Senator Hickey Review

Arkansas officials announced that the state is about to receive more than a billion dollars in federal funding for expanding broadband access throughout the state.

Before the end of the year, the state Broadband Office will submit a five-year plan with details of how we intend to spend the funds.

The Broadband Office is within the state Commerce Department, whose secretary called the federal grant “an economic game changer.”

In announcing the award of $1.024 billion, he reiterated what educators, economic development recruiters and public health officials in Arkansas have been saying: access to high speed Internet is not a luxury but a necessity for communities to prosper.

The governor praised the award, calling it “transformational.” It will allow Arkansas to close the digital divide between rural and urban areas, she said. It will level the playing field between isolated and urban areas, and unlock the economic potential for businesses, schools and ordinary people who live without Internet access, she said.

Officials in the Broadband Office said that a priority would be addressing the lack of Internet access in about 215,000 households and businesses across the state.

Also, some of the funding will pay for improvements at vital community centers, such as hospitals, libraries and schools. Some funding will be used to enhance training in digital skills among the workforce.

Expenditures from the broadband grant will go through the legislature’s review and appropriation process, according to the state Commerce Department’s announcement.

Under current Broadband Office guidelines and its Rural Connect Grant Program, the standard for high speed Internet is universal access with download speeds of 100 megabits per second and upload speeds of 20 Mbps.

Arkansas is one of 19 states that is due to get more than $1 billion for broadband access. Texas will receive the largest award of $3.3 billion. Nationwide, the federal Commerce Department is distributing $42.5 billion.

The federal agency within the Commerce Department that is distributing the funds is called the National Telecommunications and Information Administration. Its mission is similar to that of the Rural Electrification Administration, a federal agency that subsidized construction of transmission lines to bring power to farms across the country. In the early 1930s an estimated 90 percent of farms lacked electric power.

The cost of running power lines was too high for most rural residents. In a city, the electric utility would spread the cost of building a ten-mile power line among thousands of customers. However, in the country those same costs would be shouldered by just a few families. For that reason, government funding was essential for bringing electricity to Arkansas and rural America.

Water Projects

The state Natural Resources Commission approved $702 million in loans and grants for 122 water and waste water projects, which will benefit more than 1.2 million Arkansas residents. With some of the loans, the principle will be forgiven.

It is the largest single distribution of money for water and waste water projects in state history.