Senator Tina Smith Pushes for Broadband Access

(KNSI) – Minnesota Senator Tina Smith is pushing to build out broadband internet access across the state.

Smith co-sponsored a bill to direct the U.S. Department of Agriculture’s Reconnect loan and grant program to focus support to the most rural areas of the country.

Smith tells KNSI that 170,000 Minnesota families do not have adequate internet service. “One thing I think we have learned from the pandemic is that broadband is the basic infrastructure of the 21st century. If you’re not connected, you can’t really do anything.”

The USDA Reconnect loan and grant program was funded by President Biden’s Infrastructure and Jobs act. The program provides loans and grants to fund the equipment needed to provide broadband service to rural areas. The law requires that 50% of the households served by a Reconnect grant must be in a rural area.

Smith’s bill would raise the requirement to 80%, along with other changes. “My bill will work with local providers in rural communities. That might be your local Electric Co-Op or telecom that knows best how to get that expansion done in the community but they need that partnership with the federal government to get that last mile laid and those areas that are the hardest to reach.”

Smith says the pandemic showed how vital internet access has become. “I have heard stories of families parking their car outside of a McDonald’s in order to get broadband so that their students could do their homework. Sometimes we had situations where families might have had, (decent) Wi-Fi but not great. You might have had a parent who was trying to do their work remotely and then to students that were also trying to dial into a classroom and it just didn’t work.”

The bill is co-sponsored by Senators Tina Smith, John Thune, Roger Wicker, and Bob Casey.

___