Bill Expanding Broadband Into Rural Areas Passes State Senate

Wednesday, February 16th, 2022 -- 12:01 PM

(Raymond Neupert, WRN) A bill that would help spread fiber broadband into rural areas passed the State Senate on Tuesday.

Bill author Senator Howard Marklein says the Broadband Expansion Grant Program needs more guidance to get into low population areas. "We're getting to the point where some of the low hanging fruit has been served. Easy rural subdivisions and that kind of thing have gotten the grants but the challenge now is finding funding for some of those harder to get areas and this bill would take a step in the right direction."

Senator Marklein says he wants to make sure that they're not stepping on plans from the U-S-D-A for rural broadband. "A lot of federal money coming in, 2.5 billion dollars of federal money coming into the states for broadband and we want to make sure that we aren't duplicating state resources and top of federal and that's one of the goals."

The bill now heads to the State Assembly for approval.

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