected to receive $1.35 billion from the BEAD program, the eighth-largest allocation in the country. 

Verizon is looking to install a high-speed, fiber-optic network on Cape Cod, focusing first on unspecified, underserved areas. Ellen Cummings, Verizon’s regional director of state and governmental affairs, made the announcement at a meeting hosted by the Cape Cod Technology Council. Cummings was asking for the council’s support in applying for a portion of millions in federal funds to help pay for the project. More specifically, about $145 million in grant money would be awarded in $20 million installments and would be administered by the Massachusetts Broadband Institute (MBI) and funded by the US Department of Treasury. The formal name of the project is the Broadband Infrastructure Gap Networks Grant Program. The project “aims to expand connectivity to unserved and underserved locations throughout the state to help bridge the digital divide, with a particular focus on communities with substantial low-income households and disadvantaged populations,” according to MBI’s website.

The Federal Communications Commission (FCC) is in the process of increasing the definition of broadband from today’s paltry 25/3 Megabits per second (Mbps) to 100/20 Mbps. This article looks at the FCC’s decision to consider 20 Mbps as the definition of upload. The 20 Mbps definition is a political compromise that has nothing to do with the broadband speeds that households and businesses need. Several of the big cable companies are currently implementing mid-split technology upgrades that I’ve seen reported as delivering from 100 Mbps to 300 Mbps upload speeds depending upon the local conditions in a cable company network. But cable companies will likely continue to fight to keep the 20 Mbps definition because they will not want to upgrade their networks in smaller and non-competitive markets. The FCC should consider a faster definition of broadband just because of the changes in technology. There is no reason to set a low definition of 20 Mbps upload that only rewards ISPs that want to stick with older technology.